Cigarette Smoke Has its Benefits
What is our current definition of clean air? Is it the air we breathe on a cool night, while standing in the desert or on a beach where we can see thousands of stars twinkling in a crystal clear sky. Is it spending a day in the mountains near a sparkling stream?
According to anti-smokers, it is breathing the recycled germs and viruses from every other person in the same sealed and enclosed environments of our office buildings and shopping malls where smoking is no longer allowed. We are supposed to believe with no reservations that fresh air is being supplied by ventilation systems.
What kind of air are we really breathing? What are the long term effects of our supposedly healthy no-smoking indoor environments? What is recycled and manufactured air doing to us? I really would like to know, especially after my most recent shopping trip. We need cigarettes back in our closed environments to provide us with visible proof that we are being supplied with enough fresh air.
Cigarette smoke used to be the "whistle blower" for indoor areas with substandard ventilation systems. Before smoking was banned from shopping malls and offices buildings, if a haze of smoke remained in the air, it was a warning sign of poor air circulation and stale air.
Now, smokers are no longer allowed to light up indoors, so I wonder how we captives of controlled air quality environments can possibly know what kind of poisons we are being forced to breath. I smoke, and if allowed to spend my time in my car, home or outdoors, I breathe freely.
I have always had strong allergic reactions to the dyes in clothing, carpeting, paint, fabric sections and various plastic products. Prior to smoking bans and sealed buildings, stores and shopping malls did not cause me any discomfort. Now, my eyes become red until I leave the stores--be it Marshall Fields or Wal-Mart. On the day following a shopping trip, my nose, sinuses and inner ear passages swell shut. I have learned to cope with these inconveniences through the use of eye drops, baby-oil-on-a-Q-tip (for my ears) and home made nasal rinses. I would like to see what the smoke from cigarettes would be able to tell us about the “cleaner” air we are supposed to be breathing today.
I used to enjoy flying. I now dread it, not only because I can't smoke in the airport and on the plane, but because I know I will feel sick the day following my flight. I prepare myself with aspirin and cold tablets to negate the effects, but I didn't find this necessary either before airline smoking bans were passed. How many passengers could survive a flight without the little "air nozzle" above their seat, giving them the impression that they are receiving fresh air during their trip? Passenger planes have become notorious for spreading colds and viruses among travelers. Airlines would be forced to return to adequate ventilation levels if smoking were again to become legal on flights, because passengers would be able see if airborne impurities were being eliminated along with the cigarette smoke.
Our world is so concerned and self-absorbed with health warnings that no one can watch, read or listen to any media source without paid commercials constantly reminding us to visit our doctors for endless preventative test procedures, and suggesting we can improve our lives by trying any of the hundreds of pharmaceutical products being advertised for any number of imaginary ailments. Big pharmaceutical firms, with the assistance of the advertising media are breeding a population of hypochondriacs! We need to encourage survival of the individual, squash this norm of socially acceptable prescription druggies and medicating ourselves into oblivion! Is Prozac really preferable to a cigarette?
Something is twisted in our age of technological advancement. I really wish we could go back to the choice of opening our windows, lighting a cigarette and using fans (a no-no for many buildings with codes forbidding plug-in electrical devices) on a nice day, rather than alternately steam-roasting then freezing everyone unlucky enough to be trapped in our inescapable state-of-the-art poisonous buildings.
I can say nothing les than OH WOW!!!!!!!!!!
I could expound on so many of your points - but I am just going to leave them as is at this time. They speak volumes as is.
Well done.
I wish I had said that.
It all comes back to the desire for the nanny state to take care of them. If the nanny state says that air coming out of the vent on the airplane is fresh air, heck!, it's fresh air - no matter if it stinks like hell and burns your eyes!
But if you asked a anti-smoking nazi why their eyes were so red after a flight, they'd never connect it to the filth pouring out of the vents.
If I go into a furniture store I have an instant headache. The fabric guard and the preservatives they use on new furniture make me sick, as do strong colognes and perfumes, but I've never thought about filing suit for my own selfish reasons.
Live and let live.
That was darn good, Garnet. Very enjoyable reading and some excellent points!