nowlin@ihu1e.UUCP (Jerry Nowlin) (06/11/84)
I've always been opposed to the practice of smoking. Whether a pipe, cigar, cigarette, or some other variation on the theme. I've heard and repeated various arguments against it. Personal health, public health, cost to taxpayers, sin to most religions, fire hazard, and on and on. If you work around computers you've probably heard a couple others like the real aversion some disk drives have for smoke particles. I have yet to hear a valid reason *for* smoking. I've read the arguments about the loss of income to individuals and tax revenue to governments, but maintaining the economic base that rests on the tobacco industry isn't a valid reason for an individual to start or continue to smoke. It's just an excuse used by legislators to justify getting their campaign contributions from Reynolds etal. I won't even give credence to the "I'll start to gain weight" type of response. That's just defending one lack of will power with another. This isn't tongue in cheek. I'm trying to solicit tangible reasons for smoking. I want to try and understand what motivates people to start or keep smoking in spite of the overwhelming evidence that they are seriously harming the health of themselves and the people they associate with. I've got 3 kids that are going to have to make the decision to smoke or not some day and I want to be able to understand both sides of the issue so I can explain it to them. Experience tells me that dad saying no isn't going to cut it, and I've got enough respect for my kids not to try it. If you smoke you must have a reason. Let me hear it. I'll be glad to hear from non-smokers too. I realize this is an issue akin to religion in that logic doesn't always prevail. I stayed of my soap box (as much as possible) so please don't get too carried away. If you know of a better group or other forum to carry on this discussion please let me know. Jerry Nowlin ihnp4!ihu1e!nowlin
jlh@loral.UUCP (06/12/84)
Well, when I have lots of fireworks to shoot off I tend to light up a cigarrette because the punk sticks designed for that job don't work well at all. Other than that, I too see no reason to smoke. Of course, I assume you are talking about tobacco. Jim The opinions expressed herein are the sole responsibility of the author and probably have nothing to do with reality.
plunkett@rlgvax.UUCP (Scott Plunkett) (06/12/84)
"..dad saying no isn't going to cut it.." ... it depends on *how* you say no. I know a chap, of Polish extraction, who once told me how his father convinced him never to smoke. Understand that his father had the strength of several bulldozers, was the size of a house, and had hands the size of shovels. Father once said to son slowly with unflinching eye contact: "Son, if I ever catch you smoking," he said, "I will break both your legs." To reassure his son that this was not infact an act of mercy, he continued, "..and if that doesn't make you stop, I'll kill you." Son never smoked, never particularly wanted to, after that heart- to-heart. -- ..{allegra,seismo}!rlgvax!plunkett
labelle@hplabsc.UUCP (06/12/84)
I used to smoke 2 packs a day, I have quit for 3yrs now. I originally started because "everyone else did". Later I continued (until about 31 yrs old) because 1) I was hooked and 2) I enjoyed it (probably due to 1)!! Honestly, if you're a smoker, there's nothing like sitting back after doing something and having a smoke. If it didn't bother others so much and didn't carry such a health risk, I WOULD STILL SMOKE! I respect the rights of others to smoke (or anything else they may wish to do for that matter) so long as it dosen't infringe on someone elses right. I have two teenage kids. One smoke lightly probably for the same reason I started. She is 17 and old enough to know what she is doing to her own body. There is a point beyond which you no longer have control over your children and they reach that individual status. All you can do is advise! She is not allowed to smoke in or around the house because we as her parents feel an obligation to her as a child (until 18 or moved out of the house) to protect her health. At this point example and education are the only tools we have to work with!! My advise to you is 1) If at all possible, educate your children as to the health risks, bother to others, and expense of smoking such that THEY DON'T START IN THE FIRST PLACE!! 2) Do not condone smoking even if you know that they are smoking anyway. I started smoking at about 14 and heavily smoking at 16 WHEN MY MOTHER DISCOVERED I WAS SMOKING AND GAVE UP TRYING TO DISCOURAGE ME!! I must reiterate however smoking was pleasurable and I respect other adults right to indulge. P.S. I like cheap wine GEORGE
heahd@tellab1.UUCP (Dan Wood) (06/12/84)
See reply in net.misc. -- /\ /\ / /~~~~~~\ \ ( ( \ / ) ) Yrs. in Fear and Loathing, \ [~] [~] / The Blue Buffalo \ / || \ / Haunted by the - \ /||\ / ~~~ G \(^^)/ ) o h `--'\ ( z o \) n s o t of G ...!ihnp4!tellab1!heahd
john@plx.UUCP (john butler) (06/12/84)
<Here's a rolled-up line for the line-smoking bug!> This is in response to Jerry Nowlin's request for information on why people smoke. I feel particularly qualified and interested in responding to the subject for the following reasons: 1. I smoked a pipe for 3 years. 2. I smoked cigarettes after that for 5 more years. 3. My wife smoked cigarettes for 10 years. 4. I had a 1-1/2 pack-a-day habit. 5. My wife had a 3-pack-a-day habit. 6. We quit smoking together last summer (July 1983). I am going to present two sets of reasons for smoking: 1. Why do people start? 2. Why, in the face of such overwhelming evidence, do they continue? (In other words, why don't they just quit?) Before I begin, I want to clear up a misconception in the original article. Nowlin states that he won't give credence to the excuse that "I'll gain weight if I quit." He calls this substituting one lack of willpower for another. There is now physiological evidence for weight gain in people who quit smoking. A certain enzyme has been isolated, the amount of which can predict how much the quitter will gain. The national average weight gain for people who quit smoking is 15 pounds. The higher the level of this enzyme *before* the subject quits smoking, (I don't remember the name of it--it just came out in a medical journal a month ago) the more weight the person will gain. The lower the level, the less the gain. Let's stop beating people over their body chemistry. Now to the subject: Why do people start smoking? One barrier to this answer is that until medical professionals acknowledged the seriousness and strength of tobacco, nobody gave a rat's ass and therefore never researched it. Research is just now beginning to surface. 1. It's a drug. Nobody seems willing to admit this, but when you first start smoking, it makes you high after a fashion. It gives you a "hit". When you first start smoking, and suck burning nicotene into your lungs, it jolts your system to constrict the blood vessels, raise the blood pressure, and speed up the heartbeat. When I first started smoking, I couldn't believe it was legal to smoke and drive. I damn near blacked out a couple times when I took a hit from a non-filter Camel. Later on, the effects are nowhere near as pronounced, but by then you're hooked. 2. A recent study has shown that nicotene desensitizes a person (or a rat) to random sensory input. I can vouch for this. As a writer, I found it much easier to concentrate in a noisy, open office when I smoked than I do now. This may indicate a cause-effect relationship between the higher incidence of smoking found in urban dwellers and workers. It may also explain the higher rate in non-professionals, since they tend to live in more cramped living conditions and with larger families than the professional, suburban types. 3. Nicotene stimulates the colon somewhat like coffee does. I had a small constipation problem until I started smoking a pipe. After a bowlful at night, however, I was always then ready to "lighten my load" and then go to bed. 4. Cigarettes serve as a mood enhancer. Studies have shown that even though nicotene physiologically speeds up the metabolism, it can have the opposite effect under certain circumstances. As I noted in item 3, above, it helped me calm down and go to sleep. 5. Although this is diminishing rapidly, smoking has several social aspects: Lighting someone else's cigarette, offering a light or match, offering a cigarette, sharing a pack, etc. all denote familiarity, courtesy, generosity, or intimacy, depending on the context. Smoking makes extra opportunities to be generous or grateful. No such phenomenon occurs among non-smokers (Hey, can I offer you a pair of Adidas shoelaces?). 6. Cigarettes are a boon to self-conscious people. It gives them an outlet for venting random anxieties, allowing them to speak more directly and forcefully in situations wherein they might otherwise be intimidated. I speak from experience. You may call this a "crutch", but it enables self-conscious people to function in circumstances they would otherwise avoid altogether. 7. One of the strongest reasons to start smoking is pre-addiction. My wife's mother smoked 2 packs of unfiltered Pall Malls while pregnant with Renee, who is now my wife. Thereafter, for the next 20 years, Renee shared 988 square feet with her mother and step-father who each smoked at least two packs of cigarettes per day. When Renee took up smoking at about age 17, she was simply following a craving she'd had all her life. It's like craving eggs if you have a protein/cholesterol deficiency. When my wife took up smoking, it also desensitized her to the asthma, allergies, and other respiratory irritations she'd suffered all her life (from secondary smoke). Now, here are the barriers we encountered when we quit smoking. 1. Couldn't wake up all day. We had come to depend on nicotene to wake us up in the morning and regulate our metabolism throughout the day. We doubled our coffee intake, and still felt sleepy all day. In fact, after a month of total body shock we felt like we had defective voltage regulators: we'd alternate periods of hyperactivity with lethargy. There was no normal pace for the first 3-4 months. 2. Weight gain. We each gained 15-20 pounds within the first 2-3 weeks after quitting! That is nearly impossible through simple overeating. So two weeks after we quit, NONE of our clothes fit. We both had to buy new tops, bottoms, and underwear. The only thing we could keep was our shoes. This cost at least $500 just to get some lightweight, low-budget stuff, as we didn't want to buy nice clothes for our F-A-T selves. So if quitting smoking is going to save money, don't count on it for at least a year. Our top weights, Me: 5'9", 200 lbs (normally 165-170). Renee: 5'2", 147 lbs (normally 115-120). If you don't think this would alter one's self-esteem and send most people back to their cigarettes, guess again. 3. Anxiety-induced ailments. We had major intestinal gas problems. Sometimes I nearly knocked myself off my own chair. Renee had it so bad she got a spastic colon and went to the doctor. He prescribed Tranxene, which cleared it up. Stress produces illness. Quitting smoking creates much stress on the body. (Nicotene is the most addictive substance known to man, both in terms of the quantity required to addict, and the persistence of the addiction after quitting.) We both got sick and had to stay home more last summer than we had had to in the previous five years. The stamina just wasn't there--for AT LEAST SIX MONTHS!!! 4. The irritability factor is phenomenal. I almost punched out a co-worker because he knocked over some of my papers. Nearly every weekend my wife and I fought over something really stupid, to the point where we began to doubt the soundness of our marriage (that is, until we got the Tranxene). 5. We were unable to make rational decisions for at least six months. We hired a landscaper to put ground cover on our yard. He hosed us for $3000 which came up weeds. It would not have happened under any other circumstances in my life. 6. For all the above reasons, it jeopardized my job. Who wants an employee who doesn't wake up all day, who is distracted very easily, who doesn't have the stamina to work a full day, whose attendance record is suspect, who is surly and irritable? One final note: to add insult to injury, the medical insurance company disallowed our claims (a total of eight-five piddling dollars) for the doctor's visit for the spastic colon, the diagnosis (nicotene withdrawal), and the treatment (Tranxene, a mild tranquilizer) even though they cover illness (spastic colon?), drug treatment (but nicotene's not a drug??), and anxiety and nervous disorders (but since it was just cigarettes, it couldn't have been too bad???). Would the insurance company have paid for a coronary bypass or lung removal? You Betcha! So quitting smoking is possible, but not easy. I lost a year of my life to quit smoking. I wasted $4000 from buying clothes to fit, making irrational decisions, and experiencing medical problems. There is no immediate reward in spite of the BULLSHIT the American Cancer Society spews out. I lost wind and stamina for six months. I lost my sense of health and well-being. I continued to refrain from smoking because I knew I'd be better off in the long run. And now, nearly 12 months after I quit, I am finally beginning to feel the benefits.
fish@ihu1g.UUCP (Bob Fishell) (06/13/84)
(oo) <- a healthy set of lungs.... Nice horror story, John, but you've made the mistake of projecting your own experiences on others. Just because you had a horrible time kicking, there's no reason to assume everybody does. I'll try to relate my own experiences: I started smoking at age 17 for the usual stupid reasons. At the time, it seemed like something I was supposed to do, just part of becoming a man. Why not? Both my parents smoked, as did many of my friends. I really got hooked when I went away to college and discovered that smoking is a way to relieve tension. It gives you something to do when you don't know what to do next, a real boon to the activity addict. Needless to say, there're a lot of times when I don't know what to do next, so I smoked a lot, as much as three packs a day, with a mode of 1.5 packs. It probably averaged out to 2 packs per day, and this went on for 13 years. My decision to quit came about as part of the traumatic process of turning 30. I realized that I was not really going to live forever and that my health was nothing to screw around with. Now, I couldn't climb two flights of steps without getting dizzy, and couldn't swim a length of the pool underwater. What really did it for me, though, was realizing just how offensive my habit was to others. My breath and clothes stunk, I had a yellow sheen all over everything I lived with, and I polluted the air around me for several yards every time I lit up. I used to think that it wouldn't bother anybody as long as I didn't exhale in their direction. What put the cap on it was my non-smoking office mate's remark that his wife could smell my cigarette smoke on his clothes when he got home from work. He was never nasty about my smoking, either, just civil as could be. I quit cold turkey in late February, 1980. The experience was very uncomfortable, but not unbearable, and the worst of it was over after three days. For a period of about three weeks, my sleep and bowel habits were disrupted, but that, too, was not unbearable, and it passed altogether after a few months. I did gain about 15 pounds, but I lost all of it and more thanks to watching what I ate and riding a 10-speed bicycle. I have not had a cigarette in over four years now, and I feel better for it by several orders of magnitude. Nowadays, cigarette smoke offends me just as much as the most vehement, never-smoked, anti-smoker, thanks to the quick return of my sense of smell after stubbing out that last butt. In short, it's the biggest favor I ever did myself. So, for any of you out there who are contemplating quitting, DO IT! It's well worth whatever temporary discomfort you might experience, and not as bad as some people would have you believe. -- Bob Fishell ihnp4!ihu1g!fish
dgary@ecsvax.UUCP (06/13/84)
<> >From: plunkett@rlgvax.UUCP (Scott Plunkett) Tue Jun 12 09:38:23 1984 >... "Son, if I ever catch >you smoking," he said, "I will break both your legs." To >reassure his son that this was not infact an act of mercy, he >continued, "..and if that doesn't make you stop, I'll kill you." >Son never smoked, never particularly wanted to, after that heart- >to-heart. Who says health warnings aren't effective in discouraging smoking! By golly, those packs ought to say WARNING: The Surgeon General has determined that he will kill your ass if you smoke. Thank you. Call this Damned Assured Distruction (DAD). :-) (if you need help) D Gary Grady Duke University Computation Center, Durham, NC 27706 (919) 684-4146 USENET: {decvax,ihnp4,akgua,etc.}!mcnc!ecsvax!dgary