Are smokers an unrightfully persecuted minority?

[ywhtptgtfo]

I understand exactly why. Anyway, enough of this.

He's under the serious moonlight.

 

[CavLancer]

We should cut him some slack, this isn't the time. Besides, this random bornagain non-smoker on the interwebs rather likes the guy. Though I'm sure he thinks I have a funny way of showing it. He'll thank me someday. joking...

 

[ywhtptgtfo]

I guess he will forgive you once he stops smoking and no longer qualifies for the "pathetic" descriptor.

 

[CavLancer]

What I like about him is that he's stubborn, so I doubt it.

 

[H4run]

What I like about him is that he's stubborn, so I doubt it.

or consistent about his belief? I already stated before in this thread or other thread I forgot, now I'm striving to stop smoking, and when the time come I promise to myself for not being abusive, intimidative and discriminative to the smoker. If I do that not because I am stubborn, because I try to be more constructive than destructive.

You are trying to be assertive in this terms I can see that, however categorizing a smoker to be stupid or pathetic it is also not true and not constructive. Some peoples did that mostly to satisfy their own narcissistic impulse, they made smoker some kind of their alter ego to be compare with. Like, Non smoker smart-smoker stupid; non smoker good citizen-smoker bad citizen; non smoker kick ass-smoker pathetic; by these you define who you are and feel good about it.

And smoker are not stupid everybody know that, taking wrong decision in life it doesn't mean one is stupid, especially back in 90's the anti cigarette slogan can be consider nearly zero, back then I can smoke in shopping mall, I can smoke in the train, I can smoke in the bus, and no one consider smoker as a threatening individual. So we are in transition, we need time and patience, we need assertive and constructive attitude. Mockery and intimidation just push smoker to smoke more. Yes it is.

 

[CavLancer]

Wait until you get the job done and see people around you still in their prison of smoke, then tell me about it. Touchy feely stuff doesn't mean anything when it comes to quitting, you have to be determined and in your determination you have to be stubborn and you first have to overcome your delusions. Pathetic is an understatement. I saw my father on his deathbed sucking on a straw which my stepmother gave him. It was the most pathetic thing I'd ever seen. Get it the **** done and quit dickin around. It was the single most difficult thing I've ever done in my life. Make it the single most difficult thing you're ever done in yours and put it behind you. Then see how touchy feely you are. When I was 5 years old my mother who loved him put me up to asking him to quit. His reply to his 5 year old son? "I can't". Pathetic. I could never say "I can't" to my kids.

Mad? Well u s e it. Beat this thing before it beats you into the ground.

 

[Mise]

Naggers are annoying. Cigarette smoke is annoying. This is what this thread boils down to it seems.

 

[aelf]

If you go back and pick up the previous context for which I made that post these responses are all kinda the point of it.

And if I go back far enough in your posting history, I might find that it's a consistent theme, whereby, at least at some point in time, you think of city people as living like rats?

Don't worry, you're allowed to keep that opinion. The only thing contemptible about moderates is their hypocrisy.

 

[H4run]

Wait until you get the job done and see people around you still in their prison of smoke, then tell me about it. Touchy feely stuff doesn't mean anything when it comes to quitting, you have to be determined and in your determination you have to be stubborn and you first have to overcome your delusions. Pathetic is an understatement. I saw my father on his deathbed sucking on a straw which my stepmother gave him. It was the most pathetic thing I'd ever seen. Get it the **** done and quit dickin around. It was the single most difficult thing I've ever done in my life. Make it the single most difficult thing you're ever done in yours and put it behind you. Then see how touchy feely you are. When I was 5 years old my mother who loved him put me up to asking him to quit. His reply to his 5 year old son? "I can't". Pathetic. I could never say "I can't" to my kids.

Mad? Well u s e it. Beat this thing before it beats you into the ground.

I really feel sorry about your father. And arguing on something that I don't belief in is against my very principle, I agree I must stop smoking and smoking is bad, and I must put it off as soon as possible, so I think there nothing to argue I must accept it as the way it is, the things that I just don't agree is how peoples put a stigma to smoker something that is not belong to them, that one also injustice, however I drop it off now because mostly I agree with you, and I gonna be a father soon.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

I don't know who brought it up, but there is indeed a fear of turning into the self-righteous better-than-you attitude wielding born-again non-smoker. I'd rather die wheezing and coughing up lungs the last 10 years of my life than being that obnoxious about it all of my life.

So thanks a lot. Thanks for making quitting that much harder for me if I make that decision.

And if I ever do quit, and any of you catches me acting like that kind of nogger, all you guys have permission to visit me and kick my ass. I'll thank you for it and even pay your ticket.

 

[Hygro]

If you go back and pick up the previous context for which I made that post these responses are all kinda the point of it.

You mean the context in which you called people for liking living in cities stupid, i.e., below a necessary bar of stupidity to live in a city.

 

[Terxpahseyton]

This resonates.

Thank you. As I don't or at least should not grow tired of repeating - a word of kindness and/or respect is worth a ton on the net.

The only caveat I have is that it's an addictive product that's targeted to teenagers. The idea that a teenager can pre-emptively 'best' judge their own self-interest is ... non-intuitive.

From my POV it does not even need to be targeted at teenagers.
I talked a lot about the value of smoking depending on individual values. But I did not mean to advocate a general neutrality regarding the value of smoking. To the contrary. I accept and support the notion that smoking will tend to be a bad or a "stupid" choice. So much that I support measures to raise awareness of the downsides - or the outright prohibition for young people who are so disproportionally* full of them selves that they have good use for special protection. Not to mention the biological issue of developing brains and in general bodies.
What I object is not the general but specific stigmatization of smokers. Which of course means that those two are distinct to begin with, which usually and sadly is not the case.
Nuance dies a quick death in public discourse.

To have "society" determine what is stupid or not is putting the fox in charge of the henhouse if you ask me.

*relative to their later selfs

Society's making a judgment not because it has different tastes, but because it perceives that smokers are taking an undue risk for not enough reward. That's a fundamentally different consideration than a question of whether someone has 'right' or 'wrong' tastes.

And that is where you are completely and utterly wrong.

A more correct analogy would be Harry preferring strawberry ice-cream, and Bob preferring arsenic-laced ice-cream.

If Bob does not mind having himself killed, if instead Bob likes the thought - Bob is right. And society is trying to feel more comfortable by calling Bob stupid. An expected and ordinary reaction. Not an inherently justified one though.
Smokers often don't want to kill themselves of course, I don't. I have a feeling Ziggy doesn't. But the principle remains the same. What I feel is what I feel. No one else, be it you or Donald trump or some god dame society has any reasonable grounds to call "stupid" If I know what is at stake and feel about it the way I do - why is your feeling superior? Why? Because it more closely resemblance your feelings in another 40 years? Why are those grounds to call me stupid? Why do I have to care about that? That is not stupidity. That is attitude. Not telling the two apart - that is motherfreaking stupidity.

You can tell me - if you are old and dying of lung cancer- you will regret it.
You can tell me all sorts of things. But declare me stupid? That is no other thing than someone else wanting to feel better about him or herself. Ziggy got that dame right.
And it is disgusting and disturbing how even people I'd judge to be in generally smart and reflective are blind to that. Goes to show the stage of the prosecution. Awareness - all for it. Prosecution - punch yourself in the dick or I hope somebody else will. The difference is an awareness of the delicateness of choice and value and truth. The difference is respect and awareness of the fragility of the human condition.

edit: @CavLancer
Sorry be to blunt but I am going to play Freud here. I think you redirect you secret lust for the smoke into attacking smokers. Not meaning to say that this makes you bad. I am happy for you being smoke-free, truly am. Your comments still can be of the bottom of my empty coffee cup.

 

[CavLancer]

I just like the smell, I don't ever think of smoking myself anymore. That's the nice thing about being truly past the desire, I go decades without thinking of having a cigarette.

That takes a while btw. You can quit but the cravings will sneak up on you for a few months. Give in once to a surprise craving when you thought you were done, getting sideswiped, ambushed, by your cells can cause failure long after success is assumed.

One cigarette and you're hooked again like you never quit. Amazing stuff really.

 

[ywhtptgtfo]

I don't know who brought it up, but there is indeed a fear of turning into the self-righteous better-than-you attitude wielding born-again non-smoker. I'd rather die wheezing and coughing up lungs the last 10 years of my life than being that obnoxious about it all of my life.

So thanks a lot. Thanks for making quitting that much harder for me if I make that decision.

And if I ever do quit, and any of you catches me acting like that kind of nogger, all you guys have permission to visit me and kick my ass. I'll thank you for it and even pay your ticket.

So you'd rather suffer from severe respiratory issues than to be a dick about smoking. That's some seriously off priorities (at least according to my preferences).

Perhaps CavLancer does have a point after all.

 

[ywhtptgtfo]

Naggers are annoying. Cigarette smoke is annoying. This is what this thread boils down to it seems.

SNIP

You should be careful about posting pictures like this. Others may report you for baiting that particularly forbidden word and then the mods will action on it.

 

[Mise]

You should be careful about posting pictures like this. Others may report you for baiting that particularly forbidden word and then the mods will action on it.

You're right, that was silly of me. I've removed that picture from my post - can you remove it from your quote as well please?

 

[Farm Boy]

You mean the context in which you called people for liking living in cities stupid, i.e., below a necessary bar of stupidity to live in a city.

The fact that it seems to annoy you and triggers the standard Aelf response of fishing really hard for something fascist(or a complete inability, willing or otherwise, for the two of us to communicate effectively) to hobnob together means the point about some people finding a legitimate value in a lifestyle choice is also something somebody can find contemptible and unhealthy. It was a call for moderating judgment while being aware enough that yes, I do realize people legitimately like living in cities for good reasons I do not share their valuation of. It's not that hard a point man.

Edit: meh, the break was longer than I realized and I'm tired of having this conversation over and over with the two of you. Neither is willing to read my points with enough innate generosity to get to my actual intended point rather than hanging up on my failures to express it effectively. It's an exercise in futility. Take it easy Holmes.

 

[Hygro]

All I responded with was "we like people and cities are full of people" to your claim that "My perpetual bewilderment that people are stupid enough to enjoy being in cities, much less the total idiots that want to breathe that air perpetually because they choose to live there?"

...and somehow that's me not being charitable enough to you.

But mostly I just hadn't read Camikaze's post and had no idea you were going off his discussion of the word "stupid".

 

[Mise]

I had the weirdest dream last night! I dreamt that aelf had met up with Farm Boy and fallen for his country charms. No word of a lie, this is what I dreamt. For some reason I was trying to convince aelf that Farm Boy wasn't the one for him, and that he would break his heart eventually -- that Farm Boy was just putting on a facade to attract naive lefties who think they can change him. I suppose this says more about me and my love life than it does about either of you two, but I just thought I'd share cos it's totes hilare!

 

[Hygro]

I had the weirdest dream last night! I dreamt that aelf had met up with Farm Boy and fallen for his country charms. No word of a lie, this is what I dreamt. For some reason I was trying to convince aelf that Farm Boy wasn't the one for him, and that he would break his heart eventually -- that Farm Boy was just putting on a facade to attract naive lefties who think they can change him. I suppose this says more about me and my love life than it does about either of you two, but I just thought I'd share cos it's totes hilare!

lol! I love CFC dreams