I live in Michigan, and our legislators just passed a state-wide smoking ban, which is going to be put into effect this May. Once in effect, all businesses, including bars and casinos (excluding those owned by Native-Americans), will be required by law to be smoke-free.
I’m just going to say it like it is.
This law is bull.
First, smoking is something I am doing to my own body (I’ll get to second-hand in a bit). You obviously feel strongly about people having the right to do what they want to their own bodies, because it is perfectly legal in this state to have an abortion. And I’m not saying anything negative towards the pro-choice stance. I’m actually arguing for a choice of my own right here. I also understand that you’re not outlawing cigarettes altogether, but you’ve been trying to stop us through taxes like mad over the last few years. They’re around $6.50 a pack now, which is like what, $1.75 to the cigarette company and $4.75 to you? Did that plan not prove effective enough, so you just decided to go for the jugular and ban them?
Moreover, there are already laws keeping smokers away from doorways and the like. What is it, 25 feet or something? I’m going to go off on a bit of a tangent here, because I would love to see some neutral third party perform a scientific test on this. What I’m talking about, is how quickly cigarette smoke dissipates into the air. As we know, gas is the most exited state of matter found on earth, and because of this, it’s particles move at an incredibly fast velocity. If I’m outside, surrounded by the massive ocean of air that surrounds our planet, how long does my puff take to be diluted into some infinitesimally small, worthless amount. Also, because I have a brain, I try at all times to be aware of others around me, and act as a polite smoker should. I respect other people’s rights to do things I don’t like. Please respect mine. But being inside is, of course, a whole different story.
And here we hit the meat of the issue, the only places where smoking inside is still permitted, besides our homes, is privately owned businesses: bars, restaurants, casinos, etc. Now, we have to understand that there are bars and restaurants which are entirely non-smoking. Almost all restaurants which allow smoking have designated smoking and non-smoking sections, and it’s pretty safe to assume they also have some system of air circulation.
And here we reach the only point you have: But what about the people who work in these places? I agree, this is a sticky issue. The only little thing I have in my defence, is that almost everyone I know who works at a bar, either smokes or is indifferent. The people who hate smoke that much are not the type to apply for a job at a bar. Moreover, I’m not sure those that do are willing to lose the paying customers who do smoke.
But the biggest, biggest problem with this, is the effect it’s going to have on our economy. How many years now has Michigan had the worst or second/third worst economy in the country? It’s been awful, and it keeps getting worse. We never meet our state budget, we need to make more cuts all the time. But for some reason you decide to pull this on us now? What are you thinking? Do you really think it’s going bring a bunch of closet smoke-haters into the bars and restaurants? Have you ever even been to a bar? You are alienating their main demographic and then crossing your fingers that other (better, non-smoking) people will rejoice and flood the place!
The restaurant industry is pretty much all we have left in this state! Why don’t you take this risk once we regain at least a semi-stable economy. Do you not know that your actions have repercussions? I bet you saw some study of one business that did this and got more customers, and latched onto that as the truth because it fits in with your ideology. Which, by the way, has done us a heck of a lot of good so far…
Please, we can choose what’s best for ourselves. Don’t be a fascist, we enjoy our freedom.
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