Smoking politics

Last week, letter writer Scott Jones ridiculed David Romano’s assertion that the smoking ban signifies a dangerous step down the slope of government intervention in our lifestyle choices [“Smoke-free satisfaction,” June 1]. I wonder what Jones thinks of recent proposals to tax junk food or ban perfume and scented deodorants. Completely unrelated?

Furthermore, Jones claims that “second-hand smoke has been proven harmful, even deadly.” Why didn’t he step up to the plate and meet Romano’s challenge to find a study that gives second-hand smoke a risk ratio higher than 3.0? Because there are none. (One death, supposedly from second-hand smoke, does not a credible study make.)

Jones also attempts to discredit Romano by questioning his credentials (a PhD in Political Science, rather than medicine) to write on the smoking ban. However, with the issue rapidly appearing more and more political rather than medical, perhaps Romano might indeed be the most adequate expert.

» Lucy Brown, Ste-Marguerite

I have been a smoker longer than I haven’t been one. I am not proud of this because it is an addiction unlike any other. I never felt comfortable smoking in front of non-smokers and I totally respect their decision to be non-smokers. (I was one once and plan to be one again someday.) I can’t say that I am opposed to the new rule. I will do my best to make it work and chances are I will quit sooner than later.

But why stop there? What about people who don’t recycle? What about all those people who sit in their parked cars with their engines running in the middle of summer yapping away on their cell-phones? Isn’t that polluting our environment? Isn’t that killing all humans globally? Why isn’t anything being done about this? Why aren’t these people made to feel like criminals? I know that if I don’t stop smoking, I will develop some form of cancer or worse, and yet someone who works in a smoke-filled bar who doesn’t have the good sense to not work there develops cancer and dies.

If an F1 race car driver slams into a wall at 200 mph, killing him and a few spectators with debris, does that mean we should ban F1 racing? If a child drowns in a swimming pool, should we ban swimming pools? Where does it end and are we really hitting the mark when passing these laws? It seems that the catch-22 and inconsistency of lawmaking will never fully protect the general public and serves only to empower the rich and/or the stupid and shackle everyone else into submission. (Remember the woman who burned herself with hot coffee at McDonalds?)

It’s alright for people to pick on smokers because we have faces, but what about the environment? What about our children who have to grow up with a planet that we are killing? There is no law that says that we have to recycle or car-pool. Hypocrites!

Lastly, I assume that the police will be enforcing this ban. If there’s never a cop around when you need one now, what’s it going to be like when they’re out hunting down us murderous smokers instead of those self-obsessed sit-in-my-car-with-the-engine-running bastards that we have to share this planet with? Aren’t there more people out there with cars than there are people who smoke? Get real. Grow a brain or buy one at least.

We don’t need more chains, we just need a little more common sense and respect for others.

» Gerhardt

Vegetarians, humour
and hot air

To a vegetable, vegetarian humorist Manish Patwari’s one-liner, “I’d kill for a veggie burger,” is tasteless and insensitive [“Vegetarian humour,” June 1].

Just because a carrot doesn’t scream when you skin it alive and chop off its head doesn’t mean that vegetables don’t see vegetarians for what they are: brutal vegecidal destroyers of their life force.

If vegetables really love vegetarians, why do all vegetarians suffer from excessive flatus gas?

» Ron Huza

Thanks, Manish Patwari, for proving my point about vegetarians. Say anything even remotely critical and out come the defensive accusations of “ignorance” and the same old tired proselytizing. Not only that, he also misread my comment, which was that “more people would be vegetarian if more vegetarians had a sense of humour”. There are plenty of cool funny vegetarians and vegans who don’t go around insulting the people who disagree with them. Unfortunately, Mr. Patwari doesn’t seem to be one of them.

» Sean Mallard

Regarding “Let the butcher be” [Letters, May 25]: Sean Mallard, leave your tired prejudices at home. Despite people like you, vegetarianism is growing everywhere!

» Sophie Martineau

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