Capitol Hill Blue Forums Political Issues Constitutional Issues Smoking in Public and Whose Rights are they?

So Big Daddy is again made part of our society. I live in a senior development where anyone can smoke anywhere they damn please. It's called respect for the residents. Are we going to legislate that deodordant must be used before going into other people's presence? What about bad breath? Must we be forced into chewing gum before heading out the door?

I don't smoke and have no problem if anyone wants to light up in my home or anywhere. My husband smoked a pipe at all times. Alan smokes cigars. So what? People put up with cat hair in my home and I should tell them not to smoke?

I don't like this new attitude of pushing one's own problems on all others. I'm not comfortable in crowds so I don't shop in malls. I'm not comfortable having to listen to the crap on the music stations in every damn store where I live. When some woman who has yet to locate a music note in her voice starts screaming while I'm shopping, I lose my train of thought. I hear a slide guitar and I want to search for what the hell he is trying to find on his instrument. Should I start a movement to stop being assaulted by such sounds? I've been known to walk out of Safeway stores here when the music is an assault and also too loud. I stop by the manager's office and wave.

I kept my bookstore on soft classical music and I wish I could tell you how many people came in and loved the atmosphere brought to you by J.S. Bach. I had Glenn Dictarow's mother come in and spend several hours just taking in a pianist I hired to play on Sunday in the store. She sat down and they did some 4 handed musical improvisations. I do believe she even had a cigarette during her visit. What a horror!!!

Nice sweeping generalization Phil. Thanks for letting me know that I am neither smart nor caring enough to not smoke in your presence (even if I'm asked). Thankfully there are laws to protect you from me.

Jeffro, I should have added "many" to that sentence to exempt you and others who may exhibit that level of concrn. It has been my experience that without laws restricting smokers, they would light up anywhere they desired. It used to happen in movie theaters, restaurants, in fact everywhere.

Now I ask you, is that a right you have? If so, where does your right end and mine begin to be able to breathe non-toxic air? And do you really have laws to protect you from me? Wow.

Phil:

your post,Individualism that is aimed at personal rather than communal interests is retarded development. It is a natrual stage for a teenager who must hold parents at bay to prove that he or she has the right to be separate and have separate interests.

But if the teenager never gets to the point of seeing that one's life is given as a gift to the world around oneself, life is never actualized and one is left empty and unsatisfied. The illusion that being an individual is the highest form of human expression is a deformation of life and like any cancer, will either kill the host or lead it into a painful existence.

The natrual rights of man, to the extent they exist as more than a shiboleth, are natural only if the add to the planet and its inhabitants. If not they are an abberation, a deviate state, an evil illness that needs heeling.
_________________________My Question?????

Would all this post of yours apply to homosexuality also????
Just a thought...Mike D.

of course it does, Grassroots. And I am proud of the many contributions homosexuals have made to the planet throughout mankind's history.

Phil:

Then I hope you are happy in your [deleted] development....


Mike D.

I remember those days well. I remember smoking in the office, on airplanes, etc. I remember televison commercials for cigarettes complete with catchy jingles ("you can take Salem out of the country, but...") Perhaps, as a non-smoker, you felt you were held prisoner by the acceptance of smoking. Of course it was legal to smoke in those places then. That was a long time ago. I was always polite to people who did not smoke or would rather I not smoke around them.

Is it a right? I suppose as much as it is a right to wear cologne (which bothers my sinuses and makes my eyes water) or to drive a car with emissions that harm the environment and potentially my health. Do you have the right to do those things? Even if they cause discomfort or danger to me? Sure, why not? It's legal.

As for where my rights end and yours begin, using the smoking example, I would say my rights end: in bars, restaurants, office buildings, government buildings, parks, beaches, airplanes, airports, stores, hospitals, some apartment complexes, movie theaters, hotels, motels, buses, trains... so really anywhere but my apartment and sometimes outside. I'm waiting for the day that is no longer permitted, then I guess I'll just go hang out with Sandy, she seems to be okay with it.

Then we agree, Jeffro

I have yet to read of anyone here claiming that smokers have a right to smoke anywhere they want, Phil. The focus has been on people being granted the privilege of smoking in or on someone else's property -- a bar for example. It has been about the property owner deciding if smoking will be allowed by others on his property as a part of his property rights -- not the government.

You bring up "public accommodation" which is nothing more than a subversive artifice used to infringe on another's property Rights by a non-owner or a group of non-owners who are powerful or influential enough to have politicians help them take partial control of another's property.

You do not have a right to be free of tobacco smoke on another person's property. You do have the right to leave, or not enter, or go where an owner does not allow smoking.

The bottom line is you and others who demand that property owners Rights should be curtailed to please you, base your demand on nothing less than the morally reprehensible
principle of "Might makes Right". As usual, it is about being able to control or push others around.
Yours,
Issodhos

Issodhos, it is always "might" of some sort having the power. It is the "right" of an owner (who has title only because the majority have agreed on such a system) or the "right" of the majority to regulate what happens there.

I fail to see how you draw the line at regulation at smoking. Are you saying that the government has no right to regulate what happens on private property (a notion which is, btw, supported only by the claim it exists at all and sold to an unsuspecting public as the "natural" order)? I know it is embedded in the philophical roots of this nation but that still doesn't give it any reality.

My point however is that unless there is no right to regulation then I would have to ask why is smoking so privileged? Why pick that to say there is no right for government to regulate smoking on private property in some circumstances?