Are Smoking Bans Good For Us?
In response to a proposed smoking ban in my town, here is why I don’t support it.
Smoking is bad for you. I get that. Everyone knows it’s true. Cigarette smoke is toxic. Most of us have had the annoyance of going into a restaurant, the obvious smell from the smoking section greeting us at the door. Maybe we’ve gone elsewhere. Maybe we’ve had to wait longer because there were no tables in the non-smoking section. Or, maybe we’ve even elected to sit in the smoking section because we didn’t want to wait. But no one is forcing us to eat there.
Proponents of this recent proposed smoking ban argue, “But what about the employees?” Employees who work in these businesses are exposed to secondhand smoke. No one is forcing anyone to work in that job, first of all. It’s a free country. They can go work somewhere else. It makes more sense to enact laws requiring businesses to protect employees who don’t want exposure by offering arrangements within the workplace. For example, those employees don’t have to work in areas where smoking is allowed. How many businesses would this affect? How many employees? Most of the restaurants around here are already smoke free. Many employees smoke themselves. This argument seems to rest on such a small premise. Those who support the ban seem more bent on being the moral authority on smoking rather than generating productive debate or enacting real public policy that favors the common good.
Yes, blowing smoke near someone is wrong. But so are a lot of other things. Companies shouldn’t be allowed to charge you extra if you don’t sign up for automatic bill payments. Victoria’s Secret shouldn’t be able to put “Kiss This” on the front of a pair of underwear marketed to young girls. A child shouldn’t be allowed to eat a whole box of Swiss Cake Rolls. The point is, people make bad choices. Sometimes they directly affects us, sometimes they don’t. Most of the time, we can make another choice. We can choose a different company to do business with. We can help our kids make better food choices. We can buy our underwear somewhere else. The bottom line is this: How much does a particular activity actually harm another person? Who decides how to define harm? And at what point does the government need to step in and regulate it?
When a person’s choice is virtually eliminated, that’s when. Let me give you an example. Hospitals shouldn’t be allowed to charge a patient $29.00 for a dose of Tylenol. That’s common sense. But at my local hospital, they do. I took my son to the ER. He needed Tylenol. We were several hours from getting released and I didn’t have any Tylenol. So, we get the bill. It’s common sense that no business should be allowed to charge about 58 times the normal consumer value of something when no other choice is given. I’m not a math whiz, but isn’t that like a 3,000% markup or something? I don’t know about you, but I think that’s criminal, especially when customers have little choice in the matter.
When it comes to smoking in public places, we have choices—a lot of them. Most business owners recognize—and have for many years—the need to protect customers from unwanted smoke, and have made accommodations. The reality is that customers know they can choose if they want to visit a particular business. Employees can go elsewhere or demand a clean working environment.
For me, this whole debate comes down to Freedom of Choice. Some people want to go to a restaurant where they can smoke. Some people want to go to a restaurant where there is no smoke. Some employees want to smoke on their breaks. Some do not. They should have those choices. But, the most important choice of all is this: The restaurant/bar owner should be able to decide if he wants to allow smoking in his business. That business owner has done the hard work of starting the business. He has probably taken out loans, put his livelihood on the line, and invested his whole life in that business. He pays the bills. Most likely, he works 80 hours a week on that business. Unless he is operating a publicly funded facility, paid for by taxpayers, NO one should be able to tell him how to run it. A smoking ban takes away the freedom to choose. And taking away the freedom to choose, like that 3,000% markup on Tylenol, is the real crime. It’s like being tied up, smoke blown in our face, 58 times too many.
Copyright, 2011, Melissa Dereberry
