Is it right to treat smokers like second class citizens?

Question

If smokers are made to stand outside, won't it be like apartheid in South Africa when black people had to stand at the back of the bus?

Should we be victimising smokers or helping them?

Cylon = You are such a pragmatist!

I'm slightly surprised that there has been little mention of the addiction side of smoking. Couldn't employers/government do more to help with this?

Answer 1

There should never be anything such as a second class citizen..and you're all wrong! Do any of you know how difficult it is to just stop smoking? It's way more than a habit..it's a decease. Please don't misunderstand me, I have zero tolerance for anyone who makes the choice to smoke in "my space". But it is easier to leave a situation, then to make someone feel as though they are lower than me. If they can't control their urge, then they should stay home!! But I personally would never say anything nasty, look at them in a nasty way or even think anything nasty...takes too much energy and I have my own life to worry about. Both of my parents smoked and tried to quit..it was very hard on them, they did it, though and within months, they both died of something completely unrelated. I have heard and witnessed too many stories such as my parents to ever make someone feel lower than me.

Answer 2

No, no one should be treated as a 2nd class citizen.
It is not the same as the apartheid because being black does not hurt the people around you, smoking does.
You should help smokers because even if they have no intention of quitting, they do not deserve to be looked down your nose at.
We all have our bad habits, some just more harmful than others. Let us if you don't have any bad habits.

Answer 3

I think that it is right to treat the smokers as "second class citizen" BUT TO AN EXTENT. their political rights should not be limited but their social rights have to be limited. I don't smoke and understand perfectly what smoking does to people; Therefore, I just want to put the smoker under a lot of restrictions so they won't be able to smoke and so that smoking would disappear from the pop culture.

Answer 4

Smokers have all the help they need. Ever seen those "Truth" commercials? They know smoking is bad for them. I'm a former smoker and I wouldn't feel comfortable polluting someone else's lungs. Smokers should be made to go outside. Smokers are victimising themselves by slowly committing suicide.

Answer 5

You have not used a proper analogy. Being black is a race, not a choice, and does not affect the other people in the immediate area. Smokers have every right to breathe smoke, but non-smokers have the right NOT to breathe smoke, and since it is the smokers who are affirmatively doing something to breathe the smoke, they must be the ones to be inconvenienced, not non-smokers.

Answer 6

For one thing, it's WAY different. Smokers can control their habits. People can't control what color their skin is.
Having to stand outside should be a motive to quit smoking. No one is "victimising" them. They are the ones that decided to smoke in the first place! How are we supposed to help them? If we let them smoke everywhere, then why on earth would they ever want to quit?
I don't think it's right to treat smokers differently, but I also know that they are not being victimised because it is their choice to smoke. If anything, they victimise themselves by putting their lungs in danger with smoke!

Answer 7

Get real!! We've had the smoking ban in Scotland since 26th March, 2006, you'd think you were extracting kidneys without consent to listen to you lot!!! I smoke 30-40 a day, and I go out in the snow and the rain, I don't care, who cares, it's not hell itself it's only outside for 3-5 minutes. Stop exaggerating, 'oh, this is terrible,!' it's not, it's just a cigarette and yes, it can be dangerous for other people and the ban is quite right! If I don't care what happens to me, that's my choice, but I don't have the right to kill someone else, do I?

Answer 8

I don't want to breath their smoke. That is my choice. Fortunately today it is.

smokers are pretty stigmatised these days. I assist in getting finance to upstarts companies. I think less professionally about a smoker that a non smoker. If someone is controlled by a substance what else controls them? At one point i didn't even register that I was thinking like this.

It is clearly a habit that affects others adversely and therefore should be confined to people that engage in it by their own free will

Answer 9

Good. Serves you smokers right for bein retarded. You can easily help yourselves, and theres number of things that can aid you in quitting as well. Your choosing to keep smoking and not use these things like the gum, patches, etc....

Tough love is the best medicine. If we werent assholes to you, you wouldnt figure out that maybe you should stop.

You should have rights, but NOT when they infringe on my rights to be in a smoke free environment. Why should I get cancer, because of your dumb choices that I didn't make.

I have tons of friends who smoke, and im at parties all the time. I choose not to go outside with people when they smoke. Im still friends with them, and they know not to smoke around me.

Answer 10

I think that you are rather insulting the black South Africans who suffered under apartheid if you compare that with smokers. Get real.

But, if there was any merit in what you say, would you be prepared to tolerate glue sniffers in the work environment or pub with their noxious fumes?