Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Why do we still permit tobacco use? (2015)

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 250 posts

Re: Why do we still permit tobacco use? (2015)

#71

Post by jondwillis »

ravi-delia wrote: post #50
willcipriano wrote: post #45

> However, there is no moderation in tobacco. There is no level at which tobacco smoke is safe for the consumer or the people around them or, as we are seeing, even those who are exposed in a tertiary environment. I've used tobacco products perhaps from 0 - 5 times a year from adulthood on. While not "safe", pretty low risk. I have the same relationship with caffeine and alcohol. Nothing can be all that enjoyable if…

You know what, that's the first good plan I've seen for handling the issue.

Would love to give myself a vice ban occasionally.

Re: Why do we still permit tobacco use? (2015)

#73

Post by 11235813213455 »

That's also what I sometimes say to smokers "it has no benefit at all, only drawbacks, it's just an addiction and you can decide to stop if you understand it's damaging" (my mother died at 63 from lung cancer), and there are many subjects here in France. It's also quite annoying to breath that smoke anywhere outside. That's one of the things I hope will change, along with noise (cars, motorcycles as someone living near a street, and using a bicycle) and pollution, and overconsumerism

Re: Why do we still permit tobacco use? (2015)

#74

Post by woodruffw »

ReptileMan wrote: post #46
woodruffw wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think many people would like to see their loved ones live longer, healthier lives and die with relative comfort. That doesn't require being denial about their mortality.

And yet the loved ones decision how to live their lives greatly outweigh what many people would like to see. Having more pleasurable life when young while trading for a more gruesome death after 80 is not that bad of trade off. There was a joke: - Drinking, smoking and whoring shorten your life with 6 years. - Which six? Between 92 and 98 - take it.

I don't disagree. But it's also not clear why the government should incentivize individually cheap, collectively expensive personal decisions like current smoking patterns.

Re: Why do we still permit tobacco use? (2015)

#75

Post by tptacek »

andybak wrote: post #67
tptacek wrote: post #40

You could construct an equivalent argument about bacon.

Anyone can throw in a silly comparison but it doesn't really help. I'm fairy certain you're smart enough to reflect on the nuance that this topic deserves. Some bad things are legal. Some bad things aren't. It's a complex thing for society to weigh up and the linked article attempts to contribute to that discussion.

I'm not being glib. This article is premised on the idea that because there are no health benefits to tobacco (none.), it has no value whatsoever. But it clearly does have value: it is a source of pleasure for a large number of people. Pleasure has value. People shouldn't smoke, it makes perfect sense to vice-tax it to offset the externalities, and nobody should valorize the companies profiting from those externalities. But the reason we "permit" it is because we have no business not permitting it: we have centuries of experience showing that, unlike opiates and methamphetamine, there is no risk of tobacco destabilizing society.

It's a comically weak argument. It could, as I just said, be applied just as readily to bacon.

Re: Why do we still permit tobacco use? (2015)

#76

Post by dageshi »

klyrs wrote: post #62
kadoban wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does this apply to other drugs as well?

Few drugs are as harmful as tobacco.

Not all tobacco products are equal because not all tobacco products are intended to be inhaled. Cigars and Pipe tobacco aren't intended to be inhaled and most people will not find them addictive.

But there's no nuance regarding them in discussion of tobacco. They do likely have negative issues in terms of potential mouth cancer, but they're way less dangerous than cigarettes.

Re: Why do we still permit tobacco use? (2015)

#78

Post by retrac »

beloch wrote: post #53

"Our governments collect $2.81 billion in tobacco sales taxes federally (2), which is >1% of all federal government spending in 2013 (3) ... However, the direct and indirect cost of lung cancer, asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease in Canada is $12.0 billion (2012 figure), of which smoking is considered to be the number one cause (4). That’s not a good trade-off, even if you only consider it economically.…

> The public willed it [...] because politicians have the power to prohibit it, not doctors

At face value you seem to be arguing for a medical technocracy to replace democracy.

Pre-legalization I expected the government to strongly discourage /smoking/ cannabis. Edibles and sprays and non-combusting vapes would be emphasized. But nope, my local cannabis shop prominently sells rolling papers and bongs. You can buy pre-rolled joints ready to go from the government distributor directly.

I feel this aspect of legalization was handled poorly. The public wanted legal cannabis. Our politicians should have done so while emphasizing harm reduction. They talked about it but perhaps unsurprisingly it didn't really materialize.

Re: Why do we still permit tobacco use? (2015)

#79

Post by CaptArmchair »

Because tobacco use is deeply engrained in culture, economy, politics, etc. There are tons of social and economical interests tied into all of that.

Tobacco use has a long history. Archeological finds indicate that humans in the Americas began using tobacco as far back as 12,300 years ago, thousands of years earlier than previously documented.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_tobacco

Also, society doesn't consist of people who all share the same mindset or the same faculties to come to a particular notion. There's a wild amount of diversity which defines people's identity. It is said that you can't reason someone out of a position they haven't reasoned themselves into. If you were raised in an environment with tobacco use, there's a high likelihood you're going to be a smoker from a young age as well.

Wholesale prohibiting tobacco use sounds like an easy fix. But it really isn't. Prohibitionism as a legal philosophy has its fair share of criticism as well:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prohibitionism

Consider the complex history of Prohibition in the U.S. during the 1920s:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prohibition_in_the_United_Stat...

That doesn't mean tobacco, alcohol or any other drug consumption is problematic. It very much is, and it comes with immense suffering and a massive societal cost which shouldn't be ignored. But instead of approaching consumption as a singular law enforcement issue, the bigger challenge is to approach the education, healthcare, social, culture and economical issues that lead to the promotion of such consumption.

Even then, it's a pipedream to assume that the entirety of humanity will ever stop using tobacco. Or other substances for that matter.

Re: Why do we still permit tobacco use? (2015)

#80

Post by cmrdporcupine »

63 wrote: post #43
cmrdporcupine wrote: post #24

I enjoy the plant. I grow it in my garden for the beautiful scented flowers, and then I dry it or buy higher quality pipe tobacco and smoke it in my pipe in the summer and fall. Or a nice cigar when I'm on vacation in a warm place. The industrial cigarette product.. yeah that's something else. Gross. But I don't see how the two can be reasonably separated from each other, though, and how you can realistically police…

You've hit upon the article's exact thesis.

Not really, I read the article and saw the thesis, and I took exception to the "tobacco has no benefit", hence what I was saying about the beauty of the plant and the pleasure of some of the product. Many things have no benefit when taken from that same angle of medical analysis. The tobacco plant has benefits like many other pleasures, and a long social history on this continent of North America and in this region, among the people who were here before my people.

Despite people's dubious health claims about anti-oxidants and resveratrol, wine also has "no benefit" when taken from this angle. Alcohol generally, beyond its anti-septic/cleansing properties. But it has at least a 10,000 year history of pleasurable and social use, like tobacco.

It just has to be taken in the right context and the culture around it one of education and management of risks and context.

Post reply on HN