Dan,
No, my tongue is not in my cheek. I truly believe that
exposing children in the home to tobacco smoke is a
form of child abuse and should be prohibited.
Now saying that it should be prohibited says nothing
about how one goes about enforcing the prohibition. I
am NOT in favor of a total ban on tobacco. I agree
that doing that simply won't work. We'd just create a
black market for it. Without going so far as to have
the police invade homes looking for signs of smoking
around children, I'd treat it the way we treat other
forms of abuse. When it comes to the attention of the
authorities through a complaint by someone, a social
worker, friend or relative, I'd haul the parents
before a judge, have an order entered prohibiting the
parent from exposing the child and, after appropriate
warnings and such, impose penalties sufficient to
deter the behavior.
We don't routinely send the police out looking for
parents who beat their children but when it is brought
to the attention of the authorities we do something
about it, ranging from requiring parenting classes to
termination of parental rights and prison. No reason
not to treat the smoking problem the same way (not
necessarily the same penalties but penalties tailored
to the behavior).
Charlie Swope
Ward 1
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