Most major cities across the U.S. are up in arms over the new smoking ban policies. Once contained to hospitals, libraries and public schools, the smoking bans are spreading everywhere, newly including nightclubs and bars. Bar and club owners think these policies will hurt their businesses, and fear that another “Big Brother” scandal is on the rise (Big Brother). On the contrary, many citizens believe that the effect the smoking bans may have on small businesses is nothing compared to the positive impact it will have on big cities as a whole and their inhabitants. Although, constitutional rights are in question for those who oppose the smoking bans. These people are wondering why the government should be allowed to tell them what they can and cannot put into their bodies. Also, If drinking in public is socially acceptable, what is wrong with smoking? People dedicated to a more aggressive smoking ban believe that secondhand smoke is the main problem with public smoking; smelly atmospheres and litter are common complaints as well. In order to get all these issues straightened out, smoking bans should be commonplace throughout municipalities in the U.S. This will greatly reduce the plight that many healthy citizens, scrambling to find their way out of the smoke, face every day.
It's understandable that smokers like to enjoy a cigarette in a restaurant or a bar. However the current barriers that often separate the smoking sections from the non-smoking sections are hardly appropriate. A thin wall, that doesn't even reach from the floor to the ceiling, constitutes the normal dividing line in most eating establishments. A yellow tint stains the wallpaper, as it slowly peels and chips in the corners from the intoxicating fumes. The odor of the smoke seeps into the upholstery, never to be washed out. It does not make for a warm environment, nor is it an inviting aspect of a family diner.
Along those lines, for most non-smokers there is never a time or a place where they want to be around smoke. So even though bars and nightclubs are not catering to a family crowd, they need to be aware of their other health conscious customers. Although many would say this comes with a price. A study done by the United Pro Choice Smokers Rights shows that taverns and nightclubs across the U.S. have been completed shut down due to the bans. If they were not completely shut down, they lost a significant amount of business, around a 40-60% reduction (Smokers). While certain establishments should worry about these smoking policies that could keep their customers away, they should also be reconsidering the caliber of their entertainment. If they cannot keep their old customers, they might have to draw in new ones. This is simply the nature of the food distribution industry. The business owners should be considering the health of their customers anyway. Smoking bans began due to the poor standards of separating smoking from non-smoking sections in food establishments. Even when people thought they were not being exposed to secondhand smoke, they actually were. Studies now show the dire consequences that secondhand smoke, even passing through an air purifier, can do to humans.
Secondhand smoke kills. This is hard to refute seeing that cancer rates and miscarriage percentages due to secondhand smoke are rising. MedlinePlus Epidemiology reports that women who smoke are twice as likely to miscarry, while women exposed to secondhand smoke are still 67% more likely to miscarry. This is because secondhand smoke is not passed through a filter. Out of the hundreds of carcinogenic chemicals that are contained in cigarettes, fifty of them are present in secondhand smoke, i.e. formaldehyde, nicotine, and carbon monoxide. These carcinogens become part of the DNA inside the human body and interfere with cell growth (Children) This causes cancer in men and women equally, and often contributes to the premature death of a fetus.
Other than the 3,000 lung cancer deaths every year caused by secondhand smoke (Children), other symptoms often occur in people who have inhaled a significant amount of this unfiltered smoke. Uncomfortable chest pain, pneumonia, bronchitis, and SIDS, Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, are common outcomes (Secondhand). One of my close friends could have had an older sibling. However, his mother worked in a bar during the early months of her pregnancy, before she was aware of her maternal status. She ended up having what she thought to be a healthy baby, until it died shortly after birth because of SIDS. The infant's brain stem did not mature fully, because of a lack of blood flow restricted by the nicotine in the unfiltered smoke. Nicotine is too strong of a stimulant for an infant to handle, and thus the secondhand smoke in the bar was deemed the cause for the infant's death. Secondhand smoke kills, often more frequently in people who have never lifted a cigarette to their lips.
This is rediculous. People were going to these places when they were smoking anyways.
What they should have done is restrict smoking in public places. I still see people sitting outside at restaurants, as well as walking down the street, with cigarettes in hand, and leaving a huge smoke cloud in my face.
This isn't so much a matter of smokers rights, as a matter of owners rights. The owners of these nightclubs and restaurants should have the right to allow people to smoke in their establishments. The next logical step is to ban people from smoking in their own homes.
#2 by Joe Aug 27, 2007
I'm sure that people all around America have already thought about this, but this smoking ban is eventually going to turn into another probation. And again people will continue to smoke. See you can stop people from smoking in their own home. Unless you want to go to extremes and put a special smoke detector designed especially for cigarette smoke in every home. That would just be crazy. And if they for some reason decided to do something like that, then people would just end up going into the woods somewhere, dig a pit and invite people to come. But I'm not pro-smoking. In fact the downside of just dropping the entire smoking ban, would be people coming in and arguing that other bans should be lifted. For example a bunch of hippies could come in a say that they should legally be allowed to smoke marijuana. After that there would be no end to it. You see a cigarette is a drug, or at least nicotine and tobacco are. And nicotine and tobacco and just as bad as marijuana. People will argue the fact that if nicotine and tobacco are legal, why isn't marijuana? What politicians have done with the smoking ban has just put them in a bad position. Because now they have only three choices. They can start a new probation and prohibit smoking in all states, they can drop the entire smoking ban, or they could try to do something else that will completely divert everyones attention away from smoking ban and on to something else.
What they should have done is restrict smoking in public places. I still see people sitting outside at restaurants, as well as walking down the street, with cigarettes in hand, and leaving a huge smoke cloud in my face.
This isn't so much a matter of smokers rights, as a matter of owners rights. The owners of these nightclubs and restaurants should have the right to allow people to smoke in their establishments. The next logical step is to ban people from smoking in their own homes.