I've enjoyed smoking for a long time. Because of this, I feel that I am well-qualified to advise nonsmokers on just how to reason with the 60 million Americans who indulge in tobacco. Public smoking has become a very controversial issue and one I am passionate about; for those of us who choose to smoke are among the most persecuted and discriminated-against segment of the world's population.
At one time, smokers made up about half of the adult inhabitants of this country. When the practice became linked to lung cancer and heart disease some 45 years ago, the proportional number of smokers began to decline. By the early 1990's, the ratio of nonsmokers to smokers had increased to about 80/20. This figure has remained fairly steady into the first decade of the new century, but despite this, it is estimated that around 3000 people begin smoking every day.
My induction into the smoking community began back in 1974. I was a few months shy of 15, and I thought smoking was cool. In those days, just about everybody did. It defined maturity. Sophistication. Smoking had sex appeal. It also defined something else: addiction. I will defend smokers until the day I die, yet there is no disputing that cigarettes are perhaps the most habit-forming substance on the planet. Before long, what started out as a consumption of 3 or 4 cigarettes a day became an entire pack of 20. Since then, I have doubled that to 2 packs; so on average I have had a cigarette in my mouth once every hour for the past 34 years! Do you still question my veteran experience?
Now I shall once again attempt to unveil our side of this issue of public smoking, and hence what angers me the most. Smoking was perfectly acceptable for decades and even centuries. That is; untill 1993, the fateful year in which the Environmental Protection Agency declared that "secondhand smoke" was a threat to nonsmokers. Logic and common sense were not questioned. Instead, most nonsmokers suddenly and unequivocally decided that their very lives were in peril at the very sight of seeing somebody light up. It didn't matter that literally, the day before, there was no problem. Certainly there were a few rude individuals who would wave arms about and deliberately fake a cough the split second a smoker entered a room before 1993, but these types made up perhaps 1 person per 1000. After 1993, these people came out of the woodwork as if an infestation of cockroaches had taken control. To make matters worse, they claimed that smoke "always" bothered them. Uh huh. Sure, it did.
Here's what really happened: they were brainwashed; programmed if you will, to loathe tobacco smoke. How? The government told them that it endangered their health just as if they were smokers themselves. To this day, I remain astonished at how very few questioned the "sudden" claims of the EPA. Even more amazing were the "landmark" studies that followed this figurative New Testament. Over the next few months, all kinds of ailments were suddenly attributed to smoking. Impotence. Mental retardation. SIDS. Breast cancer. Asthma. In addition, nonsmokers suddenly developed the olfactory senses of predatory sharks. The claim that earns the top spot as my personal favorite; perhaps because it is so insulting to the intelligence, is that people can now tell whether or not someone in a car moving 70 mph down the highway is smoking just by smell! Our understanding of physics has also changed; for now tobacco smoke has the incredible ability to pass through walls and then to opposite ends of buildings, even if we're talking about something the length of a naval aircraft carrier. It goes without saying that the dreaded "secondhand smoke" must then therefore also be capable of traveling upwards. So, if you're on the 100th floor of the Empire State Building, you'd better make sure that somebody down on Floor 20 isn't sneaking a cigarette. It could be deadly. It's as if a mass hysterical stupidty has enveloped the thought processes of tens of millions of people since the EPA report of 1993. That; in a nutshell, is what is so frustrating.
I've stated this time and time again since smokers have become second-class citizens: If one would pause for a moment and really think about these and countless other preposterous claims, I'd like to believe that he or she would realize how ridiculous they really are. Unfortunately, until then, those who smoke will remain on the bottom of humanity's social ladder.
It doesn't have to be that way.