Smoking - selfish habit?

Question

I quit smoking at the end of last year and I'm really proud of myself as it took a few attempts to finally quit for good. However, I get really annoyed when people smoke around me, especially when I'm walking down the street and someone in front of me is smoking and the wind blows all their smoke in my face. It makes me feel like I quit for nothing. If they want to give themselves cancer that's their prerogative but I want to live a healthy life thank you very much. I chose to try and not get cancer so why should I have to breathe in other peoples' dirty smoke? Thank goodness for the smoking ban in public places! Other opinions please........

I am not so dumb that I don't realise that smoking is not the only way to get cancer, but why increase the risk? THAT is dumb. Also, you want perspective? I didn't realise how selfish it was until I became pregnant and people still thought nothing of blowing smoke near me. It's as good as sticking a lit cigarette into my baby's mouth.

Answer 1

I find some of these answers rather dictatorial, smoking is a selfish habit if you sit in a confined space smoking around non-smokers. However as somebody rightly pointed out there is much worse in the air in most cities anyway so the smoke from somebody in front of you smoking is probably the least of your worries. Also it is a fact that riding the London Underground for one hour is as bad for your health as smoking 10 Light cigarettes, so to those who take their children on tubes or into industrial areas, town centres, are they murderers too? Or are they just being selfish?

Answer 2

First of all, good for you!

No, smoking, I think, isn't a selfish habit. You of all people should know this. Think of how hard it was to quit. How many times you thought, "Oh, one more, one more and I'm done." It's a psycological dissorder that can't be broken easily. It's IS their fault that they're addicts, but they're not trying to hurt anyone.

If someone is smoking around you, leave the room. If you can't, then just leave. I always hold my breath while walking past someone smoking. That, or cover your mouth to act as a filter if you can't avoid it.

I've never had to be in this situation, but I hope I helped!

Answer 3

I completely understand what you are saying, and yes smoking is a very selfish habit. You are correct in this, but when you smoked you really didn't care about this issue and now that you are a non-smoker, suddenly this issue is important.

I can't stand it when people are over-eating, or smoking, or drinking, and it are alright because they themselves are doing it, but the moment they stop they want everyone else to stop too. They get up on a soapbox and denounce smokers as selfish when they themselves were selfish about their habit at one point.

The older I get the more depressing people seem to make me.

Thanks for the 2 points.

Answer 4

I'm in my 50's and I've been allergic to Cigarette smoke since birth. I've chosen to stay as far away from what causes severe migraines, difficulty breathing, heartburn and vomiting when I've just had a meal or a beverage. That covers about half of the affects that Smoking by others has on me. So when I've lived in a smoke free apartment complex for 3 years and I've seen 3 separate groups of neighbors ignore the non smoking policy even though they know how it affects me personally, I vote selfish hands down. And when the Neighbor drives out with the AC on and windows rolled up with that smoke in her mouth and her kids strapped in back... Yeah. Selfish. So for all those who laugh that I puke my meals up because of you. Well, that's why God made Cancer.

Answer 5

Smoking is a selfish habit. Why did you quit? Was it for your health? Or did you quit because you did not want others to be bothered by your bad habit? Did you mind walking down the street while smoking a cigarette blowing smoke into other peoples faces?
You were probably self-centered when you smoked and you still are now. It is all about you, isn't it?
Maybe NASA can find you your very own private planet that you can live on so you can always have it your way.

Answer 6

Smoking - Selfish habit? I think not

Smoking - Disgusting habit? Certainly

Answer 7

Absolutely selfish! I am serving nobody's ends but my own! I love smoking, and only fellow smokers appreciate my habit, which is annoying! I add to the poison by working in a city, thereby more than doubling my intake of poisons by inhaling city air every day!

I wish I could be a non-smoking farmer living in the country on his own, with no livestock to breathe harmful CO2 into his lungs!

Unfortunately I'm a city dweller, killing myself faster by working than cigarettes could ever hope to achieve! At least I'm funding the NHS and keeping even a Labour government's income tax rates relatively low!

Thanks to a Labour Government and my smoking, you have the NHS and immigrants will always be able to live in free housing.

Answer 8

first of all, congrats to you for quitting the cigarettes and in not smoking since you did it last year! secondly, i personally think that if people chose to smoke i think its their own decision. i have never smoked in my life and regardless of how many times someone pesters me to do it i won't, ever. as for smoking being a selfish habit, well, i wouldn't say selfish but harmful. when i walk down the streets and someone is puffing away on a ciggie, i get out of harms way and not inhale the fumes, because i know how deadly it can get once it enters my system. i don't want to see myself as a passive smoker and i do my best to maintain a healthy and balanced lifestyle. i am 25 after all and as i look ahead and as i get older, i know i cannot afford to abuse my body in such a way that is detrimental to my well being.

i know how you feel though. although smoking no matter how bad it is, is a personal choice that one makes- and yet one does and has to realise the effects of smoking, in the long run. there are even people in their 80s and 90s who have survived primarily on cigarettes in their lives.

but i for one can live for a long duration without certain things- and tobacco is one of them.

Answer 9

I suffer from mild asthma so for me other people smoking is also a health issue. I hate it when I walk past someone and they blow smoke into my face. If I have to spend anytime near smokers my hair and clothes end up stinking of smoke. I find it incredibly selfish, I'm inhaling their smoke through passive smoking, I can't exaclty create a bubble of clean air around me. They also love to chuck their cigarette ends on the pavement, often without stamping them out, creating a fire hazard and litter.
How anyone can be addicted to breathing in smoke for the "taste" and nicotine I'll never know.
Congratulations on quitting, I wish more smokers would do the same.

Answer 10

YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES YES it is. This subject is a little sensitive to me as I have a three year old who has chronic asthma. He has been in the hospital 18 times in the last two years with severe attacks as well as in the Intensive Care Unit three times on the verge of having a breathing tube inserted. Adult's PLEASE stop smoking around children. If you are inclined to fill your lungs with that junk then by all means have at it but give the children around you a chance to make that decision for themselves. Smokers DO NOT have the right to infringe their terrible, deadly habits on anyone else. It amazes me at the rights that smokers believe they have....That's where it's selfish...yes, you have the right to attempt suicide if you would like but you DO NOT have the right to force it on others. Studies have shown time and time again that second hand smoke is as deadly if not worse than for the smoker themselves.