Montgomery County Smoking Ban

[Desdemona]

Re: SOMETHING TO CHEW ON

Originally posted by otter
(swiped from one of the web sites cited above)

Always keep in mind that "correlation" does not mean "causation." Once you have that firmly planted in your scientific consciousness, take the following into consideration when assessing the weight of the medical accusations leveled at secondhand smoke and what can happen if you are exposed to it.

1. More than 98 percent of convicted felons are bread users.

2. Fully HALF of all children who grow up in bread-consuming households score below average on standardized tests.

3. In the 18th century, when virtually all bread was baked in the home, the
average life expectancy was less than 50 years; infant mortality rates were
unacceptably high; many women died in childbirth; and diseases such as typhoid, yellow fever, and influenza ravaged whole nations.

4. More than 90 percent of violent crimes are committed within 24 hours of
eating bread.

5. Bread has been proven to be addictive. Subjects deprived of bread and given only water to eat, begged for bread after as little as two days.

6. Bread is often a "gateway" food item, leading the user to "harder" items such
as butter, jelly, peanut butter, and even cream cheese.

7. Bread has been proven to absorb water. Since the human body is more than 90 percent water, it follows that eating bread could lead to your body being taken over by this absorptive food product, turning you into a soggy, gooey,
bread-pudding person.

8. Newborn babies can choke on bread.

9. Bread is baked at temperatures as high as 450 degrees Fahrenheit! That kind of heat can kill an adult in less than two minutes.

10. Most American bread eaters are utterly unable to distinguish between
significant scientific fact and meaningless statistical babbling...

 

[tlatchaw]

Let's make Southern Maryland a bread-free zone! Quick everybody, go buy the Atkins diet book!

 

[TWLs wife]

I think their taking away everyone freedow for doing that. I thought we were still in the USA, but I might be wrong.

 

[hwyman3]

For those who say a smoking ban does not affect a restruant's business, I offer this. I just returned from a trip to California where they do have a smoking ban on restruants and bars. I had dinner at a TGI Fridays on a Sunday night when the football games were on. Normally, the bar area would be full of football fans enjoying the game. However this bar was empty.

As further evidence that banning smoking in bars affects their business, why then do these folks who claim they want to enjoy a meal or a drink without smoke open a bar that does not allow smoking? How long would that bar stay open?

Currently, bars and restruants are required to separate smokers and non-smokers, even have separate ventalation systems in place, just look at the fish bowl they built in the Waldorf Denny's. I can appreciate the desires of a non-smoker who doesn't want to be around smoke, but there are many restruants that do not allow smoking. They should just patronize those establishments.

 

[Tonio]

but I've never understood what attracts people to smoking. The tobacco itself doesn't smell bad, but the smoke smells terrible. It's not like tobacco has a high like weed. Whenever I see people smoking, they don't look like they're having a good time--they're always coughing and hacking. I once helped a friend strip tobacco in a barn, and I was doing the same coughing and hacking for two days afterward.

 

[hwyman3]

I too have striped tobacco, planted it and cut it out of the field. The thing is there are places you can go and eat and drink without dealing with the smoke from tobacco. If you do not want to be around it, fine, I have no problem with that. I respect the rights of people who do not want to be around smoke, however, I also respect the rights of people that choose to smoke. If you do not want to be around it, you have plenty of places to go out and enjoy an evening out. I only ask that you offer the same respect to the people that choose to smoke.

 

[justin anemone]

Originally posted by Tonio
but I've never understood what attracts people to smoking. The tobacco itself doesn't smell bad, but the smoke smells terrible. It's not like tobacco has a high like weed. Whenever I see people smoking, they don't look like they're having a good time--they're always coughing and hacking. I once helped a friend strip tobacco in a barn, and I was doing the same coughing and hacking for two days afterward.

Maybe you don't understand, but you could try having a more open mind about things.

And this isn't meant as a slam. But if I don't understand something, I TRY.

 

[Tonio]

Originally posted by justin anemone
Maybe you don't understand, but you could try having a more open mind about things.

And this isn't meant as a slam. But if I don't understand something, I TRY.

I understand your point. I've never eaten chitlins or scrapple, because I've smelled them cooking and I couldn't even stand to be in the room. I have the same reaction to tobacco smoke, so I can never see myself taking up smoking.

 

[czygvtwkr]

The problem with smoking is that the 15% that do smoke automatically force the 85% that dont smoke to do it also.

Now there is no proof that someone with horrible body odor or that craps themselves for fun causes 2nd hand diseases but would you want to go to a resturant and sit in the next booth?

Most of the smokers I know are real considerate but there are some that are just jackasses. There was a woman in giant one day puffing away, they kept announcing their non smoking policy but never had the balls to come tell here to her face. I thought about getting a can of whipped cream off the shelf and using it as a fire extinguisher but alas I didnt.

 

[SurfaceTension]

Originally posted by czygvtwkr
I thought about getting a can of whipped cream off the shelf and using it as a fire extinguisher but alas I didnt.

That stuff still pressurized with nitrous?

 

[Ken King]

Originally posted by czygvtwkr
The problem with smoking is that the 15% that do smoke automatically force the 85% that dont smoke to do it also.

No one is forcing anyone to smoke. ETS concentrations are so low that real science says there is no impact. Did you bother to read the links Chuckster provided? I bet not, the truth would deflate that balloon you call a head.

Another case of the irrational mass trying to control personal behavior. If smoking bothers you that much I can only imagine what oil fired furnaces, fireplaces, or woodstoves are doing to you (not to mention the output from automobiles and trucks). Where is your outrage against these?

 

[hwyman3]

Originally posted by czygvtwkr
The problem with smoking is that the 15% that do smoke automatically force the 85% that dont smoke to do it also.

This is not exactly correct. First I call your numbers into question, but I am not going to dispute them at this point. The cliam that smokers force non-smokers to smoke is totally inaccurate. Most restaurants are completely non-smoking. Either the bar area of a restaurants is the smoking section or they have a separate smoking section like the Denny's in Waldorf. How are you forced to smoke in Denny's with the fish bowl? Non-smokers have a choice. They can go to restaurants that are non-smoking or go to one that allows smoking. Bars that have decided not to allow smoking have seen business decline. If this is not true, then why are there no bars that are non-smoking? If this does nto affect their business, then why has no one opened up a non-smoking bar and make a fortune on this untapped business?

 

[vraiblonde]

Last time I looked this was a free country, filled with entrepeneurial opportunity. Why wouldn't someone open non-smoking bars and more non-smoking restaurants instead of trying to make everyone else go non-smoking?

Because this isn't about smoking - it's about power and control.

Non-smokers could just as easily limit their dining options to non-smoking establishments - God knows there are plenty to choose from. But they consider that a violation of their right to be able to go anywhere they want without suffering one smidgen of discomfort.

Once the zealots get it into their head that they don't like something, they don't merely avoid it - they move to have it banned. It's no coincidence that most anti-smoking activists are liberal Democrats.

 

[Tonio]

Originally posted by vraiblonde
Once the zealots get it into their head that they don't like something, they don't merely avoid it - they move to have it banned. It's no coincidence that most anti-smoking activists are liberal Democrats.

True. I say the same thing is accurate for anti-porn zealots. Although some of them are feminists, most of them seem to be conservative Republicans. Both sides have zealots who believe they can control how other people live. Luckily, both sides also have people who believe that freedom comes first. It's too bad that we don't hear more from the freedom-lovers and less frrom the control-lovers.

 

[vraiblonde]

Originally posted by Tonio
True. I say the same thing is accurate for anti-porn zealots.

It's hard to avoid porn unless you throw your TV out the window, never go to the movies and close your eyes so you don't see the headlines on the mags at the supermarket checkout.

It's still shocking to me to see what they get away with on primetime TV.

 

[Otter]

Originally posted by cariblue
What's your definition of porn? I don't think I'm seeing what your seeing.

That would make a good poll(Im serious), if you could categorize different levels of nudity/sexuality. Everyone's definition of porn is so different.

 

[vraiblonde]

Originally posted by cariblue
What's your definition of porn? I don't think I'm seeing what your seeing.

Maybe not "porn" so much as just in poor taste and exceeding the limits of what I want my kids exposed to. But I consider anything more than kissing to be porn, if it's done in public or on TV. :shrug:

Our High's actually had Hustler and Penthouse right on the regular magazine rack, not covered or anything. I wrote a complaint to the company and we haven't gone in there since.

And we were flipping channels last night and came across a pretty explicit sex scene in some show - don't know the name of the show but it was one of the regular channels, ABC, NBC, or CBS. It was obvious the woman was giving the guy a bj - they all but showed his hmm-hmm.

 

[vraiblonde]

I hate to sound like one of these feminist nutballs but one of my main complaints is the objectification of women in our mainstream media. I think it sends the message to our girls and young women that they're nothing more than some man's sex toy.

 

[Otter]

one of my main complaints is the objectification of women in our mainstream media. I think it sends the message to our girls and young women that they're nothing more than some man's sex toy.

Thirty years ago I would have never guessed it would get worse(lots worse) instead of better.

 

[justhangn]

For Tater.......

Originally posted by vraiblonde
I think it sends the message to our girls and young women that they're nothing more than some man's sex toy.

They aren't??!!