Ya know I wasn't going to weigh in on this again even though the start of the ban in Minneapolis makes it a current list topic again, but this notion of smokers as minorities irks me. I won't get into the interesting historical and behavioral angle highlighted in the exchanges of Michael Atherton and Guy Gambill because I think they have strayed many thousands of miles from Minneapolis, but the discrimination against smokers as minorities and equating smokers with downtrodden indigenous peoples of the world is something worth pursuing here, I think.
If a person can change something about themselves for minutes, for hours, for days, for weeks, or forever; does that something still define them as a minority? I think not, unless we're talking religious ritual. A smoker can choose not to smoke for various periods of time using will power, snuff, chewing tobacco, nicotine patches, nicotine gum, or a combination of any of these for as long as it takes to comply with a law or the wishes of those with whom he socializes or forever should she choose to quit a nasty and unhealthy addiction. What a drinker, a smoker, or any substance user or abuser does in no one but themselves until they cross a line where it does. When they harm no one else, let them alone. Harming others, those willingly harmed or not, by smoking is criminal now in Minneapolis, Bloomington, Golden Valley, and I think that the state and the whole world will go the same direction eventually until smoking tobacco becomes an extremely rare habit. I've often quipped that smokers would serve society better by playing Russian Roulette instead of lighting up; the question of burden on the health care system represented by smokers makes the case for minority discrimination even more ludicrous. I was against the Minneapolis ban, but I have really loved going back to bars again after I quit smoking cigarettes nearly twenty years ago (used the gum with an American Lung Assn. cessation plan in 1986). I really missed that atmosphere, sans smoke at least. I think the Ramsey County variance for bars was perhaps a better way to go (I don't think there were many takers. Anyone know?). There are some local bars that cater to a crowd of folks who are never going to quit smoking; I think these bars may go the way of the dinosaurs eventually, but I did not see any need to hasten their demise. I'm not crying much about it though, just crocodile tears for my customers who really care about the issue. But the only rights issue is the right of business owners to run a certain kind of establishment that caters to smokers over nonsmokers in those areas that stamped them out. It is a property rights issue and the courts have clearly stated that government has greater latitude in intervening in those situations where those property rights are paradoxical to the personal or civil rights of others. As for our indigenous smokers, I say stamp'm out mercilessly but figuratively and they will continue to kill themselves or quit individually; theirs is a culture we can afford to lose, but just how far we go in bringing that about is proscribed in our laws. For someone to make this ban out to be a civil rights issue? Well, it is more than a bit of a stretch to me. I would hope that Sue Jeffers, the VFW posts, and the others who wish to allow their patrons to smoke and drink indoors or out and expose only those staff who are happy to be so endangered, would work with county and municipal governments to provide for the American way through vice and iniquity, i.e., my vice asylums, but I won't cry in my beer if they don't unless my eyes are watering from too much smoke in one of those bars in Ramsey County with a variance (not likely). I've patronized some bars in the last few days, but I'm having difficulty going to Stub 'n Herbs. Bill Kahn Prospect Park "there is nothing divine about morality; it is a purely human affair"--Albert Einstein REMINDERS: 1. Be civil! Please read the NEW RULES at http://www.e-democracy.org/rules. If you think a member is in violation, contact the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. For state and national discussions see: http://e-democracy.org/discuss.html For external forums, see: http://e-democracy.org/mninteract ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A Civil City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[email protected] Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
