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Ron Jackson's Perspective
The Sunday Journal -
Think
Kankakee, Illinois
February 19, 2006
Freedom to smoke OK
in
restaurants you can avoid |
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I don't smoke. Never have, never will. Yet, I don't agree with the
big fuss over making certain, limited businesses non-smoking.
I support a non-smoking ordinance but only in places where I
must legally frequent. Any place that I am required to be by law or
necessity I would prefer to be non-smoking. If I am mandated to sit
in a jury room for hours a day, I don't want to fight smoke. In a
learning facility I must attend to further my education, I don't
want to inhale smoke while trying to ingest information.
However, I am totally against forcing any business to become
non-smoking when I have a choice not to go there. The minute the
law or necessity requires me to go to a restaurant or bar, I will
support banning smoking at such places. As long as
I have a choice to do something, I do not want the government making
decisions on my behalf.
I am aware of the reports of deaths attributed to secondhand or
environmental smoking. According to the American Cancer Society,
secondhand smoke is the third leading preventable cause of death in
the United States. The ACS estimates deaths of non-smokers by
secondhand smoke to be from 38,000 to 65,000 per year. That seems
like a large number of deaths. However, if we took the largest
estimate of 65,000 deaths and divided it by 50 states, that is just
1,300 deaths per state. If one of your loved ones died from
environmental smoke, it's understandable to be upset; but such a
small number of deaths per year does not register a blip on our
government's radar. Sixty-five thousand deaths per year are but a
small price to pay for the millions of dollars cigarette companies
donate to federal candidates.
The lack of relevance of the number of smoke-related deaths is
why the federal and state governments are passing the buck to local
municipalities. If secondhand-smoke deaths were important,
cigarettes would be outlawed in the first place.
In no way am I being unsympathetic to anyone who has suffered
from cigarette smoke. The greatest person I have ever known to walk
this earth was a real smoker. By choice he chain-smoked
non-filtered Chesterfields and Pall Malls. Some of the best advice
my stepdad ever gave me was between long, coughing, gagging spells.
He died of lung cancer at age 53. He chose to smoke, and ultimately
he chose his manner of death.
We all have choices. Pregnant women, infants, and anyone else
who does not want to suffer from secondhand smoke should choose not
to frequent places that allow smoking. There is no law that says
you must acquire your daily nutrition from a restaurant. Food is
available at grocery stores, which are non-smoking. Dining out and drinking are privileges, not
necessities.
A night on the town is part of our culture. It's what we do.
Eating in America is a form of recreation. We eat to have fun. We
drink to have fun. That privilege should not be denied anyone. Not
even smokers.
Non-smokers imposing their will upon others when there are
alternatives is not the American way.
Employees and patrons alike have options. If smoking were
permitted in an establishment when a prospective employee applied,
that person made the choice to work in that environment. No
employee is forced to work in a smoke-filled business.
Speaking to a local bar owner who would like the government to
pass a non-smoking ordinance, I asked why didn't she just make her
establishment non-smoking. Her reply was that it would be easier if
the government just made it apply to everyone. That way she
wouldn't have to offend her smoking clientele.
That is just what we need, for private businesses to become
state-run. If this non-smoking train picks up steam, next we will
have advocates of certain types of music asking the government to
ban rap music because of the number of deaths related to that genre.
The choice to allow smoking in a place of business should rest
with the owner, not the government. The choice to patronize or work
for that business should be left up to the individual.
I don't smoke. I realize I could die from the effects of
environmental smoke. A bus could also hit me, but you won't see me
pimping a politician to remove all buses.
From the moment of conception, we are all destined to die.
Most of us won't have a choice in how we die, so it won't matter if
we die from the first leading cause of death or the tenth. I have
yet to see an obituary that reads, "Mr. Doe died from the Xth
leading cause of preventable death."
If cigarettes are that much of a detriment to our society, they
should be illegal period. If the estimated 2000 per day newly addicted teen smokers were important, cigarettes would
be outlawed. If, if, if…
We will have an Iraqi-born, miniskirt-wearing woman elected
president of the United States before you get enough politicians to give up their cigarette company campaign contributions to pass that
law. |
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