simpler answer: look what happens when you ban things
Why do we still permit tobacco use? (2015)
191–200 of 250 posts
Re: Why do we still permit tobacco use? (2015)
#192This is one of my favorite questions in the area of social/moral governance. Put more generally: How much should we protect people from themselves? In the not-so-distant past, I'm guessing, the answer to that for most people was: Very little. After all, adults are capable and expected to make rational choices and do so every day; for themselves, and the people they cate about. So giving them more options is just help…
One thing that occurs to me is that the 'jungle law' is fairly one-sided in who can predate upon whom. We all laughed at the lady who won a big settlment for being burnt by coffee she spilled, or the people sueing Mcdonald's because they were overweight. But maybe those were opening salvos in a war that currently has the megacorps winning more ground than they should. Perhaps the parents of the next radicalised young person should sue Meta, and perhaps the jury should help take them to the cleaners. It seems to be working against Monsanto. Perhaps we need to recognise that we don't care nearly as much about how protective the megacorps are as we care about our ability to turn the tables now and then.
Re: Why do we still permit tobacco use? (2015)
#193And this is why we can't have nice things... because "we" don't "permit it". How does someone even write this sentence? Did they glance over at their crown, which says "King We", and think "thou shall not smoke!"?
Well. There's plenty of things that are illegal. How far down the libertarian rabbit hole are you prepared to go?
We've run this experiment with the War on Drugs, and prohibition before that. Puritanical attitudes towards sex before that.
Where are these people who don't think the data is in?
Re: Why do we still permit tobacco use? (2015)
#194Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well. There's plenty of things that are illegal. How far down the libertarian rabbit hole are you prepared to go?
We've run this experiment with the War on Drugs, and prohibition before that. Puritanical attitudes towards sex before that. Where are these people who don't think the data is in?
Correction - we're still running this experiment. That was rather my point.
Re: Why do we still permit tobacco use? (2015)
#195Earlier quoted context omitted.
This could also be said for alcohol though. Alcohol is associated with higher levels of motoring accidents, assaults, and chronic disease. The externalities of alcohol consumption can be largely mitigated by drinking in moderation. The primary externality of smoking, secondhand smoke, can be mitigate by having people smoke outdoors, which most countries already require in public spaces. The main secondary externality…
There's no "secondhand" alcohol drinking like there is secondhand smoking - while the effects afterwards (if someone chooses to be irresponsible after becoming inebriated) can be severe, they are mitigated by choosing safer practices such as having a ride, drinking at home, and knowing to limit oneself if they exhibit behavior that is negative toward others. With smoking, this isn't a possibility.
As I previously mentioned, secondhand smoke can be easily mitigated by smoking outside and away from other people.
Re: Why do we still permit tobacco use? (2015)
#196Earlier quoted context omitted.
There's no "secondhand" alcohol drinking like there is secondhand smoking - while the effects afterwards (if someone chooses to be irresponsible after becoming inebriated) can be severe, they are mitigated by choosing safer practices such as having a ride, drinking at home, and knowing to limit oneself if they exhibit behavior that is negative toward others. With smoking, this isn't a possibility.
> There's no "secondhand" alcohol drinking like there is secondhand smoking Counterexample: drinking while pregnant.
I would go as far as to say alcoholic parents in general.
Re: Why do we still permit tobacco use? (2015)
#197Earlier quoted context omitted.
It seems as though the beginning argument is incorrect - [0] seems to state that nicotine itself is in fact addictive. While there may be pseudo-benefits to both tobacco and nicotine, the overuse does indeed negate said effects as you've mentioned, though. [0] - https://www.fda.gov/tobacco-products/health-effects-tobacco-...
The FDA doesn't source those claims. It seems more political, than empirical. Having used nicotine, tobacco, and been around people that have used nicotine and tobacco, there is little observational evidence that is addictive, relative to every other drug out there (including caffeine). From my experience, the effects of nicotine are exceptionally mild compared to caffeine. The most serious is usually severe nausea/v…
Nicotine is addictive. Patches and gum contain extended release nicotine which might be why you think it isn’t addictive. Zyn pouches are a freebase nicotine product that the user puts in their gum like tobacco chew and is an addictive product.
Re: Why do we still permit tobacco use? (2015)
#198Smoking is bad but prohibition is worse. Being subjected to the carcercal system is worse for your health than smoking.
The issue was prohibition in the USA was that it indiscriminately criminalised selling, transporting, owning and consuming alcohol. With tobacco, modern countries could simply ban selling while allowing consumption. The risk is that the black market would flourish. I think the current policy of constantly hiking the price is a compromise: it restricts availability while limiting the development of parallel sell chann…
Banning prerolled cigarettes while allowing the sale of rolling or pipe tobacco might be a good middle ground.
Re: Why do we still permit tobacco use? (2015)
#199Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think also that developing software has no health benefits, none, but only as a counterpoint I do not wish to argue. The better argument is that something is deadly, not that something has no health benefits. What I do wish to argue is that the author failed to recognize the difference between tobacco, and what is in nearly all manufactured cigarettes, that is killing people. What is killing people is that most smo…
"Even if you don't inhale, you can get cancer from smoking pipes and cigars. People who smoke cigars regularly are 4 to 10 times more likely than nonsmokers to die from cancers of the mouth, larynx, and esophagus." [1] "Between pipe and cigarette smokers, no or only minor differences were found in mortality from any cause and the specified smoking-related diseases. Pipe smoking is not safer than cigarette smoking." […
The trouble here is that I can't see actual paper in [2], cigars don't enter into it, and that the study I referenced, and subsequent studies, show that what causes cancer is carcinogens, which are intentionally addrd by Big Tobacco to increase addictiveness. The fact is everyone has cancer, but we're not all sick because we naturally slough off cancer cells. Is anyone particularly aware of cancer rates in Native Americans from the 1300s to the 1940s? Why aren't we? Probably because they were low enough to be noise against the natural occurrences of cancer.
Smoking anything can cause emphysema, and I wasn't ever making a claim that smoking is healthy or safe, so there are some straw man fallacies present in your reply. What I was drawing attention to is that cigarettes are not tobacco, and that due to the intentional infusion of 300+ known carcinogens [1], it is no wonder it kills so many people every year. I don't have any references, but I expect before the chemical revolution in the 1950's, smoking cigarettes didn't kill remotely as many people.
Re: Why do we still permit tobacco use? (2015)
#200Simple answer, because we live in a free society and the consideration for what is outlawed isn't how beneficial an activity is for the person who engages in it but how dangerous it is to others. And so while I'm okay with banning smoking from places where others are affected, tobacco consumption in private or voluntary settings shouldn't really be an issue. Also interesting angle in the piece to declare that tobacco…
I feel like the substance should be permitted, but companies profiting from it's industrialized production should be taxed into oblivion.