Should cigarettes be illegal?

[undeterred]

Poll question: Should cigarettes be illegal?

[nightfox02]

1. hell no...

what kind of communist mickey mouse democracy would suggest that?

People must accept that there at things in life inevitably which pose a threat to your health. Second hand smoke is the only thing that people should not have to endure and more often than not they dont....

[sui generis]

12. thank you

You're in the right place.

It's weird that some people want gummint to raise our children and wipe our ass for us and we don't want to take any responsibility of our own for ourselves.

I personally think that if you go the route of making cigarettes illegal, you should also make sunbathing and eating more than 1800 calories a day illegal, oh, and you should also just move someplace where everything but fucking to reproduce is illegal.

[Atlas Mugged]

25. Don't forget booze

Oh, we tried that once before, didn't we?

Frankly, I'm completely distubed by anyone who would even suggest making cigarettes illegal. Perhaps a little lesson in Domino Theory is in order.

Besides, one of the most dangerous aspects of making abortion illegal is the Fetal Rights angle. The health of the fetus will be more important than that of the mother, and the mother will then be held responsible for every little thing she ingests that could possibly harm the incubating citizen, who will, no doubt, already be issued a social security card. Can't wait for the Fetal Protection Camps where the female of the species can be detained to insure that the rights of the fetus are not violated. But at least the mother won't have any access to black market tobacco.

BTW, congratulations for starting what will most likely be the biggest flame fest of the month!

[Dulcinea]

56. Absolutely not.

No way. Nyet. Never.

[SteppingRazor]

2. Oh, real brilliant idea there.

Turn cigarettes into a black market. Boost our prison population by lord knows how many thousands. Lose a source of tax revenue. Put half of the Carolinas out of work.

Yes, yes. This seems a fine idea.

[cdb]

4. if weed is illegal, why not ciggies? n/t

[SteppingRazor]

9. Yeah, but the answer to that is:

They should both be legal, not they should both be illegal

[sendero]

Some people...

.... think that any time there's something they don't like, it should be illegal.

How about Twinkies, what redeeming value have they? Potato chips? Corn syrup is making people fat, that certainly isn't healthy.

I could go on and on. You believe in freedom, or you don't.

[WillowTree]

14. WAIT A MINUTE!!

Are you dissing potato chips? Why, they're a modern marvel of precise calculation! Just the bare minimum amount of potato to hold the fat and salt together. I have to take issue with including chips in the list. I really do.

[sendero]

27. Or as I call them....

.... potato flavored grease sponges :)

[Patiod]

57. mmmmm....potato-flavored grease sponges

mmmmm...............

[sendero]

59. hey...

... they are not something that should be a staple of anyone's diet - but they are great with a good sandwich :)

[paineinthearse]

3. Cigarettes are a drug delivery system

...and like any other drug delivery system should be regulated by the FDA and purchased only with a prescription from a medical doctor.

[sui generis]

5. so is food

so let me be the first one to say overeating should be regulated because that causes just as many healthcare related costs.

really. (huffs off)

[SteppingRazor]

6. Which makes them illegal.

As no doctor will give a prescription for them.

[Mizmoon]

8. By that logic Cola should be regulated by the FDA

and purchased only with a prescription ... after all it's a caffine delivery device ...

[sendero]

11. Better put Starbucks....

.... and Coca Cola on the drup delivery system list.

[Walt Starr]

7. Only if Marijuana and heroin are illegal.

Same holds true for alcohol, aspirin, and chocolate.

[Protagoras]

10. I'm deeply disturbed that often...

the most passionate issue I see on DU surrounds the Cigarette debate. I'm all for worrying about it...right after we save the country from Bushco and stop keeping and torturing political prisoners and eliminate a 10 trillion dollar debt and deal with peak oil....

Then again I see Cigarettes as a corporatist issue also...subsidizing it, allowing false advertizing...public health...so maybe I'm being too harsh and it should be included with the above issues.

maybe.

[undeterred]

18. I'm not advocating making cigarettes illegal

But clearly they are more addictive, costly, and harmful than marijuana, which is illegal. There is no consistency in the way the law regulates or fails to regulate "substances".

[Protagoras]

19. very true

nt

[RebelOne]

13. I voted yes even though I am a smoker.

If they were illegal, maybe I could kick the habit.

[Ron Green]

24. Your post brings up an important point.

To what extent can we, as a society, adjust law and policy to help people combat their own bad habits? There's obviously a gray area here, but it certainly seems that some things are harmful enough that law must intervene.

Only 50 years ago, people really didn't know how harmful cigarettes really are. Public education has decreased their use among people who pay attention, but marketers are trying every trick to maintain the sale and acceptance of their product.

What I'm seeing is that tobacco is a poor person's drug, despite the price of 3 to 5 bucks a pack. This is what the market has wrought: those least able to afford this drug are the most likely to remain addicted to it.

[SteppingRazor]

30. I disagree with these sorts of laws entirely.

There should be no helmet laws, no seat belt laws, no drug laws, so on and so on. If you fly headfirst through a windshield, that was your decision. So was shooting up pure heroin and ODing. Government should not regulate personal decisions, excepting in cases where the rights of other citizens are infringed.

[wuushew]

34. Safety laws should be mandatory on PUBLIC roads

when using a public right of way you make certain concessions such as becoming licensed, obeying operating laws and not driving like an asshole.

[Ron Green]

39. It's not a black-and-white issue, but "the rights of other citizens" are

often infringed when people are irresponsible in ways that seem to harm only themselves. Public health costs, lost productivity costs, and law enforcement and court costs hurt others economically, and weaken the fabric of society.

There's lots of libertarian sentiment on this site, and while much of it flows from the natural American love of freedom and responsibility, some of it feels like reluctance to participate in progressive public policy.

[undeterred]

15. Smoking 101 Fact Sheet

Cigarette smoking has been identified as the most important source of preventable morbidity and premature mortality worldwide. Smoking-related diseases claim an estimated 440,000 American lives each year, including those affected indirectly, such as babies born prematurely due to prenatal maternal smoking and victims of "secondhand" exposure to tobacco's carcinogens. Smoking costs the United States over $150 billion each year in health-care costs including $81.9 billion in mortality-related productivity loses and $75.5 billion in excess medical expenditures.

* Cigarette smoke contains over 4,800 chemicals, 69 of which are known to cause cancer. Smoking is directly responsible for 90 percent of lung cancer deaths and approximately 80-90 percent of COPD (emphysema and chronic bronchitis) deaths.

* About 8.6 million people in the U.S. have at least one serious illness caused by smoking. That means that for every person who dies of a smoking-related disease, there are 20 more people who suffer from at least one serious illness associated with smoking.

* Among current smokers, chronic lung disease accounts for 73 percent of smoking-related conditions. Even among smokers who have quit chronic lung disease accounts for 50 percent of smoking-related conditions.

* Smoking is also a major factor in coronary heart disease and stroke; may be causally related to malignancies in other parts of the body; and has been linked to a variety of other conditions and disorders, including slowed healing of wounds, infertility, and peptic ulcer disease. For the first time, the Surgeon General includes pneumonia in the list of diseases caused by smoking.

* Smoking in pregnancy accounts for an estimated 20 to 30 percent of low-birth weight babies, up to 14 percent of preterm deliveries, and some 10 percent of all infant deaths. Even apparently healthy, full-term babies of smokers have been found to be born with narrowed airways and curtailed lung function.

* Only about 30 percent of women who smoke stop smoking when they find they are pregnant; the proportion of quitters is highest among married women and women with higher levels of educational attainment. Smoking during pregnancy declined in 2002 to 11 percent of women giving birth, down 40 percent from 1990.

* Neonatal health-care costs attributable to maternal smoking in the U.S. have been estimated at $366 million per year, or $704 per maternal smoker.

http://www.lungusa.org/site/pp.asp?c=dvLUK9O0E&b=39853

[dbonds]

16. They should not be as now.

I don't know the right answer. But they are too easy for children to get. Weed should be the same laws as ciggs and alcohol. Maybe allow the same people to sell them that sell liquor. I also don't like the idea of how the cigarette companies re-engineer their tobacco to make them more addictive. That should be stopped.

[DistressedAmerican]

17. Phohibition Has NEVER WORKED! Yet we cling to it like it is a solution

to our social ills.

WRONG! It creates social ills by putting money into the hands of those who are willing to take the legal risk to provide what people will demand regardless of the laws!

On top of that, it fills our prisons with individuals who have harmed NO One! There should be no such think as a victimless crime on the books. Who the hell is the government to tell its cititizens how they are to use their bodies? The real crime is locking someone up and destroying their lives for actions that effect from no one!

Prohibition is counterproductive bullshit. It always has been and always will be!

[Celeborn Skywalker]

20. No way!

All drug law are, IMHO, anti-freedom and anti-American.

[AntiCoup2K4]

21. If it were up to me, I'd wipe the tobacco plant off the face of the earth

It's the most addictive drug on the planet, and unlike opiates, has no medicinal value. However, as we all know from prohibition of alcohol, marijuana or any other drug, making something illegal does NOTHING but cause more problems.

What I WOULD make illegal is this obvious product placement bullshit that takes place in Hollywood movies, and has gradually moved back onto TV in recent years. No advertising on TV should mean exactly that. Don't have the vile shit on television. There's no justification of it whatsoever. Except for Phillip Morris wanting to make money, and the GOP wanting them to make money, because they are one of the greatest Republican cash cows.

[ConfuZed]

22. Yes, they serve no good purpose n/t

[Atlas Mugged]

33. Like hell they don't

They were the perfect Bette Davis prop. What the hell would you have her waving around during one of her diatribes? A lollipop?

[Catchawave]

23. If smokes become illegal....

...so should fast food joints? Obesity? Alcohol?

Of course the Surgeon General's warning does include "May result"...much like my jogging everyday "May result" in a heart attack?

I'm so sick of the Health Police,really:

http://www.lcolby.com/b-chap9.htm

[Atlas Mugged]

29. Perfume and cologne, too

I have, quite literally, been seriously sickend by second hand cologne. WHAT ABOUT *MY* RIGHTS, DAMMIT!

[Catchawave]

36. Cats too......

My husband is "mortally" allergic to them. Sadly, I can't have cats in my life, despite all the hypoallergenic rub-ons out there.

[sui generis]

42. I say we get rid of the people with allergies

damn nuisances

:evilgrin:

[Catchawave]

46. LOL...we almost got rid of my husband.....

father to my children...over a cat...when he said "me or the cat" ? He had just came home from Beirut....and spent the first 3 nights home sleeping in the driveway because he couldn't breath in the house. I guess this was a no-brainer...so sad.

[Cleita]

26. Like all drugs, they should be legal, regulated and taxed.

If cigarettes are made illegal, they will be sold in the black market like drugs and that generates crime. Do you want that?

[wuushew]

37. What if the black market resulted in fewer sales?

Since the tobacco black market would not have the benefit of government subsides and handouts it would be more difficult to produce the volume of cigarettes that industry currently does. Tobacco unlike the robust marijuana plant or the naturally occurring process of fermentation of alcohol is a product that benefits greatly from modern industrial processes.

Naturally if output was diminished but demand was unchanged fewer packs would be sold at higher prices. Some smokers would be priced out of purchasing them. The sum effect which would be fewer cases of smoking related illness which would benefit society financially and medically at the expense of the personal freedom to commit suicide in small degrees every time you light up.

[Cleita]

41. Your objections can all be taken care of with legislation. I

don't think tobacco companies should be subsidized by the government either. Smokers will smoke no matter what cigarettes cost and probably will welcome the cheaper black market version.

If my knowledge of the drug trade is any indication, you can be sure cigarettes will be obtained somewhere in the world and sold here. I lived in countries where American cigarettes were illegal, but readily available from the bootlegger, along with other American products like whiskey.

Think of the drug cartels turning to tobacco, getting coca farmers to grown it along with the coke. They know an addictive product when they see it and will encourage it to remain illegal. Think of all the murder and mayhem that go along with an illegal product that is in demand.

I wonder who is actually pushing this agenda to make tobacco illegal? I think it's big crime myself who have been behind movements in the past to bring back prohibition engaging the unsuspecting aid of Churches. Banning tobacco altogether smells of this to me. We already have plenty of laws in place to keep tobacco out of the way of those who are offended by it. As far as health risk goes, that is really between the smoker and his doctor, no one else.

[wuushew]

43. I don't doubt that a black market would exist...

just that many of the people who enjoy cigarettes include the working class and the elderly. They are assisted in their habit by the legal availability of tobacco on almost every corner gas station and convenience store in America.

The mob for all its ingenuity I doubt would be able to match the distribution system that tobacco now enjoys. As to price, illicit cigarettes would be free of taxes but also subject to higher production costs. How the consumer would come out is unknown to me but there is evidence to indicate some demand elasticity with the level of cigarette price, since high sin taxes seem to dent the use by teenagers.

[Cleita]

47. Trust me. The illegal product would be just as readily available

and more risky as far safety is concerned. And there would be higher use among teenagers since no eighteen year old or older laws would apply. As a matter-of-fact, this would be their target demographic.

Why do people want to take one of the few pleasures available to the working class and senior citizens away from them? I am a senior who quit smoking fifteen years ago, but I know many who still do and who are cutting years off their life for doing so, however, when you turn sixty-five, it becomes less important, how long you are going to live. Again, it's their choice, not mine.

As for the working class, there are programs for them to quit smoking available and a lot of peer and family pressure. Again, it's their choice. Why make smoking a bigger hazzard than it already is?

The only way to stop illegal activity like bootlegging booze and cigarettes would be to bring in laws like they have in the ME like beheading and having hands cut off etc. for drinking and having illicit sex. That keeps the population sober, however, there is a widely used drug in the ME called khat, which seems to make up for the lack of alcohol and that the mullahs don't object to.

You just can't forbid people from doing the things people do, so you make the product available, regulate it, and tax it.

[nonconformist]

48. And the lack of regulation would lead to even unsafer cigs

As well, most of your arguments could be applied to high-calorie high-fat foods.

Should Big Macs be illegal?

[wuushew]

53. No because....small amounts of junk food won't kill you

I am all for the forced labeling of food products and the regulation of food and drugs by the FDA. It may be entirely appropriate for the government to ban whole classes of substances in relation to their effect on the public. A government that attempts to micromanage a society for health reasons fails the same way a command economy fails to function in production of goods. However prohibiting the sale of a certain class of drug or products is not micromanaging. Forced monitoring of personal diet and exercise habits would be micromanaging in addition to being practically and politically impossible. Such a society would probably drift towards tyranny. Thats is of course from our western prospective, Singapore seems to function as a draconian rules based state.


The following are waste and vices common in America, all of them have beneficial uses save cigarettes. Bringing into question the libertarian standpoint can behavior be rationally arrived at when dealing with addictive mind altering substances? We usually don't trust the government to make personal decisions, however are government is full of mandatory compulsory laws that we are forced to participate in. Hopefully the wisdom of a 200 year old plus central government exceeds that of which we as individuals arrive at by adulthood.

(1)food = necessary for survival, even junk food is converted into usable sugars

(2)guns = dangerous but obviously useful to some

(3)suvs = poorly designed and wasteful, yet conceivably useful for hauling large amounts of cargo on rough terrain.

(4)booze = naturally occurring and processed by the liver. Benefits of moderate consumption include improved heart health and possible defense against brain diseases.

(5)pot = beneficial to AIDS,cancer patients,glaucoma, etc. not chemically addictive.

(6)Gambling=regressive form of "voluntary taxation" which seems to be avoided by the rich. Of the few benefits, income for Native American tribes.

(7)cigarettes = 100% harmful to lungs and circulatory system. Active ingredient nicotine is readily available in gums and patches despite being extremely chemically addictive.

[nonconformist]

54. I prefer to err on the side of freedom

In an ideal world, cigarettes would have never been invented in the first place. But they were and they're actively used world-wide legally. Making them illegal now would be quite draconian - or at the very least viewed that way by the majority people, smokers or not.

[CarefullyLiberal]

28. Why make cigarettes illegal?

Just allow health insurance companies to cancel anyone's policy that smokes.

-Fergus

[jim3775]

31. No

As much as I hate cigarettes and as bas as they are and as evil as the tobacco companies are, we shouldn't be legislating what people can and cannot put in their bodies. It would be hypocritical for me to be for the legalization of marijuana and for the criminalization of processed tobacco.

That said though I am for major anti-smoking campaigns, banning cigarette ads and banning smoking in public places.

I also think the tobacco companies should be fined for promoting smoking to children in Africa. The WHO is trying to get African countries to sign the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) which restricts tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship.

News Link

[nightfox02]

32. cant believe 14 people on THIS BLOG say yes

Do you all have any idea what FREEDOM means? God help us all if we think the govment needs to regulate the rate at which we take a piss in ml/sec...

Damnit, this is not the america i grew up in....

[boohootwo]

55. I voted YES,

I am a lung cancer patient and I don't want anyone else to go where I've been.

[booley]

35. Prohibition wouldn't work

yes cigarettes are harmful, deadly even. yes they are addictive, And yes , they are a health hazard to everybody around the smoker. (I know most smokers wil continue to say otherwise but sorry..second hand smoke is just as deadly)

BUT alchohol is also dangerouse and addictive. Prohibition didn't do a damn thing to fix this but it did create the Mafia and the seeds for an ever intrusive government.

And then we have the drug war. Long before Iraq, our freedoms were beign stripped away to fight the other war..on drugs.

Who buys the "war on Drugs " rhetoric anymore?

I'm all for cigerettes being restricted, not being sold to kids and banned from certain establishments. Hell, in amy darker moments I wouldn't mind if cig execs were put up against a wall and shot. I have lost way to many of my relatives to smoking, includingmy mother.

BUT I know prohibition won't stop more smoking deaths. It never has before.

[Coexist]

38. I voted no and I have had relatives die from smoking related illness

One is in hospice as we speak. 5 family members in all have died because they chose to smoke. They wanted to, even when they were sick. Who am I to make that choice for them. I think it is a stupid choice, but not mine to make.

[HughBeaumont]

40. Hard to say -

On the one hand, I should say yes, since that horrid industry advertised cigarettes as "healthy", "a digestive aid", "won't get your wind" back in the 40s and 50s. They gave them to GIs for free. Every glamorous star, athlete and movie shilled them. With no one to tell them those things shit up your health (besides the obvious common sense that inhilation of burning leaves, tar and paper just might not be the best thing to do anyway), millions of Americans got the green light to kill themselves. One of them was my grandmother, who died at the ripe old age of 49 thanks to her pack-and-a-half a day habit.

On the other hand, prohibition of anything has never worked and illegalizing marijuana and LSD sure as shit isn't working now. It shouldn't be up to the government to babysit everyone and, again, common sense should tell the smoker: You choose to partake in this habit, blame no one but yourself when you have respiratory infections, emphysema, renal failure, heart problems, etc, later on in life. The minute you lit up and stayed that way, don't blame the damned tobacco industry because no one held a gun to your head. This isn't the pre-post WWII era - you knew the things didn't act as a Maalox and no one but the tards at Newsmax champion these things as healthy.

What do you say, though, to the situation of a kid having great parents, a good home life, no apparent problems, ones who love them and regularly talk to them about the dangers of drug and cigarette use . . . but the kid ends up tossing all that shit out the window and smokes up anyway?

Really, maybe it's because I've never even tried one, but I'm not understanding the initial appeal. Seriously, what makes a person look at cigarettes, which make the smoker and the surrounding air smell like a planet of moldy ass, cost an assload of money thanks to taxation, slowly destroy your health and think "Man, learning from other people's mistakes is overrated - it's far more rewarding to make them on my own. Yep, that's for me."

:shrug:

[Toots]

44. Only in Public

People should have the right to do any damn thing they wish in private as long as it doesn't hurt otherts. Once they take it public then I have to say get it out of my air. You have no right to polute public air. No more than I have a right to polute public water or public food. the human being needs three things to sustain life. Food water and air. Why should you have the right to polute (poison) any of those three things and endanger my life. I could give a shit what you wish to do in Private but not in public....

[nonconformist]

45. Absolutely not.

And my grandmother died of lung cancer at 52.

It's called "freedom".

I also think marijuana should absolutely be legal, and using that as an argument for why cigarettes should NOT be is highly flawed.

There are few public places, save some bars, the rare restaurant and casinos where you can smoke anymore.

Banning cigarettes would be as huge of a failure as Prohibition was. They would go underground, free of any regulation. You think our jails are overcrowded with petty criminals now, it would be a nightmare. There would be a number of negative results from such a law, and people would continue to smoke... just like they continued to drink during Prohibition.

[dean_dem]

49. I'm all for making tobacco illegal.

I mean, look how well the War on Drugs has worked! No more drugs anywhere, right?

[Adelante]

50. Driving cars should be illegal

It's feeds our horrible addiction to oil. It poisons the air we breathe. It brings us to war and repression.

[Atlas Mugged]

51. Peanuts!!!!

Seriously, we had a couple of over zelous parents try and outlaw all peanuts and peanut related products in their child's Grand Island school because he was deathly allergic to them. While I sympathize with the childs plight, I object to outlawing a common (and, in some cases, essential) food product in a grade school. I can only assume that the parents will follow the child throughout life, suing colleges, workplaces, ballparks, whatever, just to insure their child can have a "normal" life.

They lost the case. Quite frankly, when I saw them on the news (repeatedly) pushing their cause I was completely repelled by them. Creepy, holier-than-thou assholes who were convinced that they were the only decent parents to walk the face of the earth. For having only one child, they were very vocal about what lousy parents everyone else is. They gave a whole new meaning to 'yuppie scum'. Very cold and superior in their demeanor when they should've been a bit humble about such an outrageous demand. "Demand" - not "request". Oh, and they didn't want their child on medication of any kind; that would be "unthinkable".

It was also brought out in the trial that the parents insane obsession with germs could well have contributed to the child's compromised immunity system.

[tinrobot]

52. Outlaw it! We could fill even more jails with cheap labor...

Think of the possibilities for corporations!

:sarcasm:

[Bluzmann57]

58. NO!

And I am a former cigarettte smoker, who some say is a more self righteous bastard than those who never smoked. But there is such a thing as freedom of choice. There are laws in place to restrict the sales of smokes to minors and so on. If cigarettes are made illegal, could alcohol be far behind? Marijuana should be legalized too. Tax it like cigarettes and alcohol and governmental officials could sit back and watch the money roll in. Just my opinion though.

[grumpy old fart]

60. Enough with all this Mommy Gov't crap....

people who want to be stoned all day should be stoned all day....not in jail. People who want to smoke and die early, should smoke and die early. Sheesh, if bad habits were all illegal....

[coolhandlulu]

61. All nasty drugs should be illegal!

So basically pot is the only one that would be legal in my reality. Cigarette smokers, of which I'm one, have nicotine stained fingers and teeth...and the second hand smoke kills innocents. People drink, piss on themselves and then become violent. I won't even go into coke and heroin. They are just plain evil! But this war on drugs is really just war on marijuana. Doesn't make much sense to me. Weed is so peaceful.

[Zorra]

62. I don't smoke, and I hate cigarettes, but

I am not in favor of passing laws to deny anyone else the right to kill themselves or make themselves sick if that is what they really want to do.

I am very much in favor of passing laws banning smoking in most all public places excepting some bars maybe. I do not feel that I should be forced to breathe polluted air because of someone else's bad habits.

And I do believe that tobacco companies should be fully liable for all the death, disease and destruction that they cause. After all, they are nothing but legal multinational corporate drug dealing merchants of addiction, disease, and death. And, therefore, naturally, they are also all major contributors to republican party.

Warning: Cigarette smoking is hazardous to democracy's health.

[killbotfactory]

63. No! prohibition doesn't fucking work!

End of story. Do not pass go until you learn from history.

[edhopper]

64. Yes

Cigarettes are the single biggest killers in this country. If any other product killed most of it's consumers it would be banned. I don't think smoking cigarettes should be made illegal, but producing and selling them should. This would in effect stop most of it's use. And yes, it does kill innocent nonsmokers, The effect of second hand smoke on heart attacks is staggering. Viox was taken off the market because it caused a slight increase in heart attacks. It's other benefits were very positive, yet no one cried "prohibition". I do not think we have to comfort addicts by making their addiction easy.
I do not see how people defend the single biggest health threat we have in this country.

[Zhade]

65. No, but neither should marijuana, which is safer and actually beneficial.

I support a person's right to self-sovereignty over their own body.