Look. I'm going to be blunt.

It's HUMAN CHOICE as to whether we choose to smoke or not. There are ads plastered all over the TV saying that smoking is bad, we've covered up ALL forms of indicators that show price AND covers over the cigarettes themselves to prevent impulse buying.

Statistics have shown that cigarette sales have declined this past couple years because of all the nasty pictures that they put on them with things like gangrene, emphysema, tongue cancer, ETC ETC ETC ETF****GCETERA.

I come from both sides of that argument! I was a non-smoker, my sister has smoked since she was 15 and me being 12 at the time, had to help her cover the smell of cigarettes in her room, in the car, outside, the house, EVERYWHERE. MY PARENTS USED TO SMOKE. MY GRANDPA DIED OF BONE CANCER; FROM SMOKING.

Now, I'm 20 years old now, I've been exposed to smoking for over 8 years of my life, and in recent events of depression and paranoia over my weight, started smoking to keep my weight levels 'healthy' and lose more weight before a wedding that I was to be a bridesmaid in. This being one of about 500000000 reasons why.

So I say this now. It's been nearly 5 months since I took up smoking. It's a HABIT, not an addiction, because now that the wedding is over, I went from one packet a week of 25 cigarettes and not eating to 1 packet a month and still not really eating. But that's beside the point.

MY PARENTS DON'T KNOW THAT I SMOKE. MY SISTER DOESN'T. MY FRIENDS DON'T. NO ONE DOES. BECAUSE THAT'S CALLED CLOSET SMOKING.

So I don't need lectures telling me of the dangers of smoking, hear?! I make one little comment about my Mum seeing my packet in my bag and that I was "busted haha XD", and I get about 50 comments back telling me that I'm going to die?! I KNEW THAT ALREADY WHEN I TOOK IT UP. Oh wait, there's more. Closet smoking, no one knows, means that there isn't anyone around when I do it, so WHO'S TEH DREADED SECOND HAND SMOKE GOING TO KILL???

Dear god, not the invisible children! NOT THE INVISIBLE CHILDREN! WON'T SOMEONE PLEASE THINK OF THE INVISIBLE CHILDREN?????

I even hide my cigarettes and stub the lit ones out if I'm outside of work when people walk past so people don't breathe the stuff in.

People start habits for reasons, not just because they were 'feeling' bored.

SO FINE IF YOU HAVE AN OPINION. WHATEVER, share it with the world. But if you start lecturing me on the 'dangers of second hand smoke' and all that crap, I'll get shitty. Not to mention, you can't talk down to me like I'm a child and expect me to smile and nod and not do it again. I don't take shit from someone who lives half way across the goddamn world, because you don't mean anything to me, you live in Nebraska or America or Norway or Japan or Germany or WHEREVER. Not in my home town, not next door, not in the town where my work is, not near my uni, on the other side of the goddamn world.

The fact of the matter is, to round off this rant. IT'S HUMAN CHOICE! We all know its bad for us, we do it for our own reasons and I don't need people telling me the facts. I know the facts, I WORK AT COLES. I read newspapers, for fucks sake, I do economics at uni. I KNOW THE FACTS. I KNOW THE STATISTICS.

I respect that people choose not to smoke. I respect that people do. I fit into both crowds and I'm fine with that. I don't smoke around my friends, and I might have one if stressed with a few work mates during smoke-o at work. You try catering to the grocery needs of 50,0000 people and then be screamed at if we 'don't put the meat in a seperate bag' or 'make the bag too heavy' and then be blankly stared at when we ask if they want cash out.

OFF TOPIC: Check out chicks and dudes are NOT MIND READERS. So next time you come through my till (Look for the 'Bec' name badge because I keep losing mine) and I ask if you want cash out, please, don't hesitate to verbally tell me instead of mentally! It might actually make the transaction easy!

BACK TOPIC: Just as we choose to eat McDonalds, do burnouts down a dirt road, graffitti on the toilet walls, buy the quilted toilet paper instead of the 1 ply, it's human choice.

OK???

One more thing. Laws in Australia say that we are not to smoke around minors. So fine, I don't. I never have, and I doubt I will because I probably will quit as soon as I go back on my meds. Not all smokers wall themselves up in a tiny room and blow their smoke in the faces of their 3 year old children.

Some may do. But we're all educated enough now to know that it's bad. At least in Australia, anyway.

I'm done. Sorry. It's been bugging me for a while (You can kind of tell).

Now this is what a rant is supposed to look like. XD

Seriously, though... I'm not the type of person who lectures smokers. I don't, and I wouldn't want to live with someone who does (no one in my family smokes, luckily); but I don't tell people who smoke a worst-case scenario in order to make them stop. It is a conscious choice, and while I may wish they hadn't made it, I won't lecture them -- unless it's a good friend or someone really young that I know well enough to talk to.

THAT SAID... It is a really big problem (yes, I'm going to call it a problem?), and because this is a choice, you've got to take the bad with the good, I guess. The bad being the chance of cancer, bad breath/stinky clothes, the inability to eat in some restaurants if you want to smoke, and hearing people moan about how it's bad for you. Same happens with alcohol and drugs and stuff. People saying it's bad for you just comes with the package.

Yeah. There is a smoking ban in my state. Went into effect January 1st.

Even though they have the asinine rule of banning smoking IN BARS.

Thanks =) I was kind of...really angry cause I'm sick of the stigma.

Yeah there comes a lot of bad with smoking. But even when I make it clear that I try and keep as much of my closet habits out of the way of people, I still get verbally raped. Last night I was lectured at for 10 minutes by a player on a chat box on an RPG I'm on, all about how it's bad, blah blah blah. Even when I asked the person in question just to move on, it still came. Like verbally written diarrhea.

People can just be stuck up. UGH. Not to mention he lives up in Switzerland or Germany or wherever. On the other side of the world. Now come on, if I won't even listen to my own mother if she's telling me to clean my room, what's the chances of me listening to a random guy who lives half way across the world to stop a habit that I made a conscious choice of picking up?

It just bugs me, is all.

People need to stop lecturing others how to live.

Aye. To add to your rant--and I am sorry if this is tangential--I am REALLY PISSED OFF that Congress is trying to pass a bill illegalizing flavored cigarettes, like cloves and such, but NOT menthol. I love clove cigarettes, but they didn't get me into smoking young! I smoke very occasionally, I'm 20 years old, and I do it, in fact, PARTLY to protest the way the f*cking government is eroding our rights slowly.

They don't have the BALLS to just say "we're illegalizing cigarettes," because that would go to the Supreme Court so fast your head would spin. AND they have too many fiscal interests in metholated cigarettes (1/3 of the market) to be able to stand up for what they supposedly think 'is right.'

Bitches.

*cough*

In short, I agree with you. I hate people who preach, who lecture, and give unasked-for advice. Unasked-for advice is a plague.

Now if only someone would tell that to my father in a way that he understood...

I have a problem with smoking (and I'm very worried, coming into a thread as the first disagreeing opinion =/) but that is mostly because you're allowed to smoke at my school and I can't escape from either a) the smell of cigarette smoke or b) the smell of hops (because the school's near a brewery). It pisses me off so much because I feel like these people are killing everyone else at the school as well as themselves - and then of course they throw their cigarette butts on the ground right in front of rubbish bins.

Don't they know I then have to get on my hands and knees and pick them all up?

But! I don't like people who lecture either (especially if you tell them to stop) so I'm not lecturing you. As long as you don't come along and blow smoke in my face and then drop your still-burning cigarette at my feet, I'm ok.

Onto the checkout rant! I hate that! I have people who come through the checkout, pay for their stuff using credit and then, when I'm giving their receipt, say 'oh, and I'd like money out'. I'm like 'Nuuu! Nuuuu! Stupid people!' because they could just ask before they pay. Instead I have to tell them 'sorry, we can't do that' and then they act like I've spit on them or something. Don't they realise I am not an ATM? My name badge does not say ATM!

I don't like smoking at all, though, with that said, I don't care whether or not you smoke or where and when you smoke, as long as you give me a heads up so I can decide on whether or not I want to stay and take the consequences of second hand smoking, or leave. And from what you said, it seems like you're pretty considerate about smoking around others, which is a rare thing to see around my school for the most part.

Generally, if I'm walking with you and you want to smoke, just ask if it's okay and if we're sitting, perhaps move so the smoke doesn't get in my face. If I walk into a room with smokers in it, I'll just turn around and leave if I don't want to stay or stay.

I'm not one for giving lectures, I'm all for people quitting smoking, if their own decision and I'll gladly cheer them on, but I can't be bummed to lecture people. It's your body, your health and so forth, your life really and if you're considerate about the people around you, then I really don't have a problem with you at all.
That, and I since I can't be bothered to lecture my friend, that goes to the same school as me, is in my class etc. about smoking, I really can't be bothered to lecture people across the world. I'll lecture people I live with, 'cause that is what mostly affects my quality of life and I don't like the smell of smoke in my room.

As for the checkout bit: I don't ask to cash out, I'm too shy and have a fear of using my card in stores (it's got nothing to do with a fear of being scammed either, I just don't like using my card to pay for things in stores) and have a hard enough time using the ATM without having to ask people to do something that takes me 2-4 minutes to do on my own <_<

Sorry if it's a bit of a blur, I'm not really thinking as clearly as I'd like.

Really? That's lamer than lame. I sure as hell hope this doesn't effect other forms of flavored tobacco because if I can't get my mango hookah, people will DIE!

Something that pisses me off is how many states have outright banned smoking in public places like restaurants. Excuse me for being the cynical Libertarian, but it makes me sick that such a thing is decided by the government and not the establishment's owner.

I disagree, Vildea. You shouldn't have to avoid a smoker--the smoker should go out of his or her way to avoid you, such as going to smoking areas before lighting up. If the smoker does that, then I'm not going to lecture because as the original point of this topic says: it is a personal choice. "Human choice" doesn't really make sense.

At any rate, I'm a nonsmoker and I greatly dislike smoking. As long as smokers know the consequences of smoking and they don't try to encourage other people to join them, they can smoke all day. I don't like it and I wish that they didn't for multiple reasons, but it's a free country.

Is it? I'm not so sure. (See above).

"Free" is a relative term. Of course, we cannot be completely free because where courtesy fails we need to make laws. In other words, we have to have laws because some people are morons who have no common courtesy. (In general; this isn't an attack on smoking.) We are so much more free than many, many of the countries on this planet, and I, for one, am quite grateful that I was born in the US and not Uzbekestan or something.

So I was going to say more, but then my train of thought derailed. My humblest apologies.

I'm happy to let everyone go die in their own little corner of their world, surrounded by ciggy-smoke if they so choose, provided it doesn't impact me and mine. I won't come sit by you. I smoked a considerable amount of questionable things + tobacco in my teenage years and thank you, that's an itch I've not scratched in 6 years so..yeah...temptation can go sit over there -points-.

The only thing that grates me these days is that it's yet another unnecessary drain on NHS funding here. While I'm all for the pro-active funding (such as the stop smoking campaigns and hand-holding for those who need it), I am against the NHS shelling out funding and resources to deal with illnesses directly smoking related that are self inflicted. I'm not talking about the elderly here, I'm talking about people who choose to smoke, know the risks, knew it was bad from the start and who get ill even though they think it won't happen to them.

I think you should be prepared to shell out for the majority cost of your own healthcare when illnesses you suffer are a direct result of smoking. Alas, this requires a more ideal world with more clear cut ideas of what constitutes self inflicted and what does not. So for now I will settle for, 'don't do it 'round me and I won't make you eat it.'

I agree with you. Secondhand smoke kills. The people who don't want to fill their lungs with chemicals shouldn't have to inhale them.

6 years is awesome and I'm seriously in awesomeness because it takes a LOT of will-power to quit cigarettes. I know people that've tried to quit and quit again, with and without patches and gum, and yeah.

Yes it does, I know that, there's statistics! But I don't see why I should be attacked over it when I don't even smoke near people that are non-smokers. Places that smoke now are so limited that it shouldn't really matter anymore, it's illeagal to smoke near work outdoors, near government buildings, near general areas, or indoors ANYWHERE.

Doesn't leave many places left, does it? Parks are probably going to be next, I know they ban dogs, so why not smokers?

Sorry if I confused you there then, Dec! I used 'human choice' because 'personal' implies conscious thought, and I consider animals to have conscious thought. Animals aren't as stupid as humans, lucky them!

It can be, yes! All I ask is that I don't be lectured by people that live on the other side of the world. Not just that, with my past experiences with cigarettes, I was getting the "it killed my grandpa" card thrown at me.

**MORE RANTING SO BEWARE**

Now, let's explore this shall we? Grandpa implies a male that is obviously older and possibly living in the period where cigarettes were considered a good thing to smoke. Just to underline this, we all know the dangers of smoke/drinking while pregnant, this would have been the time period, possibly border lining the baby boomers of WWII and the latter stages of the stolen generation in Australia, and the asbestos mining. So, we all know the time period, yes?

Therefore, it's possible that there are MANY Grandfathers/mothers out there that have died from smoking. My own grandpa died of bone cancer, my best friend's grandpa died of cancer, so did her grandmother-- from smoking. My classmate's grandpa died of asbestos/cancer from smoking/asbestos mining.

THEREFORE, it's not uncommon for someone who is elderly and smoked all of their lives, to die of smoking. It was the age that they lived in, they didn't know the dangers.

Conclusively, we of the much educated Generation Y who all think that the baby boomers are to blame because they were the ones who polluted the O-zone (not my personal sentiments), know of the dangers of smoking, and some of us choose to, and some of us don't. THEREFORE it's irrelevant to throw an insult like that to someone who is a smoker and young enough to have had a grandparent post WII who smoked would most likely have had them pass on due to the repercussions.

**END MORE RANTING**

UGH.

There, I'm done. Again. This is what happens when I get annoyed, apologies if I offended anyone in case I incite an immediate argument over my choice of words.

There are statistics, sure, but then, what's more notoriously unreliable than statistics? Well--politicians, for one. I remain almost entirely skeptical about the so-called dangers of secondhand smoke.

And that sort of fuzzy reasoning always irks me.

Anyway, I don't want to get too off-topic, so I'll just go and be irritated somewhere else now.

Ahh true, 98% of all statistics are usually fictitious.

I love you Smathna, marry me! ^________________^ We can be the irritated couple that sit in the corner scowling at everyone.

Just the fact that you work at Coles makes me want to wrap you into a security blanket and hug you until all the nasties go away. XD I don't know who I pity more... starving orphans, or slaves to Coles Group.

Or is it also 'human choice' to receive paychecks from the devil? /jk

Yes, I work for Safeway. Shoot me. ... Have you got your Everyday Rewards card yet?

Don't even start me on the cash register blues... there's a whole Mousie rant devoted to that already here --> Dear Mr Customer

Back to topic -- I'm a non-smoker. Not that I haven't tried it occasionally, I look seriously unco trying to smoke, my parents would kill me, and I don't enjoy it. That's enough reason for me to not keep trying. Mind you, a few drinks and I always get curious again. It usually takes half a puff of someone elses for all those reasons to come flooding back.

Some people can do it, smoke casually, I mean. Some people end up seriously addicted and can't stop no matter how hard they try (of course, there is the argument that you can't quit until you really, truly want to -- and it's hard to know exactly where that point is. I saw it happen to my parents. They literally snapped, and stopped).

I try not to lecture people. I spent years when I was little and semi-religious praying that my parents would stop one day, because I knew it was harming them. No little kid wants to see her parents harmed, so I gave them the lecture pretty frequently. But it seems to have become something that non-smokers just say... or even, anyone really. Even at the register... customer asks for a packet of PJ Extra thirties (which I can actually find better than if they ask for 'original' -- go figure), I state I'm not familar with cigarette brands..

Cue the discussion on how smoking is bad for you.

It's sort of become like.. asking someone how they are, or adding your please and thankyous.

Funnily enough, in my experience, it's usually the smoker who starts the conversation. Possibly because we're standing at the register, and we need something to talk about. Might as well talk about how the customer is slowly killing their self.

Its the sort of thing you casually mention to your friends when they light up in front of you, and the wind is blowing in your direction. You move out of the way, and remark on the smell. It's the sort of thing you poke fun at them for, when they have to leave the nice warm pub for a ciggy, cause you don't have to.

But then, the smokers I know are also the sort to start up conversations about how bad it is, and tell me that no, I cannot try their cigarette because smoking is bad for you. XD

I suppose the only thing that really bothers me about smokers (and this applies only to a very small group of smokers)... are the ones who demand a different packet off the shelf because the picture on the packet I picked up makes them 'not feel like smoking anymore'.

Well I'm sorry that the advertising designed to save your health works, but you're getting the picture of the dying baby, or the eye that stares at you, or the statistics you read once and realised you could be one of them one day. I cannot, by cigarette display and retail laws, fetch you another packet more suited to your delicate tastes...

My mousie ^_____^

...Safeway??? Bad Mousie! Baaad!

Nah, it's ok, my best friend works at Big W. We trade discount cards pending the stores affiliated with Woolworths LTD or Coles Myer!

Yes...those pesky rewards cards. We've actually stopped giving rewards to those who smoke, so no more fuel dockets to the person who spends a penny for a carton, and no more fly buys for them either!

Which is bad for me, my whole stock of fuel vouchers came from the smokers at front end, I'd empty the recycle box into the compactor and look for the dockets at the same time =D

That just made me laugh XD Next time you get the foot or the lungs, pass the packet over and say "Here's your emphseeeeeeema/gangreeeeeeene!" and see what the reaction is. It's so funny, the smokers with a sense of humour (we few that tell you "no! no smoking for you!) usually laugh. And the other's...well... not so funny.

Dear Mr Customer cheered me up though, thank you ^___________^

Sorry, I didn't mean to attack you, it was more of a general statement. I have to say I agree with you a little bit. If there's nowhere for the smokers to smoke, then they will just start smoking in the illegal areas. You guys need designated smoking areas and not just be banned from everywhere. That's not fair, as well.