Smokers of the World, Unite!
Michael Moore
COMM 105
Samuel Zervitz
Smokers of the World, Unite!
“War is Peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.” (Howe, 1963, p.3) In George Orwell’s apocalyptic vision of the future, these slogans adorn the exterior of the Ministry of Truth, the physical symbol of all which had gone wrong in that world. While any child can look at these slogans and easily identify them as self-contradictory, in today’s society conventional wisdom is making an alarming shift in the same dangerous direction when it comes to certain issues. Take the recent, rapid eroding of smoker’s rights as a perfect example. Just replace Orwell’s slogans with the following equally frightening philosophies. People need to be protected from themselves. Personal freedoms should be highly restricted, even when an individual’s actions affect no one but that individual. Informed adults are incapable of making their own decisions.
When it comes to the debate on smoking, these ideals are held by many otherwise intelligent people, who oftentimes justify their opinions by asserting that the fight against smoker’s rights is at its core a health issue. (Feldman, 2004, p.4) This, like all the other false perceptions surrounding the issue, is a blatant misrepresentation. But take these commonly-held misconceptions, add in a puff of irritating smoke and oftentimes foul-smelling clothing, and it’s no wonder that no great grass roots movement has sprung up to defend the rights of smokers. I assert that such a grass roots movement is exactly what this country needs if it does not wish to see the freedoms and liberties which so many enjoy, deteriorated by deluded, albeit well-intentioned, attacks on our individual rights, among these our right to smoke.
The history of attempting to protect people from themselves is littered with many a self-proclaimed “benevolent” despot. Fascist governments often claim to have the best interests of their people at heart, all the while limiting personal freedoms as a necessity to perpetuate the state. (Maxwell, 1994, p.156) The fact is, people do not need to be protected from themselves. How many have died, or lived their lives encumbered by the shackles of tyranny so that they could be considered safe from themselves? Not only do you not need to be protected from yourself, but when people try to restrict your personal liberties they are not doing so out of some sort of noble largess. According to Jacob Sullum, the fight against smokers’ rights was begun as “an attempt by one group of people to impose their taste and preference on another.” (Feldman, 2004, p.3) If the argument really were about health, then why is there no equal push to outlaw soft drinks, a recognized contributor to obesity in children? (Critser, 2003, p. 140) Where is the public outcry against homosexual intercourse, the number one factor in the spread of AIDS? (Hewitt, 1998, p.395) Who is leading the charge against my son going outside without a coat in the winter, the leading factor in his catching a cold?
If health were the primary concern of the anti-smoking
forces, then their response should be to inform the public and let the
individual make a decision, as they do in all other areas of individual health.
This fight is really about a certain group’s penchant for attacking individual
liberty, whatever the cost. They’ve started with what seemed to them to be the
least defensible. But once they realize that Americans are willing to give up
some of their freedom, what’s to stop them from seeing how far they can go?
Abraham Lincoln stated in the Gettysburg Address that he hoped “that government
of the people by the people and for the people, shall not perish from the
earth.”(
The French put it
best in Article 4 of their Declaration of
the Rights of Man and of the Citizen of
When I smoke, outdoors or in the privacy of my own home, I am not causing injury to others. When people attempt to prevent me from smoking they are however preventing me from enjoying “those same rights” (Robertson, 1997, p.234) namely, “the power to do whatever is not injurious to others.”(Robertson, 1997, p.234)
The only leg that the
anti-smoking lobby has to stand on is their assertion concerning the impact of
second-hand smoke, also known as “passive smoking” or “environmental tobacco
smoke.” But according to a report by the National Heart, Lung and Blood
Institute, “Generally speaking, the evidence that passive smoking in a general
environment has health effects remains sparse, incomplete, and sometimes
unconvincing…” (Feldman, 2004, pp.20-21)
Other experts have stated similar results. (Feldman, 2004, p.24) The problem
with fighting against the anti-smoking lobby is that their message is too
well-entrenched and widely accepted. In
If that
information alone has caused a decline in smokers in
References
Critser,
G. (2003). Fat land: How Americans became
the fattest people in the world.
Feldman,
E.A., & Bayer, R. (Eds.). (2004). Unfiltered:
Conflicts over tobacco policy and public health.
Hewitt, C. (1998). Homosexual demography: Implications for the spread of AIDS. Journal of Sex Research, 35, 390-396.
Howe,
Lincoln,
A. Transcript of the “Nicolay Draft” of
the
Maxwell,
J.A., & Friedberg, J.J. (Eds.). (1994). Human
rights in western civilization: 1600 to the present (2nd ed.)
Robertson,
D. (Ed.). (1997). A dictionary of human
rights.