You’re walking down the sidewalk. You approach Leonard, who is walking a skunk on a leash. You stop and tell Leonard “I don’t want to walk through your skunk’s cloud of stink.” He responds with “I’m addicted to walking skunks. I can’t help it, you insensitive asshole.” You’re forced to suck in skunk stink so as not to seem like the jerk in this situation.

Further along, there’s Bernie pushing a grocery cart of dirty diapers. You tell Bernie “I don’t want to walk through your diapers’ cloud of stink.” He answers with “It’s legal for me to do this here. Cross the street if you don’t like it, diaper Nazi.” The nearest crosswalk is 2 blocks back the other way, and you’re already late. You attempt to scooch past the grocery cart with your mouth closed and your nose plugged, with the desperate hope that you won’t have to choke down the horrible smell.

You arrive for work with an itchy, burning sensation in your nostrils, possibly even an asthmatic wheezing, and a lingering scent on your clothing,

I think we can all (and I do mean all of us) agree that we’d be: 1. Shocked that people would choose to do this in a public place you also need to share. 2. Appalled by the lack of respect these stink-factories show for their fellow sidewalk-goers in their response to your reasonable concerns.

And so I arrive to the point of my story. Why aren’t Leonard and Bernie (weirdos and jerks) called out on their bullshit excuses for their bullshit habits? Why can Ron and Bill defend their attitudes toward smoking cigarettes on the sidewalk with the same excuses, and many people (like those on this site) will either agree, empathize, or sympathize with them?

This is not an anti-smoking bitch, this is just a bitch about the bullshit excuses people use to justify their smoking. And before you say that the smell of skunks or dirty diapers is much worse than cigarette smoke, think about how many people love broccoli and Brussels sprouts and how many would think they could gag a troll. —Allumeur

This article appears in Jul 7-13, 2011.

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45 Comments

  1. Reply

  2. Addicted to walking skunks. Love it 🙂

    The cancer-stick-aficionados-internet-tough-guys squad should be here shortly to unleash the fury and lecture you about freedom, OP.

    “Freedom isn’t free, there’s a hefty fucking fee”.

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  3. That goes for just about anything under the sun.

    People will give excuses who feel the need to justify their actions all the time for just about everything. Different people different excuses for different things.
    In the big piture we are all alot alike.

    I don’t smoke but can put OP’s example to many senieros

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  4. Smokers are far worse smelling than 100 skunks. And the smell when they “Butt” them out and save the other half for later and put it in their pocket. Walking ash-trays. GROSS

    I dont think ive ever heard of someone getting cancer from sniffing skunk stink…but 2nd hand smoke now thats a different story…

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  5. I love smoking – and I understand that not everyone does – but I’m not going to stop for you or anyone else.

    When in public, in the open air, you take the risk of meeting people or simply walking by people that may not share your feelings or your sensibilities, or your exaggerated sensitivities that you use to prove a point.

    If you want to control everyone, you should stay inside the nice comfortable smoke free confines of your house.

    Because if it isn’t the smokers that irritate you, judging by the amount of time you spent writing this ridiculous diatribe, it will be something else.

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  6. Reminds of the old commercial of the lady in the restaurant surrounded by smokers, she then puts on a gas mask and pulls out a skunk and the people scatter, must have been the 70″s

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  9. Suck it up Nancy!
    Do I get to complain that you’re not wearing deodorant? Can I complain that your deordorant is too smelly?
    Life has smells, adjust to it. The smokers are outdoors along with the people spraying cow shit fertilizer and sweating as they run by you.
    Get over it or climb into a plastic bubble!

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  10. and you think sucking in a lungful of fucking deisel exhaust isn’t bad then.try sitting by a transit bus, while it is idling. holy fuck, i would rather walk behind a fucking skunk anyday. all you fucking assholes on your high horses about fucking smoking.you wanna bitch at someone, do it to the fucking government then.
    they are the ones that keep putting the addictive shit in fucking smokes, not us poor fucks that buy them. and they do it sneakily too, a little bit at a time, then by year end, they give your the full dose of whatever shit they have been doping us with.
    if you and all the rest of your mouthpiece anti smoking idiots, want us to stop, then fucking petition the government to out right fucking ban the sale and any possession of any type of tobacco product.but before you do that o.p., better have a fucking place to hide away, when the smoking zombies come looking for you and your kind.til then, FUCK OFF.

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  11. My fave anti-smoking tv ad was from the late 70’s/early 80’s. I think it only aired on maritime tv stations? (I could be wrong) I often catch myself humming the tune from time to time and have looked high and low to try and find a video of it online with no luck. It’s a bunch of high school aged kids hanging around what looks like a school yard. One male kid with an up turned collar and sunglasses lights up a smoke and the rest of the kids start singing a jingle, (sounds and looks really home made) I can only remember bits and pieces of it: “Hey Nick! Cool Nic-o-tine!… Smoking makes your teeth yellow. Smoking makes your breath smell-o….He thinks he’s so cool but he’s being a fool!” I would LOVE to find this video if it exists, just for the nostalgia of it all. Anyone on here know what I’m talking about?

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  12. Coool Nick was awesome! A fuck of a lot cooler than those pre-gleek nancies whingeing about smell-o breath.

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  13. I’ve been told I resemble Cool Nick by one of my coworkers. (Note: I don’t smoke. Never have, never will)

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  19. “This is not an anti-smoking bitch”. Yeah right, everyone can smell you bullshit over the cigarette smoke.

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  22. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again.

    Buck up, if you don’t like it, don’t breath

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  23. Someday, I’d love it if we could live in a society where people who smoke in public could be summarily executed. I don’t care about their “rights” much, it’s disgusting that I or any other non-smoker should be forced to be anywhere around their toxins.

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  24. I don’t mind walking past a smoker or having one walk past me, I dislike the odour for the most part but it usually doesn’t linger too long. It was way worse when they could smoke in the bars and you’d come home reeking, no chance you could wear those clothes again without washing them. I have more of a problem with people who smoke in/at bus stops.

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  25. I feel this way when a big gas guzzling smelly SUV or Truck drives by and I get a big face full of exhaust.
    Of course this is socially acceptable way to contribute to other people’s cancer.

    Personally, I smoke. I try not to be a dick about it, I don’t exhale right in people’s faces, I try to avoid smoking by doors, windows and bus stops, and I’ll hold it away from somebody as they pass. But anti-smoking nuts are assholes! They make me want to blow my smoke in their face. Ok, you don’t like smoking, I get it. But to imply that smokers shouldn’t have rights, have access to health care, be segregated or executed is beyond a little extreme. If you suggested this about any other group, culture, whatever, you’d be seen as a bigot, an intolerant jerk or worse. Just because it’s socially acceptable and encouraged to be a smug holier then thou, asshole, anti-smoking, douchebag, doesn’t mean you have to be. I’m sure your shit stinks just as bad in a different way (like the shit coming from your mouths that I have to hear.)

    And I feel it’s hypocritical to bitch about smokers polluting or giving you cancer and then climb into your huge SUV and pump out a ton of smog to drive to the corner store.

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  26. “Someday, I’d love it if we could live in a society where people who smoke in public could be summarily executed.”

    Yes, because fascism is a beautiful thing.

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  27. I’m not afraid of pet skunks…I once had one.
    They are very similar to a cat, in some of their habits (although mine never coughed up a fur puke ball & they don’t smell bad.
    THey are surgically fixed in the scent spraying area of their anatomy.
    But even so I have come across wild skunks who ,while not happy to see me, didn’t spray because they didn’t feel threatened enough & they didn’t smell bad either.

    I had kid’s & my wife tried to go the reusable diaper route…became to much work & whoa…did that pail get to humming
    I’m not afraid of that either.

    I don’t smoke & smokers are paying outrageous taxes to the local Gov to be able to purchase & smoke legally.
    I believe they should be able to smoke anywhere outside they please & smoking rooms should be allowed in resturants & bars, and any public building & cigar bars should also be totally smoking with a warning to non smokers to stay the fuck out, or come in & shut the fuck up !

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  28. more, i have said this here and elsewere countless times. IF YOU DON’T LIKE THE SMELL, OR THE SIGHT OF SMOKING, STAY THE FUCK AWAY FROM IT ALL THEN. people make me want to pound their fucking asses sometimes. they start off their day, by going out and looking for shit like this to bitch about. when all they have to do, is be a little bit away from someone smoking.
    outside, at any given time, there is a lot of fucking air passing between you and person puffing,don’t give me the bullshit about how the air reeks of smoke when you or they pass by. do some math on this. it takes a few seconds usually before smoke reaches your fucking over sensitive nostrils, so in that time, at least half of it is gone.
    and to those that bitch and whine about health care cash, look at where most of the sales tax goes. to health care, so you, the non smoker can go to an emergency room for your little sniffles.over the course of 10 years, i will pay more for health care taxes, than you would over a lifetime. so, if you want me to stop smoking, then start paying for your own fucking health care. smokers outnumber nons by at least 5 to 1 in the world, and in canada, it is something like 6 or 7 to 1. feeling the heat o.p., and any non smoker? well you had best refrain from ragging on us, because one day, we won’t be there to pay for your good health. and finally, GO GET FUCKED WITH CAPT. HOOK’S HOOK.

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  30. Life Sucks…what I find very humourous is these same smoking nazi’s, will suck hard on the exhaust pipe of the public bus system & never a complaint !
    Yet those of us who drive cars/pick ups, are the ‘problem’ polluters.
    Can’t you smell the stench coming off those super polluting behemoths ????
    Same thing for the transport trucks, huge black clouds of exhaust spewing out of them as they rumble down Water Street.

    its just easier to pick on the cigarette smokers…they’re responsible for all of Societies problems LMFAO !

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  31. how is your garden this year mr. more? our cherry tree had zero fruit, last year it was heavily laden. vegetables are different i know but may was so wet

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  33. Here’s the thing, you have a flaw in your logic… A SMOKER DOESN’T NEED AN EXCUSE TO SMOKE OUTSIDE OR ANYWHERE ELSE THEY ARE ALLOWED TO SMOKE!!!!!!!! If you are that delicate that the wafting smell of cigarette smoke for a maximum of 10 seconds offends you, then stay inside your house with your oxygen mask on.

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  37. Pain girl , I held off on planting my sweet & hot peppers & tomato plants & kept them in their little transplant cups until the end of June…they are growing like crazy now. My lettuce is doing well , as are the bean plants, celery’s also doing well & we’ll be picking some of it & lettuce to eat this week.
    My high bush blueberry plants are now 2 years old…& I have fruit ~:)
    It won’t be a bumper crop, but they are about 2 feet high & all of them have fruit on them. The garden Centre I go to, told me it would probably be 3 to 4 years before I see fruit, if they survived. But they are obviously happy where they’re planted.
    It was too wet IMO to try onions, & the garlic planted last October, didn’t survive the wet of May/June

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  39. Lenora is hot. She takes off her shirt. People stare. Since Lenora’s hot and hot, guys don’t mind, but the other women do. “Put your shirt on, Lenora, you offend us”, says the other women. Lenora says, “I have just as much right to be cool as the guys walking around without their shirt. If you don’t like it look the other way.” Some women claimed that Lenora’s nudity caused them to suffer from repressed pubescent bra-stuffing memories. A few men suffered from extreme you-can-look-but-you-can’t-touch anxiety. But, overall, the guys defend Lenora’s rights. It is not Lenora’s fault or problem that accidents happen in the wake of her topless walk.

    Bernadette is hot. Seeing Lenora walk by coolly, she takes off her shirt too. People stare. Since Lenora’s hot and fat, everyone is offended. The guys especially. “That’s just wrong. Put on your shirt, Lardlady”, says the guys, “You offend us.” The other women cried foul. They rose up to defend Bernadette’s right to walk around topless. They tore off their tops and marched in protest. Old women, fat women, stick women, even breastless women. Accidents happened.

    Lenora and Bernadette, seeing all these topless women walking down the street were disgusted. They put their tops back on.

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  40. very good miss kimmy, nice to see you again. if anyone is homebound the best of will ferrel is on channel 19…haha “suck it trebek”

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  44. OP, don’t worry. Lung cancer has their number, and with the Cancer Society only putting a small portion of their funds back into research, those smokers had better be looking for a spot 6 feet under.

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  45. Glorious day indeed Miss Pain. This was our baptism for the summer. Air & water a bit chilly and us both a bit out of shape but boy it was nice.

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