Witch-hunt in the workplace
Friday, December 2, 2011 at 10:15 The Boston Globe reports that health officials in the city have voted to ban the use of e-cigarettes in the workplace.
The ban also covers "restaurant patios and decks".
Given that e-cigarettes pose no threat to anyone other than the user (and there is no compelling evidence to support even that claim), a ban seems unnecessarily restrictive.
At the very most it's a matter for employers to decide policy.
If however you consider e-cigarettes to be a harm reduction product, as many people do, a ban makes even less sense. Far from restricting their use, you would think that health officials would want to encourage it in order to reduce people's dependence on cigarettes.
But no. They prefer smokers to experience cold turkey, a policy fiercely opposed by the late quit smoking guru Alan Carr who considered workplace smoking bans to be hugely detrimental to those wanting to give up or cut down. (Cutting down, you may have noticed, is no longer an option. Tobacco control activists say smokers must quit - or die.)
Alternatively smokers should use only products manufactured and supplied by the pharmaceutical giants.
It seems that the humble cigarette, and anything resembling a cigarette, has taken on the mantle of witchcraft as a potentially harmful force. Consumers are already demonised. At this rate it can only be a matter of time before they are banished, imprisoned or worse for their steadfast wickedness.
Boscastle in Cornwall is home to the Museum of Witchcraft. It is said to house the world's largest collection of "witchcraft related artefacts and regalia". Perhaps they should add to the collection cigarette packs, lighters and e-cigarettes.
See: City puts restriction on use of e-cigarettes (Boston Globe)
Reader Comments (10)
ecigs are virtually odourless, so in many workplaces, banning them is impossible.
As always the anti smoker groups demonstrate it is not about health, but about control.
The Swedish government recently lobbied John Dalli the Health Commissioner to legalise snus in the EU and were turned down flat. Sweden has the lowest smoking and lung cancer rates in Europe, I think smoking rates are 15%.
Is Big Pharma to blame? It would not surprise me in the least. It is widely acknowledged that they lobbied John Dalli (again!) to have homeopathic/herbal remedies banned and the Directive came into force in May 1st of this year.
In the You Tube video entitled "The EU: run by and for lobbyists" Dan Hannan Tory MEP for South East England accuses Big Pharma of exactly this. He also adds that without the EU, Big Pharma would never have been able to get it passed by national governments.
http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/europe-to-ban-hundreds-of-herbal-remedies-2171781.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q96H1FqDTbQ
I put the following post on about an hour ago. It suddenly disappeared - here it is again 11.47.
The Anti-Smoking League has become so strong that people are really seeing the Emperor's new clothes before he even tells them he has put them on.
I'll give you a fine example: My wife took out her 8 year old grandaughter a couple of weeks ago, and while they were out, the little girl spotted a fake cigarette in a joke shop. She thought it would be hilarious for her to "light up" when she saw me, to see what I would say. The cigarette didn't really light up of course, I think one just had to unwrap the end and a cloud of fake smoke bellowed out. No carcinogens - just clean harmless fun.
When the little girl's mother saw the joke cigarette however, she was fuming with rage - "How could you?" she bellowed at my wife, "That is irresponsible and disgusting". She then took the joke cigarette and smashed it up!
This action was from someone who used to smoke herself - someone whom my wife actually caught once, smoking on the station at the age of 12.
Now unfortunately, she, like thousands of others, believe every word they read and everything they see and hear on TV. The Emperor stands there before us - stark naked - and we buy his lines, hook line and sinker!
"- "How could you?" she bellowed at my wife, "That is irresponsible and disgusting"
Thereby pretty much guaran-f**king-teeing that your poor Granddaughter will grow up to be a 40 a day Capstan Full Strength Girl.
Nothing but nothing is more attractive to a teen than what it parents disapprove of.
You are absolutely spot-on SBC; kids are natural rebels - I certainly was (I think I still am) I remember my parents saying they liked my music - how could they? I immediately went onto some other music, after all, anything your parents like must be sort of "fuddy-duddy" mustn't it?
But my real point is that now, just the sight of a cigarett or a cigar seems to inflame people - it doesn't matter if it is real smoke or joke-smoke or real fags or E-fags. These people just hate the very sight and thought of it.
One minute they are telling the world that second hand smoke kills people and because of that smoking needs to be banned in all public places. Now we are 3 or is it 4, years down the line and it isn't second hand smoke at all that seems to be causing all the damage - no, it is a puff of water based vapour from an E-fag or a joke fag. Whith this in mind, what's next on the banning list - Turkish baths maybe, after all they do exude a lot of vapour don't they? Or what about showers - poor old Alfred Hitchcock would have had to have Janet Leigh murdered beside a damp sponge in Psycho wouldn't he, if these nutters had their way?
The bringers in of these new laws, need to be challenged on them as the law as it stands states the reason for the smoking ban to be that second hand tobacco smoke is harmful. Read the words carefully "Tobacco Smoke" - not bloody water vapour!
Of all the downsides to the smoking ban (and there are many!) in my opinion the most catastrophic has been the legitimisation of non-evidence based policy making. When no evidence has to be used to justify a law, then ANYTHING can conceivably become legislation.
And THAT is truly terrifying.
I reckon the best exhibits for a witchcraft museum would be some statutory instruments. These are dangerous artefacts, embodying all that is most distasteful about primitive societies and their strange customs, and uttered by shamans with unnatural motives.
" ... cold turkey .... fiercely opposed by the late quit smoking guru Alan Carr ..."
I thought that Carr was the ultimate advocate of cold turkey - he just thought it should be preceded by a bit of mind-bending by reading his lousy book or (more recently) attending one of his rather dubious much-of-what-is-said-on-this-course-you-won't-remember quit-smoking two-day "courses." But others on here may know better.
And yes, Mr A, " ... the legitimisation of non-evidence based policy making ..." must surely be one of the most worrying precedents which was set by the passing of the Health Act. It's just a shame that so few people whom you meet these days - even many who openly dislike the smoking ban - can't see just that one level deeper than "I don't like smoke" or "I don't like having to go outside."
Sometimes, I despair - thank goodness for blogs like these and the comments that go with them. They make me feel as if I'm not actually a rabid conspiracy theorist or a nutty tinfoil-hat wearer just for thinking about such things!
Alan Carr devised the most successful quit smoking method, which he called "Easyway". It was the method he invented by the very fact that he first did it himself. In his final months, he wrote a very strong letter to Tony Blair, explaining why NRT was a failure. Alan Carr did not believe in passive smoking. Alan Carr believed that the addiction to 'the nicotine monster' was phsycological. He strongly believed that if a person thought through exactly what they were doing and why, they could set a time, and just stop, without any cravings or undue stress. His success rate is over 50%, with endorsment from celebs who have used his method to quit, such as Ricard Branson, Pete Townsend, Janet Street-Porter and many others.
An Electronic cigarette or e cigarette does not contain tobacco or produce passive smoke. Passive smoke generated from tobacco cigarettes and cigars is the prime concern of the smoking ban because non-smokers are forced to inhale tobacco smoke without choice.