Now I'm mad

[Sonic_Death]

Actually, Mike Phillips started the thread. I shared my perspective, as your sharing yours. What can I say... some pens have more ink than others... sorry.

You don't know me to "describe" me, but you are doing an excellent job of defining yourself.

Well as you obviously didn't get from my post or that comic, I am totally against inane fighting with random people on the internet.

But since my post did not attack your character at all where as yours did allude to an attack on me, I am taking this chance to refute your post.

You 'shared' your perspective, but were posting something that was a direct attack on SMASH, meanwhile you don't know him, nor was it warranted. I know enough of you from that post to know that you are not worth my time fighting with, or de-railing this thread with.

 

[SamTheButcher]

Classic online brashness... tsk-tsk. BTW... I don't smoke cig's.

Well, you must be smoking something To think that a habit that can seriously damage another person just by being in the vicinity is OK.
Smash's urine analogy is 100% correct.
BTW, I've smoked "the other" and it never made me think it's OK to damage other peoples health.
It must be you.

 

[doc540]

My city just initiated a smoking ban in August.

It's KILLED several small clubs and bars. Their entire clientele was made up of smokers.

However, since I've owned to clubs in the past, I have to fault those clubs for not taking ANY measures to consider their non-smoking clients. The places were SO smokey, I just avoided them and wouldn't book my band in there.

When I owned my clubs, I busted my azz to maintain my smoke eaters. I spent time and money making sure my non-smoking clients were considered, and they returned the favor by frequenting my clubs.

It didn't have to be an "either/or" proposition, but the smokestack bar owners brought it on themselves, IMHO.

The upside to the citywide ban? My wife and I are not only going out to more clubs than we ever would have before, but so are a lot of other people who just couldn't handle the EXTREME, choking smoke before.

There are MANY more non-smokers than smokers, so eventually many more people will be going out to dance and hear music than ever did before.

It's a definite win for business.

 

[mike_v_s]

We've already gone rounds with this one.

If you've got the time and the interest, dig in:

http://www.talkbass.com/forum/showthread.php?t=237707

I'm behind a public smoking ban 100%

I like going out to eat or see music or have a drink again.

...and what a nice debate that was. I've softened my stance a bit since then (oddly, one of the posts in that thread eventually led to that). I'm curious. If it were feasibly and fiscally possible to have a totally separate smoking section, would you still want a ban?

Mike

 

[Matt Fat Cat]

Well, you must be smoking something To think that a habit that can seriously damage another person just by being in the vicinity is OK.
Smash's urine analogy is 100% correct.
BTW, I've smoked "the other" and it never made me think it's OK to damage other peoples health.
It must be you.

Please provide one medically assessed, diagnosed, and researched case of anyone suffering any type of disease or disorder from secondary cigarette smoke from a public place ie store, bar, restaraunt, etc.

Buddy, you got me wrong... I am a health professional. I don't want to see anyone hurt.

 

[mike_v_s]

My city just initiated a smoking ban in August.

It's KILLED several small clubs and bars. Their entire clientele was made up of smokers.

However, since I've owned to clubs in the past, I have to fault those clubs for not taking ANY measures to consider their non-smoking clients. The places were SO smokey, I just avoided them and wouldn't book my band in there.

When I owned my clubs, I busted my azz to maintain my smoke eaters. I spent time and money making sure my non-smoking clients were considered, and they returned the favor by frequenting my clubs.

It didn't have to be an "either/or" proposition, but the smokestack bar owners brought it on themselves, IMHO.

The upside to the citywide ban? My wife and I are not only going out to more clubs than we ever would have before, but so are a lot of other people who just couldn't handle the EXTREME, choking smoke before.

There are MANY more non-smokers than smokers, so eventually many more people will be going out to dance and hear music than ever did before.

It's a definite win for business.

Being from Beaumont, which clubs did you own and when (I might have played them)?

Mike

 

[Chunk-O-Funk]

Yes, but your looking slightly at the big picture which some of the astute are not. The economic support thru Medicaid/Medicare for diabetics, CHD's, CVA's, CPE's, DVT's and so on due to obesity is weighng down the system. Triglycerides and trans fatty acids are major contributors to these health issues which plague our nation. So enforcement of "better health" is a good thing.
.

Well, it did come from a person who was diagnosed with type II diabetes. I've never been overweight, but it does put me in a high risk pool for a heart attack. Since then I haven't set foot in a fast food restaurant.

I would love to splurge on an order of fries every now and then if McDonalds would spend the extra cash on a better oil in which to fry them.

I find it funny that the government is actually doing a good thing by regulating the quality of food to the general public and we get paranoid and complain about it. No one is trying to take away your burger or pork fat. Just trying to inform you what is in it and that you are at risk if you eat this stuff too often.

Same goes for smokers. Second hand smoke does puts the public at risk. Even though the law affects privately owned businesses, these businesses are open to the public. The law isn't taking away your right to smoke, it's taking away the risk of you putting people at harm.

If club owner are so concerned about losing smokers they do have a choice by opening/converting to a tobacco bar or hookah club. They are exempt in NY.

 

[Matt Fat Cat]

Well as you obviously didn't get from my post or that comic, I am totally against inane fighting with random people on the internet.

But since my post did not attack your character at all where as yours did allude to an attack on me, I am taking this chance to refute your post.

You 'shared' your perspective, but were posting something that was a direct attack on SMASH, meanwhile you don't know him, nor was it warranted. I know enough of you from that post to know that you are not worth my time fighting with, or de-railing this thread with.

If SMASH thinks I am attacking him, he can "defend" himself, and already has spoken his peace. SMASH's post was belligerant and IMO needed to be addressed within means of this thread. Sorry you don't like it, I never intended to derail any thread... or by derail do you mean propose an idea contraindicative to your's.

 

[Sonic_Death]

If SMASH thinks I am attacking him, he can "defend" himself, and already has spoken his peace. SMASH's post was belligerant and IMO needed to be addressed within means of this thread. Sorry you don't like it, I never intended to derail any thread... or by derail do you mean propose an idea contraindicative to your's.

I meant de-railing this thread from it's topic with banter, but it is good to know that this little thing is in the past.

 

[Matt Fat Cat]

I meant de-railing this thread from it's topic with banter, but it is good to know that this little thing is in the past.

OK.

Personal freedoms are being intruded upon when the govt mandates what private enterprise's are allowed to support. As a business owner, am I not able to determine what goes on in my establishment if it is within the scope of the law? Well the law says you can't smoke... blah, blah, blah... it's like gerrymandering. They create a law to enforce a belief system... how did prohibition of alcohol go over? Same story. If the tobacco industry were losing any profits, this wouldn't be happening. The fact is that this affects consumer level social brackets. The lobbyists would be raising cain if Winston or Morris were losing millions, but they are not. Just another smoke screen to keep the quiet war, squabbling amongst the lower ranks.

 

[Sonic_Death]

It is hard to say if you don't like x, dont go to y and think of it as fair. In some ways, it works... but yet, why should people be limited to where they can go because they have to worry about inhaling cigarette smoke while they are there.

Smoking is a vice which some people use in their lives, for whatever reason. You tell us (people who don't want smokers in public places) not to go there. I think the easier thing would be for the smokers to just go outside, smoke their cigarette, and then go back in.

That just seems like a more fair solution to me, although I am certainly biased.

 

[mike_v_s]

You strike me as one of the most intelligent posters on this site,

Thank you.

... yet how is it after several go-rounds on this issue you still fail to get that they are not private places in which the owner can do whatever?

Perhaps I should have used a different phrase, but I specifically stated privately owned. With that, I assumed a few things to be taken into account. Some of them are things you have brought up (in the very post I'm quoting). Others are what I consider a business owners right to have control over his business. I know you disagree, but I consider his "right" to allow smokers into the building he is paying for as important as his right to decide what he will sell in that building.

They are and always have been legally and governed as public places. You can't just open a business and put on sex shows or even sell tobacco pipes or Playboy in many places, so what makes you think anyone can just open up a suicide den?

I'm not sure this is aimed at me, but I haven't really gone as far as to state that an owner can do whatever they want in their business. I'm just stating that I think certain decisions should be left to the owner...and that this is one of them (subject to the owner's ability to offer a completely separate smoking section).

That street access, sidewalk, parking, and police protection and the water and sewers and health inspectors are all paid for by *all* taxpayers and *all* taxpayers have a right to be on those premises, safely, during business operating hours and that's per very old laws on the books not some new "ban". These are simply old, common-sense laws finally being enforced becase as always the rude try to ruin it for everyone.

I think I covered this earlier. No disagreement.

My cologne will not damage your person or your property, and neither will my poor fashion sense. Whether I get cancer or not, I still have a right not to have my person and my property damaged in a *public* place.

I was jokingly taking it overboard at that point. But I do think the "sick people" analogy is worth discussion.

You make the analogy of not going to urinals if you don't want to be pissed on, I gather the suggestion being that's a place for pissing,

Not really. I was saying that I don't go places where I will be made uncomfortable.

...well I am in the majority who see bars and restaurants not to share in a slow suicide but rather to eat and merry, have a drink or ten, watch strippers or enjoy a band. They are not places for random assault or releasing radon or urinating on people trying to enjoy a meal. Good thing, 'cause if there weren't laws against those latter things surely some ###holes would do it just as they smoke. As someone has said, once the non-smokers realize they're no longer in danger of assault then there'll be more business than before - it's been that way in each of many diverse jurisdictions that finally enforced the laws on the books.

Nothing to really add or take away here....I just wanted to quote your post in it's beautiful wholeness.

Still waiting for someone to even suggest how somking in public is any different or less damaging to a person's pursuit of happiness, health, gear, and clothes than if someone urinated on them.

No one can, 'cause it's the same thing with perhaps the exception that urine is much safer and easier to wash out.

I've got no need to expand the front. Hope I cleared up some of my earlier post.

Mike

 

[Geoff St. Germaine]

Please provide one medically assessed, diagnosed, and researched case of anyone suffering any type of disease or disorder from secondary cigarette smoke from a public place ie store, bar, restaraunt, etc.

Buddy, you got me wrong... I am a health professional. I don't want to see anyone hurt.

Vincent Rennich alleged got lung cancer from working in the Tropicana Casino in New Jersey.

Marlene Sharp allegedly got throat and lung cancer from working in a hotel in New South Wales.

Google it, there's a lot of them. Of course they're all alleged. As a health care professional you certainly know how difficult it is to prove the cause of cancer. Also, every one I found was an employee of the business, spending perhaps 8 hours a day in a smoking environment. They probably get a larger dose than most smokers.

 

[Matt Fat Cat]

I should have recalled from past threads, or realized from what you wrote earlier in this one, that you're actually a moderate on the topic.

I agree, that there should be that option on the surface, though I'm not sure the issues of people refusing to work the smoking section and getting fired for it under some other guise then filing complaints paid for publicly, the non-smoking section perhaps being 1/10 the seating capacity, etc. etc. is worth all that.

Normally I support ... no, *always* I support a law-abiding (and I mean sane and justifiable laws, not mariujuana laws for example) person's right to do whatever they want publicly or elsewhere ... until it diminishes or eliminates my existing rights or those of others. Then it's war. I'm a good patriot that way.

About the sick people. Certainly they have a moral obligation to not sit on the crowded bus and cough and sneeze all over without covering their mouths as some do. Not everyone gets sick days off work with pay, so could the inconsiderate sick people then be sued for lost wages? I'm surprsied it hasn't happened.

If a pandemic does happen, or even the hint of one, we'll certainly see laws against sick people in public. Again it'll be inconsiderate boobs ruining it for everyone, spewing their poison in public. Same as with the smokers ... rather just the inconsiderate smokers not all smokers. I know plenty of full-on cigarette addicts who never felt right about smoking in restaurants even when it was allowed (in violation of already long-standing workplace, public safety, and assault and property laws).

I can see you thought this out thoroughly. SMASH.. are being serious or just butting heads for jest?

 

[morf]

The difference between me smoking a cigarette near you and you pissing on me is motive. I'm just trying to have a good smoke while you're trying to get to me personally by pissing on me. That's a difference IMHO. What, you think smokers are out to get you and everytime someone lights one up next to you he's thinking "yea I'll piss that guy off by smoking next to him, that'll show him"?

If you dont like being near people who smoke then dont stay near them. And as far as your "then would it be ok if I decide to smack you in the face if you light one up next to me" comment goes, I would say give it your best shot but be ready to get whooped more than once if you're going to do so each time, and be ready to accept someone beating you up if you're going to throw the first punch.

 

[Diggler]

Still waiting for someone to even suggest how smoking in public is any different or less damaging to a person's pursuit of happiness, health, gear, and clothes than if someone urinated on them. I believe no one can, 'cause it's the same thing with perhaps the exception that urine is much safer and easier to wash out.

The difference is that there are probably some fetish 'clubs' where you can go where you can get urinated on until your fingertips are wrinkly, if you're into that type of thing, and it is legal. If you don't want to get urinated on, don't go to a fetish club of that type.

 

[vindy500]

well maybe smash just enjoys urinating and its not his fault you got in the way... it comes back to the the line that was quoted before "my right to extend my arm ends where your nose begins"

 

[i_got_a_mohawk]

i see ny is trying to ban trans fats, here in greenville they want to eliminate smokin in public places, eatin places, bars and so on. if we as americans aint carefull we aint gona be able to do anything. whats next, no pepsi. americas children are overweight. well damn, get em outside rather than playin them video games. i aint seen a young un ride a bike or play tag. tag, oh there is another sore subject. ban tag at school. well someone might get hurt. its excersize people. why do people care what i eat? hey i can make my own decisions. no smokin in bars. who are these idiots. do i smoke, no. does it bother me when you smoke, no. people have just as much right to smoke as i do not to. that is what made america great. the ability to do what you choose. now i reckon its the civic leaders who figure what good for me. is it just me or does anyone else feel this way?

Its worse over here . . .

Smoking is banned in public places, this is a good thing tho IMO

Kids are banned from playing conkers because it could cause harm!

 

[vindy500]

but are they still allowed to play tag

 

[Siggy_Bass]

Vincent Rennich alleged got lung cancer from working in the Tropicana Casino in New Jersey.

Marlene Sharp allegedly got throat and lung cancer from working in a hotel in New South Wales.

Google it, there's a lot of them. Of course they're all alleged. As a health care professional you certainly know how difficult it is to prove the cause of cancer. Also, every one I found was an employee of the business, spending perhaps 8 hours a day in a smoking environment. They probably get a larger dose than most smokers.

+1

Plenty of those cases in Norway, and that is why it got banned. Second hand smoking, and particulary in bar/nightclubs, can be very dangerous. Especially for the people that work there or play there (like we do).

I am very happy about the new law, and I am thrilled that my new basses wont smell as bad as my brothers ol' fender. It reeks of filth and cigarette... Its not vintage, its bad!