New Orleans: "I witnessed vapers throwing smokers under the bus"
Sunday, January 18, 2015 at 13:58 
I'll be fascinated to read Juliette Tworsey's account of last week's public debate that considered a comprehensive smoking ban in New Orleans.
Musician, ex-smoker and vaper (heated tobacco rather than e-cigarettes), she's been on our radar for a while (see Introducing … Firebug, 2010).
Now living in New Orleans (via Chicago and Los Angeles), Juliette is perfectly placed to comment on a proposal that has divided opinion in what Joe Jackson describes as a "free and fun city".
Urging people to sign a petition against further legislation, Joe wrote:
The antismoking Nazis are making a big push for a total smoking ban in New Orleans. It would apply not only to bars and clubs (there's already a ban in restaurants) but to outside areas too.
As you would expect in such a free and fun city, there's a lot of opposition, but every little bit helps, and politicians do take notice of petitions, if only 'behind the scenes'. So please sign and pass it on!
Sadly it seems the "antismoking Nazis" have the support of some vapers because on Thursday, on the Friends of Forest Facebook page, Juliette commented:
Last night at a town hall meeting in the New Orleans City Council chambers I witnessed vapers throwing smokers (and tobacco users like me) under the bus, only to witness the anti-everything crowd throw us all under the bus. It was very frustrating.
I should add that Juliette is firmly on the side of unity when it comes to smokers and vapers, as indeed am I, and the last thing she would want to do is take sides.
Unfortunately her appeal to "Anyone who may be interested in coming to New Orleans for a holiday that would like to be able to smoke or vape anywhere within the city while here please sign this petition" appears to have fallen on deaf ears within the vaping community whose attitude (publicly at least) is best summed up by this article:
Caught up in the smoking ban, the New Orleans 'vaping' community wants to clear the air (www.nola.com)
PS. Frank Davis wrote a nice piece about Juliette on his blog in 2010 - see Jred at Riff’s Bar.
Since then she's given up smoking but not her support for smokers or smokers' rights.
She'll probably kill me for saying so, but if only there were more ex-smokers and vapers like Juliette Tworsey …
Update: My last post on vaping advocates was not universally popular it seems!
Simon Clark is getting on my tits: http://t.co/ZRI4UIYGLi
— The Random Vaper (@TheRandomVaper) January 12, 2015
Reader Comments (9)
The majority of people (inc smokers and vapers) are not Libertarian, yet espouse 'selective-libertarianism' (to all intents and purposes an oxymoron) when it suits them and their agenda. That said, have you ever been insulted by smokers re tobacco issues?
Insult is obviously not the same as criticism, which some smokers have levied against you on occasion, me included . Whatever you do, don't place yourself between a rock and a hard place because you're never going to be seriously regarded as a vaping ally (unless on behalf of tobacco companies perhaps). By most smokers and particularly by vapers, who have partially or wholly chosen what they consider to be a less harmful and/or more socially acceptable alternative. Fact is, they're only whining because they're now being lumped in with smokers regarding potential harm to third parties.
The photos on the NOLA link show just what arrogant fools some vapers are. Pictures of vapers immersed in a thick cloud of smoke (for that is what it looks like to anyone who isn't 'in the know') like a latter-day Bob Marley is most certainly not going to win them any friends in the anti-smoking movement. It may be a point of honour in the vaping community to be able to produce massive volumes of impenetrable vapour, but that's just kid's boasting stuff, and won't be viewed in the same light by those who are not part of the cosy little 'vaper community'. 'Hoist by their own petard' is a phrase that comes to mind.
Their (the vapers) willingness to adopt the anti-smoking rhetoric, replete with its lies and exaggerations in their attempt to avoid the inevitable is both pathetic and reprehensible. Many of the vapers who comment on here and on other blogs like FD's and VGIF must feel mortified by the antics of the appeasers, particularly as they know that like it or not, smokers and vapers are in the same boat and share a common enemy. Creating a fifth column may possibly bring them a temporary reprieve, but it will be short lived, of that we can be sure.
It was a nice piece, wasn't it? I hadn't read that since 2010.
I posted the following on Anti-smoking exposed - tobacco control out of control and i reproduce it here...
This is a very sensitive issue. I was desperate to stop smoking and used e cigarettes to do so.
There is no evidence that there is harm from second hand vapour, and equally, there is no real evidence of harm from second hand smoke; that the evidence supporting harm from smoke has been fabricated to make that case in much the same way as it is being claimed and fabricated at the moment against vapour.
But, despite this, the case for vaping is weakened through its association with that of smoking. It has nothing to do with evidence or facts - it has to do with peoples' perceptions.The case (and lies) regarding second hand smoke and its supposed dangers worked. It is lodged into the public mind - even the minds of smokers. This is where the issue becomes clouded.(No pun intended)
Even if the case against harm from second hand smoke were to be won, we would still be up against the argument that it is unpleasant. Indeed, one public health official in Scotland said, just last month, words to the effect that the case for harm is an irrelevance, people just do not like smoking and that is enough. (If anyone has the source please send it to me) And this sums things up - So where do we go?
First we have to accept that vaping and smoking are different.
Public Health is bending over backwards to link the two. In order to win its case, vapers have to stress the fact that they are nothing like each other. However, they do not have to agree that second hand smoke is dangerous - simply state that second hand vapour is harmless and that any evidence to the contrary is skewed, fabricated.
Secondly, vapers need to recognise that the real issue here is freedom of choice and both vapers and smokers share the same platform here.
We also need to recognise that another important issue is that of persecution and the creation of a bullying culture in our societies which is being spearheaded by public health (leaders) and by governments, and again, smokers and vapers share the same platform
Most importantly, we share the same enemy. And, here is the paradox again, together, smokers and vapers are stronger, but, the case for vaping is weakened where it is being successfully linked to that of smoking.
I realise that what I have said, because we are dealing with a paradox, can be easily torn to shreds. May I say that this is only my thinking at present and that I will always have an open mind on this topic and my thinking will always be subject to modification and change.
Self interest once again trumps equity. The vapers are making a tactical choice to distance themselves from smokers so they can retain the ability to vape indoors. That may work in the short-term and some may even believe it is justified since there is no second hand smoke. The problem is that second hand smoke does not present a health risk. It is a fabricated threat supported by propaganda. The propaganda is so common that even papers and smokers themselves believe it. That's because almost all dissent is censored.
Because of this desire to extinguish smoking and anything that looks like it, papers are making a strategic blunder. Even if they can distance themselves from smokers in the short-term, the Antismokers will circle back and close the loophole. A common front is needed to counter the well-funded global antismoking lobby. Remember they are allied with Big Pharma and vaping is a direct challenge it their bottom line.
The answer is to get the facts out in the light of day. The cherry-picked studies, lies about miracle decreases in hospital admissions post ban, lies about the economic impact of ban, etc. All of the lies need to be exposed. Right now virtually all media outlets aid and abet tobacco control lies. They all accept the propaganda, they censor comments that refute the lies. The co-opted media support city after city jumping on the antismoking and antivaping bandwagons.
Smokers and papers face a common threat in New Orleans and elsewhere. Rather than let the Antis divide and conquer, both need to unite and counter the threat. In NOLA the time is now. If a common defense isn't wage immediately the ban will be enacted and the battle to repeal it will be much more difficult.
I have had some very vehement passionate angered moments in advocacy for E-Vaping at such a level of frustration over the bullying tactics of the ANTZ or ANTIS. I have said it as commentary on blogs totally flabbergasted and kind of knocking my idea born of the above mentioned as being... hypothetical and probably impossible to imagine, but here I go again. WE all forms of tobacco users (which includes vapers) MUST STOP THE MONEY FLOW!
Reply to Robert Innes:
The Scottish thing was a comment on Dick Puddlecote's blog made by me, it is here:
http://dickpuddlecote.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/too-early.html#comment-1787491632
And Dick blogged about it here:
http://dickpuddlecote.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/we-will-get-away-with-that.html
The Random Vaper blog which Simon linked to above is also mine, and I did so enjoy writing that one..
Brilliant! thank You.I had read it and had forgotten where....
Vinny,
" they censor comments that refute the lies."
They sure do. I now know of at least three people that this has happened to on Nola.com