Another ridiculous smoking ban, another nail in the coffin of civil liberties.

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08260/912516-114.stm

We all know how I feel about smoking bans in bars and restaraunts in general - and I'm not even a smoker -- and I know how many of you, like JR, feel about them and we've all pretty much agreed to disagree on them.

But someone please explain to me how in a free society, it is acceptable and something we should celebrate to allow politicians to ban smoking outdoors on the campuses of public universities. It is outrageous and very Un-American.

Regardless of how you feel about smoking, this -- banning of smoking outdoors now -- is utter bullshit and one more step down the slippery slope towards this country becoming the hammer and sickle.

 

This attitude is why the smokers lose:

 

I'm as anti-smoking as you can get. (Lost too many loved ones to lung cancer.) But if they're going to ban smoking outdoors, one presumes they'll also do away with barbecue grills at the schools' on-campus football tailgate parties? And how about those Homecoming bonfires? Call the cops!

 

No, this is why the smokers lose:

 

I was surprised at the situation at a certain NFL stadium I attended for the first time recently. Smokers couldn't smoke on the grounds outside the stadium, and no one could step off the grounds and then return. I saw lot of ticked off people at halftime.

 

There was a time when factories and chemical plants could send emissions into the air and water unchecked, without any repercussions or responsibility to society and health issues. The government changed that to some extent, and violators pitched a fit. Does that mean we should go back to unrestricted pollution and exposing bystanders to toxins?

Civilized societies learn what's healthy and what's not, and along the way change is uncomfortable. It's going to get worse for smokers, not better, and they should start getting use to the idea.

 

Aside from my wife, I believe I am the most fervent advocate of smoking bans there is. Bars, restaurants, hotels -- people should not be allowed to smoke in any of them, because they affect my ability to enjoy those places and, more so, because they create an unsafe work environment for those employed there.
But outdoors on a college campus?
This is ridiculous.
I don't like inhaling others' smoke when I'm leaving a building and they're all right there, or when I'm walking down a sidewalk and they're directly in front of me. But if the smokers will accept the inconvenience of being forced outdoors, I'll accept those inconveniences to get them from the indoors.
This isn't about civil liberties, Zag. There is no fundamental right to smoke, to pollute the air others are breathing. But it is about civility. The colleges are being unreasonable here, and it could hurt the status of legitimate bans everywhere.

 

To echo the above sentiment, there is no fundamental right to smoke. Therefore, an institution, public or private, can regulate whether or not it will allow smoking to occur on its property. These people are individual polluters.

 

Exactly.

And let's be clear. This is Clarion University's policy based on the state law, not specific legislation banning smoking outdoors on all public college campuses in the state. The University of Pittsburgh and Pann State University are sticking with their already standing policies -- no smoking indoors, at building entrances or near air-intakes for buildings.

So, are Pitt and Penn State out of line, too? Or is it just Clarion's interpretation that is too much?

 

This isn't new folks.

My kids go to a university in Nova Scotia and there's no smoking allowed anywhere on campus. That ban has been in place for four years now.

Zag would have been whining and bitching when companies told their employers they couldn't light up at their desk or the family doctor put a no smoking sign in his office or the local transit authority said you can't smoke on the subway any longer.

Talk about beating a dead horse.

 

If someone smokes and they're outside, it's their right to do so. Enough is enough.

 

Re: Another ridiculous smoking ban, another nail in the coffin of civil libertie

Fuck smokers, and especially, fuck the effects of smoking that needlessly drive up my share of the public health care bill.