POLL: Are you a smoker?

[David M. Bueker]

Three things:

1. Indeed the only militant comment came from a smoker, not a non-smoker.

2. While I do not smoke, I understand some people want to. I just do not want to have to deal with the second hand effects. That's all. Heck, one of my best friends grows tobacco for a living. I don't want to put him out of a job, not do I thin he should be put out of a job.

3. There are smoking good guys in the movies & on tv. Examples include Jed Bartlett (president in The West WIng) & John McClain (cop/hero of the Die Hard movies) though there are others.

Jenise,

I was militant... and backtracked.

Alex

I think you have to separate out the issues about coexisting in the same air space as smokers. That is a civility issue, and many, probably most smokers are pretty good about not inflicting their smoke on those who don't like it.

The issue of taste is the one that interests me the most, and I can see that a smoker can maintain a very good level of discernment in taste. I think it likely that they experience tastes a little differently, as if through a filter that non-smokers lack, but having said that their tasting ability seems unimpaired. I have heard that smokers that quit experience a period of change in taste but quickly settle down again.

The instantly hostile reaction of some smokers to anything said negatively about their habit is something aside and really hasn't got a role in this thread (I don't think, anyway). I can't blame some of them for reacting a bit that way, given the holier than thou attitude and language one sees used by some anti-smoking fanatics. For myself, I am a tobacco libertarian. As long as someone doesn't do it sitting beside me in a restaurant I am content to let them do whatever they wish.

[Jenise]

The issue of taste is the one that interests me the most, and I can see that a smoker can maintain a very good level of discernment in taste.

And that IS what this thread was supposed to be about. I have civility concerns, mostly related to litter--cigarette related detritus is a scourge--but I avoided bringing those up. Like you, I'm not interested in accusing or scolding anyone here--the majority of wine drinkers are a very classy group of people and I doubt anyone reading along here are contributors to that problem.

I would put your taste buds (and even mine, for that matter) up against several of the more militant, smug, non-smokers posting in this venue.

You know what? This has been an extremely civil and interesting thread. In fact, the only one who sounds militant is--well, you!

Moi? Surely you jest.

Not a smoker, never was, probably never will be
Managed also to discourage my wife from smoking
best
Yariv

I smoked for several years during college but not since and I now find that the aromas are quite disturbing for my food and wine appreciation.

However one wine merchant whose palate I respect very much is a smoker and I remember asking him (and his non-smoking business partner) whether it affected his evaluation of the wine. They both agreed that while it may have taken the smoking partner a bit longer to evaluate, they usually reached the same conclusions.

Emergency room Physician, 4:30 a.m., June 24, 1994: "Do you smoke?
OW, with numbness of left arm: "No sir, but I used to."
Physician "When did you quit?"
OW: "About 4 hours ago"
And that was the last.

Like many who did military service in the 60's and 70's, when a "smoke break" was announced and you weren't a smoker, you had to keep on task. Usually that was some physical labor, so naturally we became smokers just to get the break. Stupid yes, but at that age, it was perhaps the least of our transgressions. Cigarettes were cheap then, especially in the military. Fortunately some 15 years later I came to the realization of the what damage smoking does to one's health and quit.

Knowing now what the tobacco manufacturers do to addict their customers, essentially trapping them in a chemical addiction and knowing what damage smoking does to your body, it's curious at best, that anyone still smokes. Addiction is an ugly and tragic thing.

Curious too are the cultures that have embraced smoking as an accepted, or more so, expected rite of passage to adulthood, then continue it in the overwhelming evidence of it's great harm. The pressure to conform with you peers is obviously a strong and unhealthy aspect to socialization.

To purposefully stain your teeth, deaden your tastebuds, foul your breath and turn your lungs black, where's the fun it that?

To quote one of my favorite social commentators, "There's more stupidity in the universe than there is hydrogen, and it has a longer half-life." And of course, he smoked.

Roger,

Your smoking experience doesn't mention the pleasure you procured at the time, and is only limited to cigarettes.

As a cigar smoker, I don't inhale and do not need a smoke every day. Indeed, I have gone weeks without.

Cigarettes, if regularly smoked, are bad news, I agree.

But, please don't lump all smoking habits into the same bag.
It's as though a Bible-thumper told you you were "adicted" to wine...
See?

It is possible to smoke intelligently and in moderation, the same as it is to drink alcohol in moderation.

Best regards,
Alex R.

Roger, Hello.....

It was Saint Augustine who reminded us that "he who knows not wine, women and song remains a fool his whole life long"

One might as comfortably play just a bit with words of course and have that apply to women as well but that is not the issue. I think you will find that even Augustine and certainly an entire collection of saints (including Jeanne d'Arc) believed that sinning in moderation can be good for us.

Even as both a cigarette and cigar smoker, I tend to agree that all people who smoke more than 2 - 3 cigarettes daily are demonstrating foolish behavior. So long as those people do not impose on the rights of others, however, foolish behavior is an option that each person should decide, with full information, on his or her own.

Best
Rogov

It was Saint Augustine who reminded us that "he who knows not wine, women and song remains a fool his whole life long"

Rogov, I always thought that this saying was attributed to that even more severe figure, Martin Luther - „Wer nicht liebt Wein, Weib, Gesang, der bleibt ein Narr sein Leben lang“ .

Otherwise, even as a lifelong non-smoker, I agree with your sentiments.

Tim, Hi.....

You are 100% correct. It was indeed Martin Luther. Chalk my error up to a "slip of the brain".

As to St. Augustine, I do rather like his plea: "Lord, give me abstinence and chastity, but not yet Lord, not yet"

Thanks for the correction

Best
Rogov