Spare Us The Smoke, Please!

=== Interact Filtered ===
view this users filtered interacts

zephyr #18 Read this from ASH ``Tobacco use is addicting and nicotine is the active pharmacologic agent of tobacco that causes addictive behavior. It also causes physical dependence characterized by a withdrawal syndrome that usually accompanies nicotine abstinence. Evidence about the addictive nature of nicotine has been accumulating since 1942 when a medical researcher first identified the problem. Since that time many medical writers and journals have unequivocally classed smoking, and particularly cigarette-smoking, as an addiction for many people. Some physicians compare the addictive qualities of nicotine to heroin and barbiturates but others maintain that for many people cigarettes can be even more addictive than heroin, barbiturates or alcohol. ``
From Ash.org (web page of this washington dc based anti-smoking organization).
I rest my case. Enlightenment is only a few mouseclicks away - use google to find out.

Cigarettes are a possible psychological addiction, period. That`s as authentified as it can get. tahmed32 must have gotten his information from some tabloid with breaking news: quitting cigarette smoking takes 90 lives?
Physical addiction kills dude. Psychological addiction is curable by your own will power, it doesn`t cause your body organs to become perpetually dependant on the substance you`re abusing. Ive known people who`ve quit after smoking for 20,30 years and remained healthy and normal. Heroine addicts...uh...sorry, bad comparison. Common sense, hello?

=== Interact Filtered ===
view this users filtered interacts

rkhan #12 ``A stick with fire on one end and a fool on the other.``
or, as my cancer specialist brother says when he sees someone smoking on the street ``there walks the source of my son`s college fund``.

saraj #7 Good for you. It wont be easy. i used to smoke once, and can understand how hard it is to give up. i had dreams about smoking for a couple of years after I gave it up. I know one person who started smoking again after quitting for six years. BUT IT CAN BE DONE: In US today, there are AS MANY EX-SMOKERS as there are smokers. And in fact you may find it easier to quit than I did, as i found was the case with some of my friends.

just remember that fight to quit smoking is not like the Iraq war which you can win in a few weeks. it is more like the war against terrorism, which will take years to win and where you dont allow yourself to smoke even one ``terrorist cigarette``. you need to keep reminding myself that smoking is deadly business, not a light-hearted bit of fun as many young people think and as the drug cartels (aka cigarette companies) spend millions trying to convince young people is the case. yoga is good, and regular exercise is another way to make it easier to quit.

``Smoking hempers sperm productuin(??)``. Gee, I wonder how China & India which have some of the largest number of smokers also have some of the largest population of people on planet Erath! THUS, I think non-smokers should stop complaining so much about `passive smoking` and start reading the Kama Sutra and/or the I Ching instead. Or better still, start enjoying their passive smoking by lobbying for replacing normal cigarattes with joints filled with real fine quality Northen Pakistani hashish!

smoking is a personal choice. fix all the exhausts on cars, stop factorys sending clouds into the atmosphere, and then tell me to quit.

its hard to type with a ciggie in my hand.

=== Interact Filtered ===
view this users filtered interacts

Cigarette. A stick on one end and a fool on the other.
Smoked for 10 years quit for 5 and started again last year. I know, I know its bad for me. But I do respect no smoking areas and always smoke in the open never indoors.

Cigarette. A stick with fire on one end and a fool on the other.
Smoked for 10 years quit for 5 and started again last year. I know, I know its bad for me. But I do respect no smoking areas and always smoke in the open never indoors.

I gave up smoking about 4 weeks ago...in the end, you can`t harass, scare or intimidate a person into doing something they don`t want to do. I was urged for years to do it and last month after coming back from a yoga class, I just didn`t feel like picking up another cig. And the beat goes on...

sara

Madhu Warris: you write ``Smoking, by the way, is not physically addictive at all. Its addiction is about as strong as that of tea or cola. ``
Wrong. In fact smoking is considered physically more addictive than heroin. Look it up if this seems too far fetched. You are entitled to your opinions, but not entitled to spread your ignorance around.

Overall, this is a good article on an important subject. It is particularly relevant as the fight against tobacco companies is escalating beyond the rich countries and has now become global with the approval by virtually all countries earlier this month (with US finally supporting as well) of the WHO treaty to fight smoking. Particularly useful in that treaty is its focus on fighting attempts by tobacco companies to introduce young people (teens) to smoking. Smoking is destined for the ashtray of history.

PS: My correction on the facts surrounding addiction from smoking in my post below is a bit harsher than it should have been.

: )

i doubt any smoker will give up smoking after reading this article (though very well written) or for that matter after being introduced to any of the anti-smoking campagns.

all of us are ignorant fools...who smoke to smoke. period.

`that`s all that there is to say...I rest my case.`

``For those who expect me to ramble on with the many disadvantages of smoking, and healing for the perpetual smoker, can eat their hearts out.`` => *afterthought* does that mean if smokers smoke only where `publicly allowed` in order to preserve the rights of non-smokers, it would make smoking/smokers more `bearable` and/or `acceptable` by the general non-smoking public?