Do you think smoking cigerettes should be illegal ?
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M
As I said, it would be nice if people were tolerant of others. There are lots of things people do that I don't particularly like but I wouldn't call for it to be banned. That's the price of freedom, I'm afraid; sometimes people will do things you don't want them to, but I think it's a price worth paying.
S
Smoking should not be illegal.
I smoke tobacco in just about every form you can: cigarettes, cigars, and pipes.
I am not addicted to tobacco, so the whole "we should ban it cuz it causes addictions, which are evil" argument doesn't really hold enough sway in the debate for me. I smoke, on average, about 2-3 pack of cigarettes each year, 4-5 cigars a year, and a pipe about 10 times a year. I smoke when I am actually stressed out, or if there is some special occasion.
How is this possible? Well, I believe that people who are addicted to things like tobacco are probably people with addictive personalities: if not tobacco, they'd be addicted to something else. Most of us are addicted to something: caffeine, food, sodas, alcohol, attention, sex, money, texting, the internet...whatever. Are all of these things bad? No. They can be abused, and then they can damage us.
"Well, smoking will kill you!" Maybe, maybe not. Is it normal behavior for a living thing to inhale smoke willfully? No. But neither is consuming the strange chemicals in all the processed food we eat, breathing in our polluted air, screwing up our bodies with birth control pills, and so on. Smoking can eventually lead to cancer of the throat, lungs, and mouth. Some of the food we eat every day is basically leading us on a blissful path to a death-by-cancer. Maybe we should outlaw food and cars.
I smoke tobacco in just about every form you can: cigarettes, cigars, and pipes.
I am not addicted to tobacco, so the whole "we should ban it cuz it causes addictions, which are evil" argument doesn't really hold enough sway in the debate for me. I smoke, on average, about 2-3 pack of cigarettes each year, 4-5 cigars a year, and a pipe about 10 times a year. I smoke when I am actually stressed out, or if there is some special occasion.
How is this possible? Well, I believe that people who are addicted to things like tobacco are probably people with addictive personalities: if not tobacco, they'd be addicted to something else. Most of us are addicted to something: caffeine, food, sodas, alcohol, attention, sex, money, texting, the internet...whatever. Are all of these things bad? No. They can be abused, and then they can damage us.
"Well, smoking will kill you!" Maybe, maybe not. Is it normal behavior for a living thing to inhale smoke willfully? No. But neither is consuming the strange chemicals in all the processed food we eat, breathing in our polluted air, screwing up our bodies with birth control pills, and so on. Smoking can eventually lead to cancer of the throat, lungs, and mouth. Some of the food we eat every day is basically leading us on a blissful path to a death-by-cancer. Maybe we should outlaw food and cars.
C
If you are going to bring in the whole idea of freedom. Than we have no freedom. We pay the government, we follow their rules that they have providded us with. If we were truly free individuals I could do "WHATEVER" I want. I could go steal from a store and not get in trouble simply because I was "free." The point I'm making is the fact that it is the governments responsibility to protect its citizens. So, for our protection do we not have the right to not breath in these chemicals?
I smoked heavily from the time i was 9 (perhaps i have an addictive personality but I NEEDED them) until 22. This of course led to stealing cause a 9 year old cant really support their own habbit. I definitely agree with it being illegal for children & yes it is very very very addictive, it took me a year of pain to be free & still I have occasional craving. 18 years later (had my first smoke at 5 shameful but true) when I had my son I didnt see my dad for months (his brand new first grandson) because he refused to not smoke around him. He cared more about those stupid cancer sticks than his new grandchild. I was invited for christmas but told to put the baby in the back room. I went cause thats what you do, right, I was left in that cool back room & no one was told i was there because my husband didnt come with me, he was so angry at their disrespect. I was being a dutiful daughter. I missed dinner & only visited with 4 of my family members (the ones who knew i was back there with the baby, my mom & dad never came back once... they were punishing me because my husband didnt come) anyway I left in tears & my dad swore at me saying what did i think the baby was the VERY BAD WORD Christ child. & he smoked in front of my brothers kids so i should just deal with it. So this is how insidious smoking can be. It ruined my relationship with my mother because i started so young & we fought because of it... It caused division in our family because i was listening to the "propaganda" that smoking causes sids & i was a "precious" non smoker now... It gave my mom bladder cancer & she died from a disease she died from acquired hemophillia which sometimes happens to women after major surgeries (very rare). So to shrug off smoking as no big deal, well in my mind thats very very deceptive. Perhaps once you've seen someone with throat cancer and huge weeping stinking holes in their neck from the 3 pack a day habit, you would understand that no its not just a casual pasttime. (happened to the old trapper we had living in our back yard & he'd quit for 10 years prior) All this being said I still dont agree that it should be outlawed but do agree with not exposing others to the smoke.
M
The general idea is that the government intervenes when we are actually hurting others. This does not include getting on people's nerves (if it did the government ought to have a tight control over our speech) but it does include things such as theft as per your example. As I've already said in earlier posts, I do not believe that the negligible risks of ETS warrant smoking bans. In fact I think there is a more convincing case for banning motor vehicles and alcohol (which I wouldn't support either, by the way).
C
The thing is I agree with banning those things to an extent. I would have no problem if alcohol was banned, and you can't use the saying that when I get older I might want to cause I don't. I have seen to many people, myself included, end up in horrid situations cause of it. As for motor vehicles I am totally for limiting them, I think that banning them would be a ridiculous attempt. But by maybe banning them for in city transit, I could agree with. I personally walk a lot of places and when in the bigger cities use public transit. I am not saying to ban cigarettes in general, I am saying to get them out of the public.
M
lol. well I don't think God has that planned for me. I already know that I won't change your view. My points have been stated, as have yours. I see no point in debating this topic anymore. I love how debates never change anyones mind 
But they serve a purpose in that they can test one's presuppositions and force a person to think about why they believe as they do, which is a good thing.
Although I agree that smoking is bad. I believe as a sociaty have been going down a slippery slope when it comes to anything bad for you. It seems that legislating and making illiegal anything that should be a moral choice is not good. We are already demonizing ciggs and unhealthy foods. The concern is how far will it go once started. Do we ration the amount of sugar any indivigual eats. Or how about if start incarcerating those that are over weight? There are many harmfull and destructive habits or uses in our world. But making these illegal would take the moral and personal choices out of our own hands and make others responcible. This happened with the church in the past where one would be inprisoned or put to death if one did something wrong in the eyes of those in power.
We do need laws to protect and maintain a livible sociaty, but when we start making moral choices a matter of law , I believe we put all of us in a very dangerous and potentually abusive situation.
God bless, pickles
We do need laws to protect and maintain a livible sociaty, but when we start making moral choices a matter of law , I believe we put all of us in a very dangerous and potentually abusive situation.
God bless, pickles
F
I don't think it should be illegal. I don't know much scripture. i do know coming from being a non-Christian for 16 years of my life that there are other people than Christians and as we want them to respect our freedom of worship we should respect their idea of pleasure as long as it is not permanently harming another person.
aahhh man . another thread which raises a question, only to really be a way for the author of said thread to voice their opinion. misleading someone is a sin also so whosoever is without sin , cast the first stone, i think the first stone was just cast. wow. also you need to check your sources a little better. one can not prove that smoking causes cancer, we watched a film 30 years ago on america and its diet. they brought a family of five from some small country, which this county at the time had never had a case of cancer in its history, they brought the family to america. they didn't smoke but within the time period that they were here 2 of the 5 had some type of cancer, but i probably shouldn't say this for now someone will say that eating causes Cancer and I really enjoy my food. oh no enjoying my food would be a sin also!!! oh no, now what am I going to do. studies have been done, lung cancer starts in the bottom of the lungs smoke only reaches the upper parts of the lungs, Now all my information is taken from someone else for I have done no research, and I personal can't prove that smoking does not cause cancer, from my personal knowledge, but I have a sister-in-law who has never smoked her husband has never smoked , however she just had part of her lung taken out due to cancer. You can't prove that it does harm the body, the chemicals that were used on our croplands( exa. DDT before it was banned in america but is still being used in other countries ) and some other chemicals are still be used on our croplands are far more danderous than smoking but these same chemicals are used on our tobacco crops.
even with their best studies the only warning that could be put on cigerettes was that smoking may lead to. and now they only warn that quitting smoking nowgreatly reduces your chances. and before you ask No I do not smoke anymore I quit close to 13 years ago, because I felt it were coming between me and my service to my God not cause i thought they were destroying the temple. on by the way you forgot the important part of your doctrine on destroying the temple
Mr 7:14And when he had called all the people unto him, he said unto them, Hearken unto me every one of you, and understand:Mr 7:15There is nothing from without a man, that entering into him can defile him: but the things which come out of him, those are they that defile the man.
even with their best studies the only warning that could be put on cigerettes was that smoking may lead to. and now they only warn that quitting smoking nowgreatly reduces your chances. and before you ask No I do not smoke anymore I quit close to 13 years ago, because I felt it were coming between me and my service to my God not cause i thought they were destroying the temple. on by the way you forgot the important part of your doctrine on destroying the temple
Mr 7:14And when he had called all the people unto him, he said unto them, Hearken unto me every one of you, and understand:Mr 7:15There is nothing from without a man, that entering into him can defile him: but the things which come out of him, those are they that defile the man.
S
I don't want to be unkind or say anything that might offend you, but please look at this fact sheet from National Cancer Institute. I know that you understand that the body is the temple of God / 1Cor 6:19, Jn 2:21. If smoking or drinking or introducing any kind of toxins or even an STD into the blood stream that can effect the cells of the body with some form of disease or cancer is not defiling the body, then what do you call it when it kills the body? If the body dies (that houses the Holy Spirit), didn't the temple die as well? Is not the ultimate defiling of the temple to destroy it?
I have read all your other posts on this, so I know what you think. This is not said to condemn anyone but rather to communicate that partaking of these things are unhealthy, risky and forms of sublimation that substitutes for being filled and energized with the Spirit. If I have to smoke or drink to relax because of all the stress and what it produces upon my nerves, then I have not gone to the Lord for grace to help me in the time of need. Isn't it better to rely and trust the promises of God, even for my fleshly mortal body than to rely on these forms of sublimation? The word of God does say this very clearly in the authorized KJV...
Rom 8:11 'But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.'
I have read all your other posts on this, so I know what you think. This is not said to condemn anyone but rather to communicate that partaking of these things are unhealthy, risky and forms of sublimation that substitutes for being filled and energized with the Spirit. If I have to smoke or drink to relax because of all the stress and what it produces upon my nerves, then I have not gone to the Lord for grace to help me in the time of need. Isn't it better to rely and trust the promises of God, even for my fleshly mortal body than to rely on these forms of sublimation? The word of God does say this very clearly in the authorized KJV...
Rom 8:11 'But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.'