Smoking Bans

Hi Huntard, Oh the dilemma...hmmm, what to do, what to do? Roll a fatty good sir with nothing but pure White Willow, wouldn't want to ruin my lungs wih tabacco.I'm not surprised though, which is why I asked Taz about public and private pot smoking. I didn't think pot had the same negative stigma as cigarettes, for now though. If enough of these places become popular, or, Jebus willing, it is legalized completely, eventually the smoking ban will absorb pot smokers as well - like cigar smokers.Perhaps though, people won't want second hand cigarette smoke because of the health issues, but second hand weed, well, that's just cost efficient.

---

"I smoke pot. If this bothers anyone, I suggest you look around at the world in which we live and shut your mouth."--Bill Hicks"I never knew there was another option other than to question everything"--Noam Chomsky

I think taz meant that it is common sense that smoking in the home around children should not be allowed. Or at least, shouldn't be done.

What I wonder, is what are the differences in the smoke given off by cigarettes versus a joint. And what are the differences between, say, a hand-rolled cigarette versus the mass produced kind?Personally, the smell of smoke, be it from cigarettes or weed or anything else you can smoke, makes me sick.So I really appreciate being able to eat in a restaurant without having to breathe in someone else smoke.

I realise that. But he does not seeem to think that it should be illegal.Whilst he does also seem to think that more than common sense (i.e. law) is required when it comes to stopping smoking in cars with children.This, to me, seems contradictory as both are equally personal private spaces. So I don't undestrand the rationale for thinking one should be illegal and the other not.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

Let's try again. You ask if it should be illegal or not to smoke around children in homes: When Taz answers with "common sense", I read that as it should be common sense that such activities should be illegal. What else would the "common sense" refer to?Let's look closely at what he wrote above this answer. He says that having sex in the home is clearly quite okay, that it is legal to do. Having sex in front of children is (or at least, should be; I'm not familiar with chicago/Ill law) illegal. This entire answer he calls "common sense".He then answers your question about smoking in the home around kids with "common sense", thus suggesting a link between his first and second answer. He even suggests such a link with the phrase "catch my drift?"I'm fairly positive that Taz thinks this. However, since I can't actually read his mind, I qualified the statement.I don't see the contradiction you do.

Oh. I took it to mean that no it should not be actually illegal and that it should instead be left to the common sense of the parent/carer to not smoke in the home where children are present..I guess that we need Taz to clarify what he did actually mean. Fair enough. If your interpretation of Taz's response is correct then Taz is indeed not being inconsistent and I will stand corrected on that point.However if it is being proposed by Taz that the current law should be extended to banning smoking in the home under certain circumstances (i.e. when children are present) then I think that opens up another area of fairly contentious questions regarding both privacy and the practicality of enforcement.

I think its bullshit that according to the law (here in illinois)somebody can't open up a bar that allows smoking if they want to.The law shouldn't disallow people having a bar that can be smoked in if the owner wants it to be that way.If people don't want to be in a smoky bar, then don't go to the bars that allow smoking.I also think its funny when people bitch about smoking and the air while they stand on the sidewalk next to bumper to bumper traffic breathing in car exhaust

---

Its kinda funny though, around here in southern Illinois. Lots of bars just ignore the law and let people smoke anyway. Shit though, I've seen people smoking pot in a bar.The chief of police in one small town here said (I think publically) that he wouldn't acknowledge any smoking tickets and that he felt that his officers had better things to do than issue tickets for smoking cigarettes.

You misunderstand me.Is "thou shalt not kill thy neighbor" not common sense? Is "thou shalt not lie to thy neighbor" not common sense? Is not driving down the interestate at 125 MPH drunk with your 5 yr old sitting in the back unrestraint not common sense? (As a public servant, I had to respond to such a case a few days ago... the situation with the little girl sitting in the back while her mom was driving 125 MPH with an blood alcohol level of .17 really pissed me off.)But all these common sense stuff have been criminalized.Just because it is common sense doesn't mean we can't criminalize it. Unless you would like to argue that the two are unrelated? But surely, private personal spaces does not necessarily mean I-can-do-whatever-the-hell-I-want spaces. Example: I breed out kids --> I smoke pot in the privacy of my home with my kids --> I make the argument that it's the privacy of my own home --> then I complain why I'm being persecuted.

Is this a little clearer?Your right to personal privacy gives you the right to do basically whatever you want to your body. You do not have the right to make choices affecting other people's bodies. Smoking unfortunately is not an individual activity - everyone around you winds up inhaling the smoke as well.You also do not have the right to open up a bar at all. You're subject to all manner of government regulations including the procurement of a liqour licence, zoning concerns, the age of your clientele, etc. Just because it's "your property" doesn't mean you get to do whatever the hell you want. Public safety laws already exist that restrict your bar from operating with gas leaks, or with unsanitary glassware, etc. Even your personal home is regulated - you aren't allowed to improperly store or ustilize toxic chemicals in your home where they pose a public safety hazard (or even an unreasonable hazard to yourself, since public resources would need to be expended to rescue you and clean up your mess). Since second-hand smoke is just as serious a public safety concern as an unwashed drinking glass, the government is well within its authority as a regulator of public safety to disallow smoking in an area where nonsmokers will be affected as well.Your libertarian position that unsatisfied customers will simply choose to go to a different bar is irrelevant; the same can be said about bars with dirty glassware or other unhealthy conditions, and yet the government is clearly within its authority to regulate those public safety concerns. Indeed. But then, automotive travel is a basic necessity of life in America, where frequently we have woefully inadequate public transportation and our cities are designed around cheap, easy personal transportation. We're working on that, with things like hybrid cars and even full electrics or fuel cell vehicles.Smoking, on the other hand, is not a necessity, and can be restricted to designated smoking areas and the privacy of one's own home.

I am inclined to partially agree. Having designated smoking bars that are licensed exceptions to the otherwise universal ban in public places seems like a fair compromise to me.I think this was rejected here because of legal complications pertaining to the health rights of bar staff in such establishments. Perhaps further complicated by the fact that staff of many British pubs reside on the pub premises (meaning that if the pub was given a license as a smoking bar and the staff objected they would lose both their job and their place of residence).However I may well be speculating out of my arse here as frankly I am unclear as to exactly why this was rejected in favour of a blanket ban. Before the ban here there was little choice as all pubs and bars were the smoke filled, sore throat inducing, havens of nicotine addicts.The general consensus (he says having taken no census from those other than his close friends and family) is that things are much better now and, looking back, I am not sure how I put up with the previous situation (although obviously I did) As a habitual cyclist in one of the biggest, busiest and most polluted cities in the world I don't find it all funny. But don't get me on my high horse (or 'all terrain mountain bike' to be more exact) on that particular subject........

How so? Neither privacy nor practicality of enforcement necessitates you-can-do-whatever-the-hell-you-want. Again, speaking as a public servant, I can't really care less if you drink your nights away. Drinking and driving with your 5 yr old in the back not in proper child restraint I have a problem with.But then what about the privacy of your own home, you may wonder? I've responded to cases where the drunk parents almost killed their kids through reckless and even criminal actions. And then their lawyers had the guts to blame the alcohol instead of reckless conduct.Regarding practicality of enforcement. Just because it's hard to enforce doesn't mean we shouldn't have a law against it. As it stands, just about every traffic and criminal law we have on the book is hard to enforce. How would you suggest we go about preventing a meth cook and addict from getting their kids hooked on meth? We have a saying among us _________, it's not a meth lab unless it has (1) porn and (2) children addicted to meth through "second hand meth".Common sense and the law are not mutually exclusive.P.S. - And people wonder why I'm so grumpy.

I'd use a different example than drunk driving, since driving is a privilege restricted in ways that do not pertain to personal property.Instead, I'd point out that the home environment itself is already controlled with regard to children. If your home is determined to be unsafe for children (say, open paint canisters, extremely unsanitary living conditions, unsealed cleaning fluids in easy reach of a child, etc), you can already have your children taken away, and be brought up on charges of child endangerment.Since we know that second-hand smoke is a health risk, how does the same not apply to smoking while children are present?I think the mentality here considers "my children" as personal property on the same level as the home itself, or the individual's person, allowing the parent to treat the child as he/she desires. This is simply not the case - the child has no recourse, no way to escape the unhealthy environment or even a way to comprehend that the smoke is dangerous in the first place, and is an individual possessing its own rights.As Taz says, home safety may be difficult to enforce, but it is enforced when the authorities become aware of an issue.Why should you be able to smoke in the privacy of your own home in the presence of a child when you're not permitted to keep other toxic chemicals in the privacy of your own home in the presence of a child?It seems to me that smokers are maintaining a double standard. "Tobacco is okay because I like it," and so somehow the simple idea that toxic chemicals and fumes should be kept out of public places and away from children somehow gains an unfounded and arbitrary exception when it comes to tobacco smoke. Special pleading anyone?

Again I have some sympathy with the examples that you cite.Lines must be drawn and the law must reflect those lines. No-one, especially not I, is denying that.But these things are inherently arbitrary to some degree as it becomes impossible to rationalise completely what should and should not be legal. You previously cited having sex in the privacy of your own home but in front of children as something that should be illegal. I would agree.You cite negligence or even criminal misconduct against children as a result of alcohol abuse as something that should be illegal. I would agree.Just to be absoluetly clear - Are you saying that smoking in the privacy of ones home when children are present should also be illegal? In the interests of childrens health should we have legalised dietary requirements to be administered to children by parents? E.g. maximum levels of calorific intake, fat, salt etc.?By the same logic you apply to smoking at home should there be laws regarding these issues given that obesity is one of the major health epidemics in the Western world and in particualr the US?Should we have a legal limit on the number of hours a child can watch TV per day?Should there be a legal minimum stipulated as to the amount of physical exercise a child should undertake per day?Should there be a legal limit on the amount of time parents can spend on internet debate sites in order to ensure that their kids are not neglected?Sould all harmful practises be illegal? How do we determine which should and which should not? By making such practises illegal and enforcing the law as far as is practically possible.The point is where is the line that we draw regarding that which we socially frown upon and that which we make illegal?You seem to be sugesting that this is a black and white open and shut case. But it isn't.

You make some excellent points. If a parent who eats a high fat, high carb, high sugar diet devoid of vitamins and minerals also inflicts this diet upon their children should this also be illegal? How do we legalise against such practises? Should we legailise against such practises?By the logic of your argument, as I understand it, the answer must be 'yes'. Personally I am not a smoker and never have been but I remain unconvinced that making smoking in the home under any circumstances illegal is either practically possible or in principle desirable.I am not a conservative anti-government interventionalist by any stretch of the imagination but, as imperfect as it is, I feel that health eduction and the changing of social attitudes is a better way to tackle this issue.However I did originally ask the question because I am unsure of the exact reasoning behind my opinions. As such I am open to argument either way. Unless ALL potentially harmful activities are to be outlawed I think special pleading of one sort or another is inevitable. The fact is that laws are necessarily arbitrary to a degree as we exist in a non black and white, non perfectly rational, reality of humanity.The question is on what basis the special pleading is made and how valid we can subjectively but collectively deem that special pleading to be.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.