This spring, some acquaintances and I were relaxing between exams at University College. Relaxing, to us, meant smoking.
A woman walked by in a huff. “You shouldn’t smoke here,” she said. But there were ashtrays installed next to where we stood. “This is a historic building,” she explained, “and smoking degrades things.”
Students have a longstanding tradition of congregating in the UC quad to smoke, a tradition which, presumably, dates back to “historic” times. While smoking is not particularly good for anything, I’ve never heard it cited as a leading cause of structural degradation.
Of course, smoking degrades the smoker, but she didn’t need to tell us that. Her implication seemed to be that smoking degrades a smoker’s moral character, and as a non-smoker, she therefore had the right to chastise us.
This is a common opinion and to refute it, given all the tangible damage that smoking causes is generally considered self-righteousness on the smoker’s part. But why did this woman feel so justified in scolding us?
Perhaps her quarrel is with the tobacco companies we support. Fair enough. The tobacco industry is obviously a nefarious one, and I wholeheartedly support activists like EBUTT, the student group that made U of T’s tobacco investments public (and successfully encouraged them to divest ten million dollars from cigarette companies).
Certainly, the consumer assumes some culpability. But, as everyone knows, the corporate lineages of most products are far from morally sound. So why harp on one purchase and not another?
Perhaps she had a loved one who died of a smoking-related illness. That would make her cause a noble one, but I doubt many would be sympathetic to someone who berated chefs at greasy spoons in order to avenge their father’s cholesterol-induced heart attack.
Maybe she was crusading on behalf of non-smokers forced to breathe in second-hand fumes. But we were outside, and as long as we were lit up, that was where we were staying.
To equate “smoker” with “inconsiderate asshole” is unfair. I wouldn’t smoke next to a stranger without asking. If it’s raining, the by-law states that I must brave the elements rather than risk endangering a bystander. I assume it would be futile to point out that we live in a polluted city, with almost daily smog alerts during the summer.
Maybe she has children, and doesn’t want them subjected to bad influences. In that case, she has her work cut out for her. Sure, recent studies have shown that onscreen smoking, for instance, can influence younger viewers. Common sense, however, says that classmates and parents have a much greater impact on a child’s decision to smoke. And parents, not strangers that children might encounter, are responsible for instilling good sense in their children in the first place.
Finally, she might resent the burden that we smokers present to the health care system, and therefore to her as a taxpayer. But I pay hundreds of dollars a year in tobacco taxes, not for nothing.
Everyone has a vice, whether tobacco, alcohol, or trans fat; we all have to indulge our self-destructive instincts somehow. Granted, some outlets are healthier than others, but one person’s stupid decision is not necessarily another’s business. I can only conclude that most people who go about haranguing peaceful, unobtrusive smokers do so based on personal prejudices rather than genuine concern for the greater good.
