Social Smokers Love Smoking Bans
By admin on Nov 27, 2008 in People, Places And Things
Potentially big news out of Madison as Beloit state senator Judy Robson has asked Governor Doyle to include a statewide smoking ban in his state budget proposal to be submitted to the Legislature in February. Doyle says he’s a supporter of such a ban, which is way past due in Wisconsin. The big change from last year that gives this a better chance of becoming reality is the turnover of State Assembly power from the Republicans to the Democrats.
The primary argument raised in objection to smoking bans is that it negatively impacts the hospitality industry. Studies on this issue have reached various conclusions–often in accordance with whomever paid for the study. As a public health issue, however, smoking bans are important, and there is some evidence that they’d have had a measurable impact.
My interest in smoking bans is more personal: as a fan and frequenter of Milwaukee’s many bars and restaurants, I would like a) to go home after a night out without reeking of smoke; and more importantly, b) to be subjected to a paternalistic law that will sharply curb my social smoking habit by forcing me to go outside every time I’m tempted to light up.
This latter impact cannot be over-emphasized. I have lived in cities with a smoking ban and nevertheless engaged in some social consumption of cigarettes. Being forced to congregate outside in a small area if you want to smoke isn’t actually a bad thing–it puts you in a position to meet interesting strangers with a common habit, or gives you a temporary escape with a friend to privately ridicule the evening wear of a hapless member of your group or to salivate over how incredible the blonde bartender looks tonight. But without question, the law discourages you from smoking a cigarette every time you order a drink or feel a lull in conversation–indeed, it becomes socially impossible to do so without constantly abandoning the company of your friends. If you enjoy smoking but know how terrible it is for you, this forced slowdown is a very good thing.
I’ll briefly mention one other common basis for objecting to smoking bans: the personal freedom argument. This is simply flawed: just as it is with property rights, there is nothing intrinsic about individual freedom that requires taking the view that people should be permitted to smoke at will in public spaces. We might just as well start from the principle that a person is forbidden from conducting themselves in a way that will cause nuisance to others around them. That this extreme would be unworkable in modern society is obvious, but it does not mean the other extreme must therefore necessarily be the rule, and that no middle ground solution is appropriate.
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