If ONE MORE person comes up to me while I’m smoking somewhere unoffensive OUT OF DOORS and pretends to hack or cough in my general direction, I’m going to fucking flip. ESPECIALLY to people who then get in a vehicle. Yes, non-smokers have a right to clean air, but I, who chooses not to drive a vehicle, has to endure the congestion of vehicles in Halifax, day in and day out?
What about MY right to clean air? Do I stick my head in your car window and cough in your face because your car exhaust is offensive to me? No, I don’t.
Why? because that would be fucking rude.
Before any other non-smoker pretends to cough in the general direction of a smoker smoking outside, they should consider the amount of exhaust pollutants that are constantly entering the “clean air” from the hundreds and hundreds of vehicles that are expelling poisons at any given time in Nova Scotia. Myself, I’m more concerned with over-congestion and vehicle pollutants than 12% of the entire province who might be having a smoke outdoors. So fuck off, and don’t cough on me. —Blow it our yer arse!
This article appears in Jun 3-9, 2010.
haha, hilarious bitch! I’ve seen people fake cough at smokers, it is really rude.
As an ex-smoker, I totally understand your point, OP – it has always been my contention that if you’re standing there and willing to breathe in the exhaust of the 4-wheeled world, you should be able to suck up a little cig smoke – after all, IT IS A LEGAL PRODUCT – and as long as it is, tough titty, all you bogus coughers out there. Especially the ones who need a postal code for their fat, saturated lardasses.
I can see your point. It must be frustrating to have people put on an Oscar-worthy(not) performance when they come near you.
I know some people will come on and say “f**k you! smoker’s are scum”, or say the opposite with the same amount of bluster, I have a point to make about smoking in public.
Around the corner from where I live there’s a hotel. On the wall in one direction is a no smoking with 4 metres sign. The sign is on a corner. Literally 6 inches away smokers congregate and smoke and drop their butts on the sidewalk. I use a manual wheelchair. Unless I go 4 blocks out of my way, I have to push through the dead butts on the sidewalk every day. When it rains it gets even more gross. I’ve had cigarette butts get stuck on my tires, rims, and even on my hands.
As a non-smoker I find this really, really gross. I don’t care if you want to smoke (the general “you”, not you specifically, OP), but please think about disposing of your refuse in a way that isn’t littering or grosses up the sidewalk.
I find wheelchair ramps are great places for some smokers to hang out and leave a disgusting mess too. There are restaurants I won’t go to because of the grossness I have to go through to get in the front door.
I agree it’s legal. I find it affects me in other ways besides breathing second hand smoke.
Just a thought.
Meh.
WheelieP
you know what o.p., i’ll go you one further. there should be a hunting season on these holier than everyone else assholes. sometimes, the urge to strangle almost gets me, and in the open yet. case in point, two days ago, windy as fuck, waiting for bus, woman says to me, that my smoke was making her sick. helllllo, the wind was blowing in the opposite direction, it was probly about 50 miles an hour, an i was away from shelter, add to that, it was raining like a bitch. how the fuck could she smell anything, except het own shit, and then it would have blown it off her ass anyway. now i didn’t want to be rude, so i polititely pointed that we were outside, in the rain and wind, going the other way, so she must have a real wild imagination, or just a picky fucking bitch. she got kind of mad, and stalked off, saying well i never, that’s was probly part of her fucking problem, she never either smoked, thought, or fucked. what a fucking maroon.
I want some of whatever LS is smoking…
dude, you literally have no filter.
I just like walking behind people smoking.. is that so bad?
I’ll take all that second hand smoke…. anyone with me?
otherwise, I’m gonna be mighty busy.
The only time such a situation is justified is if your standing in front of a doorway and the person is legitimatly coughing, otherwise I agree it’s fair game… You cant really argue that, unless people park their cars on your doorstep idling… Overall though I agree, albeit a bit harsh and pathetic that you give a shit…
Sometimes people have legitimate lung/tube issues that may cause them to actually cough when cigarette (or any other) smoke is present.
I have such an issue… I don’t go out of my way to cough at you, but if I inhale your second hand smoke, I’m going to cough.
If it makes it more legitimate, I take the ferry to work everyday and use my legs / bicycle to take me most places.
Some of these anti-smoking people are real pussies. One of my friends complained about “second hand smoke” while a bunch of us were walking down a street and one was smoking. I’m not a smoker, but people need to suck it up.
Why do smokers feel the need to ALWAYS pull out the ‘car/truck’ card in defense of their habit? It’s such a tired argument.
Comparing smoking to driving a vehicle is like comparing apples to popsicles.
As a nonsmoker OP …I agree with you 100%.
They can all fuck off.
THe nonsmoking assholes who had to carry it too far & keep pushing until they even got rid of smoking rooms. THe idiocy of the assholes behing that ! I cannot conceive of anything stupider.
As to blaming vehicle emissions, what about power plant emmissions ? oil refineries, incinerators & ships aircraft those are pouring way more poison into the atmospher than cigarette smokers.
Lets next ban furnaces, hot water heaters, coal & oil fired electrical plants fucking do gooders are too stund to realise when they should stop.
I may be a nonsmoker, but I see the stupidity in the present system,& believe we should go back to having smoking rooms, having private clubs which cater to cigar smokers etc. Sure put a huge warning on the door, that the dangerous deadly smokers are lurking in their having a puff. THat way the nonsmokers will never have to be exposed…& as for their sanctimonious Bullshit excuse they want access everywhere…Why would they want to access a fucking place full of smokers ????
It makes NO DAMN SENSE AT ALL.
why was that again? I must have missed the groundbreaking reason why they can’t be compared since they are pretty close…
wtf are you talking about HH? As a ex-smoker(30 yrs) I’ve been on both sides of the fence and believe me some anti-smoking wacko’s have tried to include me in their reindeer games; air-borne pollutants are FAR more hazardous than some wisps of smoke from a cigarette; don’t post dumb shit
Thanks, martym, you said it best.
I guess.
While I certainly agree that we rely far too much on vehicles, they are somewhat of a necessary evil. We are always going to require cars to get people and goods from one place to another. Yes, they pollute, and yes, we should try and use them a lot less. But we do need them.
Show me exactly how cigarettes are necessary…
those non-smoking baby boomers are gonna be needing l’hopital pretty soon….
you’ll see why we need cigs soon enough.
Sorry, zZz but you’re going to have to do better than that.
I remember when I was a student at SMU, back when they still had a smoking room in the SUB. One day, a woman walks by the entrance (there was no door), pokes her head in, and does the fake cough thing.
The reaction of the 50 or so smokers in the room was priceless, ranging from the woman being booed, yelled at to Fuck Off, to garbage being thrown at her. It was awesome.
Do smokers also have the right to litter and throw their butts out their car windows? I think not. Report all littering smoking to the police.
While I don’t care if you smoke, though I’d rather not be in a closed space with you… it’s your habit, all the power to ya.
I do agree with HH, it’s hard to throw the car argument out there, but it’s a good effort. I think it would be more appropriate to gag and make fat jokes at people who are waaaay overweight because that’s OFTEN a lifestyle choice and just as hard on the medical system as smokers can be. Ya ya, there are medical reasons too, but at least that’s a closer comparison than folks who have a vehicle.
And throwing your cig butts IS littering. Pick up your shit. Most employers and public spaces have cig butts cans – but for some reason smokers don’t see them? Maybe the smoke affects your eyes. I feel for ya wheeliep
HH, wasn’t the best I got.. but it’s truly cheaper to have them die off quicker.
and you really don’t need a car either… that’s kinda false.
albeit, I certainly wouldn’t want to live way back when…
horse and buggy may be fun for an afternoon jaunt but to use it as a primary source of transportation…. no thanks.
I bet the cigs helped a lot back then whiling away the hours going on 1-2 horse power.
No, you might not need a car to get from point A to B, but I’m guessing all the food you need to eat in the run of a week isn’t grown in a 3 km radius of your house. I’m guessing the clothing you need to protect your body from the elements wasn’t weaved next door. I’m guessing the medicine you might one day need wasn’t produced and tested in HRM. You see where I’m going with this…
let’s just say I’m not the best at helping the argument along… but still.
poisonous toxins are poisonous toxins.
you’ve basically said “meh, I can’t do anythign about THESE toxins… so why bother….
but THOSE toxins… can’t have MORE TOXINS… oh no.”
they’re all gonna end up killing us quicker in the long run.
at least the cig smoke smells decent … well IMO anyways.
It’s not ‘gasoline being poured’ smell but it’s nice none-the-less.
you can’t really go the obesity route either though.. because unless you’re drinking your meals, you’ll need to eat.
meh, whatever. let’s just say we’ll never get along nor be able to justify enough to convert anyone else to the other side.
oh, and it would suck to be confined to 3km from my place…. geez would that suck.
you know we walk 5 km an hour on average right?
I could make a trek a little farther than a pithy 36 minutes.
hh, you are defeating yourself here. all those fine things, food, clothes, this that and everything not local, gets trucked in, by big fucking stinking deisel trucks, and sometimes by deisel train. and where does power come from, and don’t they have a thick plume of smoke coming out of a stack, how about the refinery? you are one of the few that can’t see a forest except for one fucking tree. that tree being the cigarette. you are so closed minded, that if darwin was to give you a kick in the ass, you would think it was a smoker.get the fuck off your high horses people, those that don’t smoke don’t, those that do, do. leave us the fuck alone, and we won’t think of you as assholes, douchebags, and a host of other classic shitty names. SMOKERS UNITE.
LOL! Stupidest fucking argument I’ve heard yet. Vehicles are extremely necessary. Otherwise, the economy would be crippled. Your right to clean air? You’re a smoker and you’re worried about clean air?
Solution? Stop smoking and get over yourself. It’s not necessary, and you look like an idiot, stop.
I say to smokers, if you’re where you’re supposed to be, minding your own business and someone does this fake cough crap, take an extra long drag and blow it in their face. Then tell them, “Now you have something to bitch about”.
HH, how did they move people and things from place to place BEFORE the invention of the car? I think it was by horse and buggy, or, at times, just horse…then again depending on where you were or what you could afford it might have been donkey or camel…or even just by carrying it on your head and walking for a week. If it was across water, they had these things called sailboats.
So do we really “need” cars? I don’t think so. They’re convenient, not necessary!
Oops, zzz, I see you already covered this in your post!
Trying to claim that car exhaust is worse than smoking is a fucking moronic argument. We know that car pollution is worse than cigarette smoke pollution. That’s not the fucking point. I don’t stick my nose in car exhaust pipes and take nice deep breaths. But I have walked by a lot of smokers who puff out huge balls of smoke into my face. It smells like shit and it makes me cough. You’ll have to fucking live with my coughing, just like I have to fucking live with your disgusting addiction. Such a retarded bitch.
“those non-smoking baby boomers are gonna be needing l’hopital pretty soon….”
Nice comment zZz, although I think HH missed the point of that one.
Why do you think that smoking is not made illegal HH. Or, why do you think that the new “smokeless” cig’s are illegal here in Canada HH. Think about it.
Cigarettes are mine to smoke if I wish, and some folks’ fucking fantasy land Nanny State would collapse without the funding me and others provide from the $8 in taxes we pay daily on every pack.
Perhaps you shouldn’t stick your face in people’s cigarette smoke they’ve just exhaled and take nice deep breaths, if it bothers you so much. Car exhaust and pollution in general is a lot harder to avoid than a cubic meter of smoke that dissipates within seconds.
If the tobacco companies didn’t add all those chemicals to keep people addicted to their product I wonder how many smokers there really would be? It’s amazing that people who would rebel against any form of behaviour control manipulation are so quick to allow ‘big tobacco’ so much control over their daily lives. And their finances. While we’re at it, let’s think about the government’s position in this manipulation and control scam. The ironic part is that smokers think they are in control. Just try quitting to see who’s really in control of your life. Don’t even want to consider quitting? ‘Big tobacco’ rules.
I’m a non smoker but lived with my parents who smoked most of my life and mother still smokes. I tend to “suck it up” when around her or my friends who smoke. But comparing having to breath cig smoke to air pollution is a little much. Of course air pollution is very hazardous not only to your body but the environment. But when standing on the street you do not walk up to an exhaust and stick your face in it to breath it in. When people smoke around me it actually trails into my face.. I’ve even showed my friends. I will move and it follows me. I wouldn’t ever flat out pretend cough near someone to give them the point, That’s rude and I would be embarrassed to be that person to do so. But if you find the large amount of vehicles unbearable what are you doing living in a city? Move to the country. Just like if someone were sensitive to the smell of cig smoke wouldn’t move next door to a smoke shack.
Here’s my zen moment from a couple of years ago. Listening to a lefty acquaintance squawk about the need to raise taxes and penalize big business in order to put more money into health care. Pretty standard stuff, right? The punchline was, he smoked like a bagel shop in the Gaza strip and boasted about his constant supply of indian smokes because “he knew a guy in Millbrook”. His current career, which I cannot divulge, makes this all the more hilarious.
I didn’t bother to read most of these comments because this has been done sooo many times before. It’s a pointless argument that no one will win. I am a nonsmoker, have always been and I hate smoking with a passion. I won’t even bother saying my two-cents because I know that a smoker’s right to smoke it always greater than my right not to. The end. shut up.
Yeah, I’m gonna hitch up a horse and buggy when I want to leave the city. Get real.
Don’t get me wrong: I think smoking is a filthy, disgusting habit, but I don’t give a shit who smokes and who doesn’t — and I also have to say, it’s the asshole smokers that give all smokers a bad name — the ones who smoke in bus shelters, or close to doors, or the guy at access NS about a month ago who told the security guard to have a “merry christmas” when she told him he couldn’t light up in there.
As long as nicotine is addictive people will smoke — and as long as nicotine is addictive, governments can tax the SHIT out of it which is good for the rest of us non smokers.
I hate to harp on the fact that I’m in quebec, but who smokes more than the french? (I really have no statistical data on this — I just like to make gross generalizations) and they are extremely respectful about it. I’m living with 999 other people, and a lot of them smoke, but I haven’t had one issue with an asshole smoker yet and I haven’t seen one smoker smoke in one of the shelters (or at bus stops at all)…. IMHO, there are lot of “asshole” smokers in hfx who ruin it for the non “asshole” smokers. *shrug*
I actually had a guy have a go at me once at the Dartmouth Bus Terminal by the bridge about the smoke from my cigarette, which I purposefully stepped over into the Scotiabank parking lot to smoke so as to not bother anyone with it. For whatever reason, this peice of work decided he was going to stand there as well (probably didn’t want to have to stand next to the people that were actually smoking at the bustop). So he says to me how repulsive the smell of the cigarette is, to which I replied “tough shit buddy, you chose to come stand over here after I was already here”. The little bastard wouldn’t drop it and kept getting closer and closer, but as he did, I started to notice a smell that wasn’t very pleasant to the nose. So I say to the little granola fuckstick ” Listen buddy, I sympatize with you, cause if the smell of this cigarette smells half as bad to you as the stench coming off of you does to me, then you must be feeling quite ill, because I know I am”. I tell ya…the look on his face…he just didn’t know how to respond to that, so he turned and walked away, muttering under his breath. It was classic. Point is, we’re all going to go through life doing something at some point in time or another that offends other people, but as long as what you do isn’t illegal, then I say to all the bitchy people on the other side of the fence…suck it up buttercups!! Kepp your fucking stupid comments and opinions to yourselves.
as a non smoker i do actually agree with you. but smokers like you are few and far between. you are the considerate kind. the person who smokes outside and butts out around kids and pregnant women. the kind that throws your cigarette butt in the little cans. i have a scar on the top of my foot because of someone chucking their butt on the ground and it landed on my foot. i was in flip flops. July will do that. so instead of apologizing, he said, “wear some sneakers” one new little consideration for smokers. please stop flicking your butts to an invisible target 30 feet away. throw it on the ground in front of you and step on it. it is kinda on fire so when it lands on someones foot or a little kid picks it up its usually more of an inconvenience than the little plume of smoke.
so people complain about a passing plume of cigarette smoke. but they are totally OK in marinating in perfume and cologne. cigarette smoke is not the only offensive smell. some people can just learn consideration and keep their arrogance to themselves. i think George Carlin said it best…may he rest in peace…”Regarding Smoking in restaurants, I know the smokers don’t see the problem. But to understand what it feels like to a non smoker. Imagine you’re in a crowded restaurant and, every 5 minutes, someone at the table next to you throws anthrax germs up in the air.”
6stars
i hate yer fn smoke i quit years ago, so be an adult and quit,and stop whining you don’t have a foot to stand on actually you smokers are so repulsive.The wretched one is the one who smokes and the more one smokes the more wretched one is.
I’m actually at a loss of words here o.O
ignore them snap…
they’re obviously jaded.
you stick to your caffeine and smokes.
what’s good for the goose, isn’t always good for the old, fucking lunatic, senile dude.
Actually, it’s only caffiene now… I gave up smoking 2 weeks ago
good luck MS your over the hump keep it up i’ve quit for 2 !/2 yrs after 30 🙂
As someone who works in downtown Halifax, it’s not only annoying to walk by huddles of smokers, it’s hazardous to my unborn child. Yes, cars are hazardous. Yes, numerous other things I am exposed to in the day are hazardous. But the thing here is that I choose not to smoke, not only for my health, but my child’s. To get bitched out because I have an issue with inhaling those insane chemicals, is pretty fucked up, in the scheme of things.
Another person using their child/unborn as an excuse to want the world to revolve around them. There are probably more toxins and pollutants in the air than the little bit of cigarette smoke exhaled by a few puffers. Considering DT Halifax has constant renovations, destruction (CH Building for example) and construction, there is always some dust, dirt, toxins or other particles in the air that are just as hazardous.
Your choice to not smoke is irrelevent. I don’t smoke either but I don’t make a fuss about what others do on the street walking by or if I walk by them.
Nobody is bitching you out here. Instead you seem to be taking a holier-than-thou stance in complaining about smokers and your unborn, which has no rights to begin with really. There are more vehicles in this city spewing out toxins galore but that somehow seems aside the issue to you.
In short, we don’t care about your unborn kid. Plug your nose or hold your breath next time you walk by. If you have an issue with smokers so much, use an alternate route when you’re commuting or cross the street instead. It’s a temporary thing to walk by a huddled group of puffers compared to the constant traffic we have. Dumb.
not only that NGF is the total lack of ANY real scientific data supporting second hand smoke and harm to people let alone a fetus (remember I’m a 30 yr. smkr before you jump all over me )
Sorry- the old “Please do not smoke in the presence of what, under less convenient circumstances would just be a non-viable tissue mass occupying my gravid womb” just does not fly. Can’t have it both ways folks.
snap… excellent… gotta get that tat
and 888.. I’m assuming you’d be the person walking down the street in those surgical masks every day all day, yes?
Actually…re: scientific data…medical scientists have recently identified a genetic marker which determines which smokers will develop lung cancer from smoking and those who are able to be life-long smokers without developing cancer. Second-hand smoke still affects those genetically programmed for smoking related cancers. Development of a swab test for those who want to know which category they fall in is apparently on the horizon.
and these subjects grew up in a bubble free from everyday pollutants and free radicals etc. and who funded this “study”
Used to smoke myself and since quitting I cannot tolerate it around me. It makes me cough. Sorry. I do speak up at the smokers who feel their right continues into a bus shelter when they don’t like the weather. I do have to hold my breath when walking through a crowd of you hugging the doors you are supposed to stand away from.
Sorry if your feelings are burned.
Sorry if you don’t like my smoke but too bad for you.
Would that be a front flip or back flip?
I wonder why one person’s “right” to do something almost always has to be mutually exclusive to another person’s “right” to do something; in this case, smokers right to smoke in places they are legally allowed to smoke in vs people’s right to not be exposed to the smoke for various reasons. Maybe if everyone chilled and exercised little consideration and courtesy, we wouldn’t have to endlessly argue this conflict of individual rights.
I am a non-smoker, and smoke makes me sick and often cough uncontrollably until tears come to my eyes and my chest hurts from coughing so violently. I also worry that the ash blown in the wind may damage my clothes. (not sure if this actually happens, but seeing many smokers with holes in their shirts and pants, I assume it can happen.) I also know that there are those of us who are actually allergic to cigarette smoke (rare, but it does exist) and they would start to choke by inhaling smoke even if they were not conscious that there was smoke.
I usually try and walk away from people who walk and smoke, and tell my friends that it is not okay for them to smoke around me. I explain why. I also tell my friends to pick up their buds from the ground, as pavement isn’t their ash tray. I have yet to meet a friend who wouldn’t respect my request.