The Emperor Has No Clothes: The Truth about Secondhand Smoke
Short paper from the Heartland Institute (click here for PDF) on the science of second hand smoke - including the oft-repeated claim about the number of deaths due to second has smoke, a figure not only refuted by subsequent studies, but discredited as a fabricated statistic. More on Second Hand Smoke and Smoking Bans:
4 comments:
It is clear that separation of smokers from non-smokers combined
with air exchange technology is a complete solution to this largely
artificial problem. All it takes is regulating authorities setting the
standards for indoor air quality on passive smoke, and the technology
does the rest. Such air quality standards are common in industrial
and environmental contexts. But, to date, no country in the world has
set them for smoking areas. It seems clear that the reasons are not
scientific, nor are they economic or technical: they are political.
The anti smoking agencies do not want safe standards that would still allow
people to smoke...they simply want a ban that will push smokers
outdoors like outcasts.
http://pasan.thetruthisalie.com
www.ventilatedsmokingrooms.ca
Smoke from tobacco is a statistically insignificant health risk.
No one on this planet ever died or got cancer, solely from second hand smoke.
The agenda of the anti-smoking cartel is to de-normalize smoking.
Passing no-smoking laws is a big step in that direction.
Unfortunately the hospitality industry is caught in the cross-fire
Smoking bans are the real health hazard.
The bandwagon of local smoking bans now steamrolling across the nation -
from sea to sea- has nothing to do with protecting people from the supposed
threat of "second-hand" smoke.
Indeed, the bans themselves are symptoms of a far more grievous threat; a
cancer that has been spreading for decades and has now metastasized
throughout the body politic, spreading even to the tiniest organs of local
government. This cancer is the only real hazard involved - the cancer of
unlimited government power.
The issue is not whether second-hand smoke is a real danger or a phantom
menace, as a study published recently in the British Medical Journal
indicates. The issue is: if it were harmful, what would be the proper
reaction? Should anti-tobacco activists satisfy themselves with educating
people about the potential danger and allowing them to make
their own decisions, or should they seize the power of government and force
people to make the "right" decision?
Supporters of local tobacco bans have made their choice. Rather than
attempting to protect people from an unwanted intrusion on their health, the
tobacco bans are the unwanted intrusion.
Loudly billed as measures that only affect "public places," they have
actually targeted private places: restaurants, bars, nightclubs, shops, and
offices - places whose owners are free to set anti-smoking rules or whose
customers are free to go elsewhere if they don't like the smoke. Some local
bans even harass smokers in places where their effect on others is obviously
negligible, such as outdoor public parks.
The decision to smoke, or to avoid "second-hand" smoke, is a question to be
answered by each individual based on his own values and his own assessment
of the risks. This is the same kind of decision free people make regarding
every aspect of their lives: how much to spend or invest, whom to befriend
or sleep with, whether to go to college or get a job, whether to get married
or divorced, and so on.
All of these decisions involve risks; some have demonstrably harmful
consequences; most are controversial and invite disapproval from the
neighbours. But the individual must be free to make these decisions. He must
be free, because his life belongs to him, not to his neighbours, and only
his own judgment can guide him through it.
Yet when it comes to smoking, this freedom is under attack. Cigarette
smokers are a numerical minority, practicing a habit considered annoying and
unpleasant to the majority. So the majority has simply commandeered the
power of government and used it to dictate their behaviour.
That is why these bans are far more threatening than the prospect of
inhaling a few stray whiffs of tobacco while waiting for a table at your
favourite restaurant. The anti-tobacco crusaders point in exaggerated alarm
at those wisps of smoke while they unleash the systematic and unlimited
intrusion of government into our lives.
We do not elect officials to control and manipulate our behaviour.
Thomas Laprade
The primary link above does not seem to bring us to an article about secondary smoke, but some of the links below it are good, particularly Joe Jackson's "Smoking, Lies, and the Nanny State."
I would like to suggest one additional resource, specifically designed for fairly quick but high impact reading in a low-light bar/pub type situation. It is a free printable booklet called "The Stiletto" and a somewhat Pennsylvania-oriented version is available for reading or printing at:
http://encyclopedia.smokersclub.com/257.html
It clearly exposes the lies about the health effects of low levels of exposure to secondary smoke and the economic effects of smoking bans. A slightly updated and more generalized version is available from me at my aol address of Cantiloper for any who want it. It doesn't have the 400 pages or 600 references of my book... but hey, it's free! :)
Michael J. McFadden
Author of "Dissecting Antismokers' Brains"
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