The Wake

Beginning October 1st, 2007, the Minnesota State Legislature’s Freedom to Breathe Act has gone into effect, restricting the ability of tobacco smokers to breathe their distinctively carcinogenic air in most public places. As was the case before, all indoor government, public school, transportation, and health facilities prohibit smoking. In addition, all public restaurants, with the exception of those whose liquor sales exceed food sales, are now illegal to smoke in. The primary source of political controversy over this matter is the question of how it will affect restaurant owners’ revenues. Many feel that this new restriction will discourage smokers from going out as much, if even at all. Though I find it hard to imagine any particularly dramatic decreases in restaurant profits as a result of this law, it does seem that this is the latest step in a gradual effort to phase out smoking as an acceptable social activity in the Land of Lakes.

People over the age of 50 can recall a grand old time when smoke filled movie theaters, buses, airplanes, restaurants, and almost every indoor area where people gathered. No one gave much thought to its detrimental impacts on smokers’ health, let alone people exposed to secondhand smoke. But as tumors grew and brown mucus flew, the evidence became overwhelming: smoking kills. The activity was banned in airplanes, movie theaters, parts of restaurants, and almost all public places where people gathered. Public service announcements, mostly funded by evil, deceptive tobacco corporations under court-order became regular fare on bus shelters, television and radio, warning the American public about the health risks associated with cigarettes. Consistent with our society’s growing concern for its health, manifested in diet programs and prescription drugs for disorders like restless legs syndrome and social anxiety disorder, the smoking ban now confirms the relegation of tobacco smoking from its former distinction of cultured elegance, to reviled and filthy habit of addicts.

Undeniably, cigarette smoke does cause diseases. It has a terrible chemical quality that leaves any place where it is confined coated in a stinky residue and stains the bodies of people who are exposed to it. Tobacco does not, in terms of mental or physical health, benefit anyone. For these reasons, it probably belongs in a category of highly controlled substances generally disrespected by the American public.

You would be hard pressed to find a smoker without knowledge of tobacco’s adverse effects. Every person who smokes, usually by the first time they light up, is aware of the addictive and cancerous propertied of cigarettes. Yet people continue to smoke, willfully destroying their own health for a mild head buzz. Compared to other commonly abused substances, the adverse effects of tobacco far outweigh its psychological “benefits”. With this in mind, it’s difficult to explain the popularity of smoking that fills ashtrays around campus. There must be some other appeal to it that nonsmokers don’t see.

Tobacco used to be considered sensual and elegant by European cultures, and was mostly a habit of the upper class during its early use in the 17th Century. Even then, people could recognize its unhealthy nature just by its lingering smell, which repelled many people. As European high culture diffused into lower classes and other societies, so did the ritual of smoking, and when tobacco advertising appeared it became clear that a lot of people smoked just to be cool. Pursuing a high-class luxury while producing a cloud of fumes noxious to everyone around fit like a jigsaw piece into the entitlement of the American dream. Cigarettes were smoked heavily by almost every character in Hollywood films, and mascots like Joe Camel and the Marlboro Man contributed to their social acceptability. However, as the icons aged and wrinkled with rapidity, smoking began to somewhat loose its appeal. The sad aftermath of long-held habits convinced a majority of people that the consequences of smoking are not worth any conceivable benefits. Teams of doctors led by the Surgeon General warned the American public, with a message on every pack, that heaps of medical evidence indicated the malignant properties of smoking. Smoking ceased to be a decadent pursuit of the celebrated upper class as movies, television, and other media reflected this change.

Although Hollywood may have changed in its representation of smoking, the fact remains that millions of people are addicted to cigarettes. Smoking will undoubtedly linger on in American, but now with a new face: that of the counter-culture. The ethical opposition to some of our society’s backward values that became widespread in the 1960s holds many attitudes which are congruent to that of the smoker. In defying all of the medical advice which has been given about tobacco, smokers depart from conventional values which place health and safety above all other things. To smoke is a way to exercise your freedom, and assert control over your own life, destructive or not. Whether the purpose is a head buzz or the loss of one’s respiratory system is irrelevant; all that matters is the right to make a deliberate choice. Smokers are more conscious than most of the fleeting nature of life, and many think of their cigarettes as a good way to enjoy it while it lasts. In a way, the fact that it’s killing you makes the smoke taste that much better.

Although the government does seem to be compromising personal freedoms in its concerns for health, I don’t particularly mind the smoking ban. Although I am a smoker, I have never smoked in restaurants and wasn’t planning on starting. However, I will not apologize for my habit. Although the general opinion of our culture may be totally averse to smoking, and many may glare, groan, or shift uncomfortably when I light up, it makes no difference. Sitting at a bus stop and obliging some stranger asking for a cigarette, by my interpretation, is a small favor to a kindred soul who’s trying to live a sensational life, or at least a little push toward the doors to oblivion for a tortured one. And as I sit back, relax, and watch people race by, examining their insurance premiums and tissue cultures, I feel somehow that smoking is healthy. Then again, it’s probably just the head buzz.