Smokers Retreat
Reading the title of this article you may think that within lies news of a getaway where smoking is permitted and celebrated, but you’d be wrong (fortunately or unfortunately).
This article is actually a reflection of what’s happened in recent years starting with the intensified campaigning of anti-smoking groups, to segregated areas in bars and restaurants to the all out smoking ban which has lead to smoker’s having to retreat to their cars and homes and the street.
It’s the street that is still the last fight for many anti-smoking campaigners. If it comes down to individual rights then who wins, the pedestrian who wants to walk in the street without breathing in smoke or the pedestrian who wants the right to walk and smoke in public places?
Those of us who are old enough remember the days of smoking on planes. I remember after a long flight from Egypt I arrived at Heathrow and after leaving the plane took a deep breath and was so happy to breath in the clean air at the airport because of what I’d sat through on the flight. It was while on the train back to Crystal Palace that I questioned how damaging it was to be on the plane for hours, breathing in the smoke everyone smelt like smoke even the children.
Likewise I grew up with parents who would smoke in the car during long road trips to theme parks and I look back on these times with mixed feelings.
Die-hard anti-smoking campaigners often want to tax cigarettes to the max, force people to consider quitting smoking and make smokers retreat to their cars and homes (so long as they are not afflicting non-smokers to the ‘poison’). Die-hard smokers (forgive the pun) resent that their freedoms have been stripped away and they are being forced to give up or retreat.
But with the health risks and effects of smoking being so clearly shown on TV and on the packaging itself, isn’t it natural for us to eventually live in a relatively smoke-free world?
I’m a non-smoker if you didn’t guess that by now from the article and I’m happy that the restaurants, pubs and bars around the Triangle are smoke-free. Let me know what you think in the comments below or by discussing this article on Virtual Norwood.
Photo Credit: Uwe Hermann
Category: Health
