On this day in 1964,
In a landmark report, U.S. Surgeon General Luther Leonidas Terry issued the warning that smoking may be hazardous for one’s health, concluding that it has a causative role in lung cancer, chronic bronchitis, emphysema, and other illnesses.
That’s how long it’s been since there’s been no excuse. (From Wikipedia.)
It’s bad enough that people do this to themselves — smoke cigarettes — despite what everybody has known in those 44 years. What is also remarkable is the hypocrisy of everyone else in the murder-suicide chain — but most of all, the state, which profits massively from tobacco taxes excised from addicts and from corporate and business taxes on the manufacture and sale of cigarettes, which doles out billion-dollar legal fees to politically-connected law firms that represent the “victims,” runs the judicial system that let that dirty deal go down, and pretends in the most preposterously transparent manner to actually care about who smokes.
Our country and our economy are addicted to assisted suicide by tobacco, and almost all of us are, one way or another, in on the game.
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Of those smokers I know, the vast majority of them started smoking almost as an initiation rite into some counter-cultural faux rebellion phase of life and could have cared less about the side effects…at the time. What was far more important to them was the social benefits in the short term. Stupidity personified, but they were never contemplating ‘suicide by tobacco’, just under the delusion of youth that the consequences are forever over the horizon.
Don’t worry about it. When the government gets around to providing universal healthcare these kind of health travesties will go away. The cost of insuring and covering the loosers who insist on trashing their body and living life in such carefree and dangerous manner is far to high to sustain a government sponsored health care system. Gone will be all those high-risk dangers like smoking, drinking and driving a bit to fast. Don’t worry Uncle Sam is here to SAVE the day… or maybe Aunt Sam.
But why stop there? We must ban fast food, private transportation, gym attendances, and guns! For Health! For the Children! For the State!
Oh carp, that’s failing to exercise that I was attempting to convey above.
The real problem here, and one that has been sadly under-reported is that while smoking indeed contributes to deaths, it is far behind the number one cause: birth.
We as a country and an economy are addicted to ‘births’ despite the manifest suffering that they cause. Only by ending birth can we hope to end death.
I go back and forth on this. I’ve seen up close and personal, as well as scientifically, that addiction is a disease that cannot simply be cured by “manning up and having some discipline.” People who start smoking often notice no real negative effects for many years, and of course I’ve known people well into their 70s and 80s who smoked since they were kids and still had no major health problems. It is an adult choice, and an often enjoyable habit, and at one time was enjoyed by a majority of people, and it is still wildly popular around the world.
So, starting is a choice, and a risk. Quitting, on the other hand, is not so easy a choice, which is the danger.
I started smoking (tobacco) at age 15, when I was too dumb to take the problem seriously. Since then I’ve quit and restarted numerous times. Will I feel I was sufficiently warned if I come down with a deadly condition as a result? Yeah I’d have to say I think I would, so I have real problems with the lawsuit industry. But I have a hard time taking a hardline stance on it to be honest.
When I was a kid, I couldn’t wait to grow up, because grownups got to do fun things like smoking, drinking, driving fast cars and motorcycles. Most people didn’t live to be 101, but as most 101 year-olds will tell you, the joys of sitting in a wheelchair all day watching the weather channel are seriously overrated.
Now the joys of being a grownup are part of a murder-suicide chain. No wonder no one wants to grow up anymore.
Smoking is a contributing factor in causing health problems, but is NOT the only cause. Other factors also play a part, from other habits, how much sleep you get, how you deal with stress, what you eat, your own DNA, what is in the air and water you consume everyday, what mother earth emits everyday around you….
The Government should educated, but I am against bans, and outlawing things for the individual good.
It is not a murder suicide chain. If one consumes tobacco within their own bodies tolerances, then no harm is done. Yes tobacco is addictive, took me 5 years to stop after 20 years of use, but it can be done. My mom has a very high tolerance to the negative effects of tobacco, she is now 70 years old, with the same health problem she has had for the past 40 years, sinitus. No cancer, No breathing problems, and still enjoys smoking tobacco. So I inherited some of her’s tolerance, but I also inherited my dads high cholesterol, and potential heart problems.
So in some people the surgeon generals warning is true, while in other people it is false. How does one no which category they fall in, now that is a 64 million dollar question.
Ron,
Do you view the automobile industry as an assisted suicide industry? After all, a lot of people are killed by cars in one way or another. Cars are tools, but then smoking tends to make it easier to stay thin — so you can view it as a weight loss tool.
Do you mean motorcycles and fast cars, or fast cars and fast motorcycles? My brother (the radiologist) calls motorcycles “donormobiles.”
Do you mean motorcycles and fast cars, or fast cars and fast motorcycles? My brother (the radiologist) calls motorcycles “donormobiles.”
True. The grownups I knew best (my parents) had fast cars and slow motorcycles. Motorcycles look like fun, but since I’m kind of wobbly on bicycles, I know I’d be deadly on anything with two wheels and a motor.
Just from conversations I’ve had with friends who ride, I’d guess that the death/injury rate is high. But the death and injury rate for people who pursue certain professions, like farming or commercial fishing is also high. Their death/injury rate might be higher then the rate for smokers. What are you going to do, that’s life…
Well it is true that many people ignore the warnings about what is and isn’t good for the human body. In the case of smoking it’s probably fairly accurate. OTOH when it comes to food and diet I don’t think science has a clue.
However personally I don’t care if anyone smokes cigarettes marijuana, or eats rocks until their ass bleeds.
It is their business and none of the governments.
If we are to subsidize the health care of smokers, or drug addicts, it should be only for getting them clean.
If a person choses to smoke/use drugs, and decides to not ask for help, the government should let them die. Charities, friends and family members, or private health insurance can address their health problems.
However, the government MUST provide good solid education to children so they are informed of the ramifications of their decisions.
CaliforniaJOSH-
What say we revisit your statement when it’s somebody you care about being told to go away and die.
I watched my grandmother die from smoking.
I was sad.
I also thought she was a complete f*cking idiot.
Part of me wants to weep at her grave.
Another part of me wants to spit on it.
My sympathies are with you.
I still think you are a fool.
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