Enough is enough
Well, it seems that the New Zealand people don’t know what’s good for them. The crazy, politically correct, busybody government has foisted a smoking ban on them, and what do ordinary Kiwis do? Do they stand up for their human rights, say “enough is enough”, and reclaim the bars for the silent majority of New Zealanders out there who love smelling terrible after a night out?
No! They say, “yeah, that made sense”.
Don’t worry, Muriel Newman’s on the case, warning of “smoking apartheid”:
Surely, if the owners of establishments, workers and customers are all happy with smoking, shouldn’t there be a free choice? Why can’t we maintain a foundation concept of our cherished Kiwi society – live and let live?
… Hasn’t the situation that has been foisted upon us, been caused by a busybody government going too far?
So, Newman’s solution to smoking apartheid is to set up bars for smokers and bars for non-smokers? Doesn’t that sound a little like, you know, apartheid? More to the point, how many workers getting minimum wage to work in a bar are going to say to their boss when asked about smokers being allowed in, “No, I don’t want you to allow smokers in here”? Wouldn’t they just be asking to be fired?
But the more general problem with Newman’s deriding of the busybody government is that the vast majority of New Zealanders agree with the ban. Reports the Press:
Support for the smoking ban in bars and restaurants has almost doubled among smokers since smokefree legislation was introduced, a survey shows.
A telephone survey of 750 people aged 18 and over shows the percentage of smokers supporting a ban is up from 22 per cent in November to 42%. Overall support for the ban has increased to 69%, with non-smoker support up from 66% to 75%.
So, like other planks of the Government’s so-called social engineering agenda, the smoking ban in fact has the support of the majority of the public at large. Perhaps it’s time for the meaningless “social engineering” phrase to be dropped from the journalistic vocabulary?
April 29th, 2005 at 7:00 pm
What a load of nonesense.
A large part of the planets population are offended by smoking, but for many years we’ve been quiet and polite and generally aquiesced to smokers desires.
Now the smokers are being suppressed, the middle opinion folks are finding it pleasent too. I am happily surprised by the opinion poll results.
I’m reminded of a bit from Gasman Johns twenty year writing epic (http://www.johnpowell.net) talking about scavenging exhaled anesthetic gas, he states:
[i]Scavenging of waste anaesthetic gases and vapours did not come into routine use until 1976. I joked at the time that anaesthetists would give up the job up once they were stopped from inhaling the vapours that hissed out of the expiratory valves, but I was wrong; it was a blessed relief! Within one week of scavenging being installed at Southmead I swore I would never work in a theatre again that did not have it. It is amazing that we had failed for 130 years to appreciate that there was a problem.[/i]
The last sentence is the point. There always has been a problem with smopking, and its only now that folks are getting it.