Is banning smoking in Pubs a step to far? Surely Drink is as deadly as smoke?

Question

COnsidering that the pub was founded to be a place where a working man/woman who finished a hard days work and could bugger off to get a pint and a smoke, I mean what is next? smoking is argueably just as bad as drinking and drinking DOES effect others around you in equally negative ways.

Or are we just the victim of too many juppy middle class morons who want to slum at the local and annoy all us real working joes?

Answer 1

i think that banning smoking is just going a little too far. i love the u.s. and how free we are but everyday the government takes more and more of our freedom away. what will be next?

Answer 2

Idon't think moke-free pubs are a bad idea. Although drinking can be as damagig as smoking, I know plenty of tee-totalers that can still enjoy a night at the pub without drinking. Non-smokers though get no such option. If someone smokes in a pub then that smoke goes into the atmosphere and the people around the smoker smoke too.
Although banning smoking in all pubs does seem slightly over-the-top. Banning smoking in some pubs would give people the choice of socialising in a smoky atmosphere or no.

I don't think it's middle-class/working class thing though. The middle-classes seem about as likely to smoke as working class. And working class non-smokers should have the same rights to not have to passive smoke as any other non-smoker, surely?

Answer 3

Hmm... I don't think it's fair to compare the effects of drinking and smoking. I think the issue is to do with the harmful effects of passive smoking. No-one ever got drunk/developed alcoholism or other drink related conditions because someone else was drinking nearby. But with smoking, it's inevitable that the non-smokers will end up inhaling some of the some if there are smokers near by. I know there is still a question of choice here, but that's not necessarily the case for those working in the pub.

Answer 4

Smoking is physically harmful to others around you. The effects of drinking large amounts of alcohol can affect others too, but only if the person drinking cannot maintain a level of decency.

It's inevitable that smoking will be banned in all public places. I am a smoker and I'm okay with that, it makes sense. Once I have run out of places to smoke then I will just give up and save my money and lungs.

Once the smoking problem has been cleared up then perhaps people will concentrate on stopping violence and abuse through alcohol.

Answer 5

I have never heard of anyone dying of passive drinking and I totally support a ban on smoking in all enclosed public places. I too am working class but I have never smoked and I do occasionally go to the pub, but not every day, as that would be both boring and monotonous.

Answer 6

But everyone knows when you go to a pub theres going to be drinking! I mean that's what a pub is. If someone doesn't want to drink or be around drinking they wouldn't go. Smoking should be banned because if people are going to a pub to drink maybe they don't want to be around all that smoke! And it messes up the ventilation system so all you end up doing is breathing in smoke, and that really bothers some people so you end up losing customers. If you want to smoke then you should go outside.

Answer 7

I agree with 'Flyboy' but disagree with J9. Why should I have to sit in the same area as you puffing away on a ciggy, example: four of us went out to a Restaurant in Soho, we were having our food, but the two idiots beside us were smoking like an Industrial Chimney, and why is it that 'smokers' get a smoke break, whilst the rest of us have to work through?! And besides, have you never gone to a pub.. and smelt your clothes the next day!!
Smoke get outside, simple!!

Answer 8

To ban smoking any where is stupid considering all of the other air pollution that everyone is exposed to. Smoking bans are only a political tool used by over zealous politicians and Idiots trying to get thier hands on our tax dollar by getting goverment grants to fund their organizations and line thier pockets

Answer 9

The point of the ruling is to protect other people from your second-hand smoke, not to pass a judgement on whether alcohol is more or less dangerous than tobacco smoke. You don't force someone else to consume your alcohol when you have a drink. Smoking is another matter entirely, and it has been provent that second-hand smoke is quite hazardous to the health & well-being of other people.

Answer 10

Yeah smoke and alcohol. I guess smoke is deadly because if one person smoke everybody in that area will inhale the smoke and the problem is those who doesn't not smoke inhale the smoke without filter. Whoever drinks alcohol it won't affect with the rest it only affect to AA.