Broadcaster can't contain his "visceral hatred of anybody who smokes"
Thursday, March 24, 2016 at 13:19 I grew up with Archie Macpherson.
He was a BBC Scotland football commentator – a good one at that – when I lived in Fife and later Aberdeen.
In 1987 he was the commentator when my team Dundee United beat Barcelona at the Nou Camp, winning a Uefa Cup quarter-final 3-1 on aggregate.
Macpherson's joy when United scored twice in the final minutes to win the tie is one of my favourite football moments.
How sad then that younger generations will only know him for what he calls a "visceral hatred of anybody who smokes".
Not just smoking, note, but "anybody who smokes". That's a hell of a lot of people – one million in Scotland alone.
I don't suppose he likes people who defend smokers either.
According to a report on STV last night Macpherson was diagnosed with kidney cancer in 2013 "as a direct result of breathing in other people's smoke".
I have sympathy for anyone suffering from cancer but these comments take anti-smoking propaganda to a new low.
According to Cancer Research UK, "Doctors and scientists don't know exactly what causes kidney cancer but some things do increase the risk."
One of those things, says CRUK, is smoking but other factors include high blood pressure and "faulty genes and inherited conditions". Passive smoking isn't mentioned although I suppose some would argue that smoking and passive smoking are the same thing. (It's not.)
Meanwhile here's another Macpherson quote, from 2013:
“There is no doubt that the smoking ban is the greatest piece of public legislation that’s been passed anywhere in the world.
“The ban on smoking in public places must go on and we must find some other ways, even in this era of human rights legislation and whatever, of terrorising smokers.”
How appropriate is that?
Yesterday STV News tweeted a short interview with Macpherson (see below).
Curiously they haven't tweeted or posted last night's news report that included a (very) brief soundbite from me concerning the public's support for separate smoking rooms.
I'll post it later when we've uploaded the clip on to YouTube.
WATCH: My Story: Archie Macpherson and the smoking ban anniversary https://t.co/mFZfUAdd8x
— STV News (@STVNews) March 23, 2016
Reader Comments (12)
Excellent!! The more that the 'visceral hatred' by the tobacco control industry of fellow human being comes out into the open the better.
Smokers can be hated. Politicians with a visceral hatred of anyone who smokes made public hate of a minority group legal and actively encourage that hate and fear. They should be ashamed of themselves rather than crowing how wonderful they are.
They're thugs, bullies and in a word - smokerphobic
The tobacco controllers have been nurturing the correlation with fear of smoking and fear of death and illness to build support for prohibition. The irrational fear of smoking is the direct result of propaganda and lies.
As its commonly known that the biggest cause of cancer is stress, Macpherson would have been better off if he had chilled, instead of annihilating smokers.
a visceral hatred of anybody who smokes
viscera
noun
"the internal organs in the main cavities of the body, especially those in the abdomen, e.g. the intestines."
"The viscera of the abdomen proper include the stomach, intestine, liver and biliary system, pancreas, spleen, kidneys, ureters, and suprarenal glands."
Perhaps it's possible to generate so much hatred that you eventually poison yourself.
I hope he knows that every smoker hates him. Estimated at 1 billion smokers in the world. How do we let him know?
To be fair, Ed, I don't think that's true. I can't speak for other people but I would like to think that most people, including smokers, would feel sympathy for anyone with cancer and would merely feel sorry that he needs someone to blame and is lashing out like this. Life's a lottery and we just have to live with it. Hate, in this instance, is entirely misplaced on both sides.
Wow, an even better piece of legislation than abolishing slavery or bringing in universal suffrage!
“There is no doubt that the smoking ban is the greatest piece of public legislation that’s been passed anywhere in the world.
“The ban on smoking in public places must go on and we must find some other ways, even in this era of human rights legislation and whatever, of terrorising smokers.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ReBJIvo5hjc
1.15 in
Yes Junican.
Look what happened to the druggie Lance Armstrong.
The hatred and wishes of social isolation based on false claims and propaganda along with death to their fellow citizens will never be accepted.
The truth always prevails through science and the filthy lucre will eventually dry up .
I see SHS a ridicule with no evidence base and not 1 confirmed death. Those extremists who have fallen for SHS propaganda appear to me as flat-earthers and unable to see a wider picture due to their brainwashing and propaganda.
Have studies been conducted on the incidental affects of the smoking bans?
No. The career politicains need to hang their heads in shame.
Humans, being innately tribal, as such require having someone to hate, a vile Them against the wonderful Us. Having removed the traditional (racial, religious, sexual) targets to beyond the pale, the pols had to give the nonsmoking Us's an acceptable outlet for the need to hate. They gave them us and we became the Them's.
You are right Simon. I feel very sorry for anyone with cancer but it isn't my fault. Kidney cancer is more associated with drinking too much alcohol or genetics.
When people are ill they look for someone or something to blame for that illness - and preferably not themselves - and what the smoker hating tobacco control industry has done in these two decades, is lie, slander, scaremonger, and encourage hate fear and blame of smokers for just about every cancer that exists despite the many other pollutant factors we are all exposed to.
Sadly the biggest casualty of war is truth and that was lost when the smokerphobic anti-smokers declared war on us with our own money stolen in tax.