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SMOKING BANS ARE THE REAL THREAT TO DEMOCRACY!!
The bandwagon of local smoking bans now steamrolling across the nation -from sea
to sea- has nothing to do with protecting people from the supposed
threat of "second-hand" smoke.
Indeed, the bans themselves are symptoms of a far more grievous threat; a
cancer that has been spreading for decades and has now metastasized
throughout the body politic, spreading even to the tiniest organs of local
government. This cancer is the only real hazard involved - the cancer of
unlimited government power.
The issue is not whether second-hand smoke is a real danger or a phantom
menace, as a study published recently in the British Medical Journal
indicates. The issue is: if it were harmful, what would be the proper
reaction? Should anti-tobacco activists satisfy themselves with educating
people about the potential danger and allowing them to make
their own decisions, or should they seize the power of government and force
people to make the "right" decision?
Supporters of local tobacco bans have made their choice. Rather than
attempting to protect people from an unwanted intrusion on their health, the
tobacco bans are the unwanted intrusion.
Loudly billed as measures that only affect "public places," they have
actually targeted private places: restaurants, bars, nightclubs, shops, and
offices - places whose owners are free to set anti-smoking rules or whose
customers are free to go elsewhere if they don't like the smoke. Some local
bans even harass smokers in places where their effect on others is obviously
negligible, such as outdoor public parks.
The decision to smoke, or to avoid "second-hand" smoke, is a question to be
answered by each individual based on his own values and his own assessment
of the risks. This is the same kind of decision free people make regarding
every aspect of their lives: how much to spend or invest, whom to befriend
or sleep with, whether to go to college or get a job, whether to get married
or divorced, and so on.
All of these decisions involve risks; some have demonstrably harmful
consequences; most are controversial and invite disapproval from the
neighbors. But the individual must be free to make these decisions. He must
be free, because his life belongs to him, not to his neighbors, and only his
own judgment can guide him through it.
Yet when it comes to smoking, this freedom is under attack. Cigarette
smokers are a numerical minority, practicing a habit considered annoying and
unpleasant to the majority. So the majority has simply commandeered the
power of government and used it to dictate their behavior.
That is why these bans are far more threatening than the prospect of
inhaling a few stray whiffs of tobacco while waiting for a table at your
favorite restaurant. The anti-tobacco crusaders point in exaggerated alarm
at those wisps of smoke while they unleash the systematic and unlimited
intrusion of government into our lives.
We do not elect officials so they can control and manipulate our behavior.
They
are in office to serve us, not visa
versa.
Councils that are considering smoking bans or that have enacted smoking bans are
looking at the small picture. As we consider our local economics it is
difficult to see the big picture. There will come a time when it is understood
that this most oppressive legislation has both impacted the liberties of a free
American people and wreaked havoc on our national economy on a scale that is too
large to imagine at this point.
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