All content is copyright © 2000-2008 Seldo.Com and licensed under a Creative Commons attribution-sharealike license. Remix away!
Written with Code Igniter in PHP. Fuelled by tea.
To understand this entry, read both yesterday's post and the comments, in particular Zaty's and Trixie's.
I defend your right to say anything, absolutely anything. I'm not so sure about your right to ingest anything; it seems like there are some things it's probably a bad idea to let anyone take on a whim. But what I'm definitely not for is your right to inflict harm and discomfort on others. Words may never hurt me, but others smoking is not just uncomfortable for me, but proven harmful to me. Even the most liberal societies have prohibitions against murder; once you have admitted that preventing citizens harming one another is a legitimate interest of the state, the question is simply one of degree, and increased risk of lung cancer is where I currently, and admittedly arbitrarily, draw the line.
I don't support, for instance, this government's ludicrous ideas about restricting salt and sugar intakes; that's a serious nanny-state situation. That's because your burger doesn't harm me, and nor does your heart attack, apart from marginally raising my taxes via the NHS. Your right to be a homosexual also falls under this category, because consensual sex never hurt anybody unless they wanted it to.
But as for "a society like America", which of America's societies do you mean? The consistent monolithic characterization of American culture by Europeans annoys me. Do you mean the American culture that produced Mark Twain, Burning Man, and the Internet*? Or the American culture that kept segregation alive into the 1960s, and is currently trying to ban the teaching of evolution in schools? One of those is all about banning things which harm nobody, which I'm against, the other is a proud liberal tradition which harms nobody, which I'm for. Neither of them has much if anything to do with a culture of selfishness.
If you want to talk about the capitalist side of America's society, then I'm not sure you can argue with the world's largest economy, considered independently of the society in which it sits, as being undesirable. And if you want to say that society and economy are intrinsically linked, then it's worth pointing out that New York and California, two of the biggest state economies, are also two of the most liberal states. And coincidentally, both of those states have also banned smoking in bars and clubs.
Trixie's argument, that the ban cuts profits and hence services, is a point much more open for debate. While at uni, I was an officer of a society and so had more than just an average student's insight into the services on offer. And as I said originally -- anathema to some of the union hacks in my circle of friends, I know -- the union seemed rife with useless services, in addition to the genuinely good and useful ones.
These defences in place, I maintain my stated position: that selfishness is an essential and desirable trait in both the student body and the public at large, and that it has resulted in a change to the union -- fewer services, but fewer carcinogens -- that is to the net benefit of its members.
* But the web was invented in Switzerland, by a Brit. You may deem this a victory for European culture if you like.
All content is copyright © 2000-2008 Seldo.Com and licensed under a Creative Commons attribution-sharealike license. Remix away!
Comments
Art
"rife with useless services"
name one :p
you think a union that was on the verge of bankruptcy a few years ago would let this be the case? you think i, as a previous director of the company, would let this be the case???
"Democracy is the people voting in their own self-interest.:
Bite *you*.
when I vote, I vote for what I think would be best for everyone, not just me. Higher taxes? Bring it on, it may screw up my pay packet but it means better for a whole other bunch of people.
Of course smokers are selfish, of course I don't want to breathe their cancer-fumes, but we have to think cold hard commercial sense when it comes to this. They will go elsewhere, it will affect the Union's revenues, and that will have a big fat impact on the work we have done. If you read the motion in question, in voting for the ban, people were voting for cuts to certain areas. That *is* selfish.
Laurie
Naming one: the (original) Glitter Ball. They splashed out a ludicrous sum of money on pre-booking a conference centre for a ball, with no idea who was going to throw a ball or why. That said, we had a great time, and the subsequent GBs were all fab too.
Naming two: International week was really lame, and as an international student I should bloody know ;-)
However:
Making a decision for reasons of "cold, hard commercial sense" is what's best for everyone? Even if that decision will negatively impact their health? I know I'd rather not have International Week than have lung cancer.
What really seems to be at stake here is that, as an employee of the union, *your* budget will be cut by the smoking ban -- in fact, your whole job might be cut. Since your power, and by extension your job satisfaction, is pretty closely linked to the size of your budget, I would say that opposing a smoking ban is entirely a selfish move on the part of union staff, motivated by a sense of self-preservation.
Josh
http://www.educationet.org/messageboard/posts/64393.html
mauzo
Art
One world week actually makes a profit, and several thousand other international students seem to enjoy it...
And you are talking of the Union when you were on an exec- an entirely different creature from the Union now, bearing in mind that in that year it nearly went bankrupt and most of the management was stripped out as a result etc. Of course the first GB was a silly situation. Lots has changed since then.
Note to self, dont post on blogs after 4 glasses of rioja....
ed
Which brings me to the other thing -- all these claims of losing revenue and such are laughably wrong. Bars in NYC and SFO are doing just as well as before, despite all the wailing that took place before the ban. People choose to go out based on income, etc. If they want to smoke, they step outside. And then they return. Hardly the end of the world.
Both sides of this debate need to quit the drama-queenery, because it's really irritating.
ed
You really have changed since you started working for people from Cali.....
Steven
Secondly, if you choose to go to a bar/restaurant who have to first define what it is you are going for. Is 'to smoke' on this list? You go to restaurants to eat and talk, less debatable there, but to a bar? You do to a bar to what? Talk to friends? Drink socially? Drink to get pissed? Pull someone/thing? I may choose to go to a bar but i don't choose to come out smelling of smoke and having puffy eyes. People can smoke anywhere, it's only their stupid and weak minded addiction forcing them to suck burning tubes of dead leaves that keeps them doing it. It's certainly not for the benefit of the friends they go to see, unless it keeps them slightly more on top of the game for conversation.
Steven
Of course, I don't mind to much to be honest, but i'll argue the point as if anything arguing for smoking of any type is just insane. There is no good thing that comes from smoking. You make a load of rich people richer, support an industry that bleeds poor people (chavs) dry with a 'tax' on their worthlessness and ignorance, causes 10's of thousands of deaths a year and billions siphoned from medical bugets that could be used to save starving african orphans (did you think about the starving african orphans, eh?) and worst of all, is an addition, a chemical dependancy. I can think of nothing worse than being at mercy to my own body in such a public way. We may all have dependancies, and maybe even addictions (I'm wanking as a right this) but to display them for everyone to see, to be even proud of what your body is forcing you to do, the money it's forcing you to earn and then burn away, the damage it is forcing on your lungs that you know full well about but do nothing because it's too far in the future to concern you now. All of that it just, undignified.
Art
mcgregor
Don't you want to lock yourself in every night with a shotgun and a copy of the daily mail?
Laurie
The Daily Mail is only there for use as toilet paper, obviously.
Chez
Question is this: how is this ban going to be enforced? No one's mentioned that yet.
I'll bet you (from spending years on the Union door) that no one bothered to ask the Stewards if it was practical.
The observant will have noticed that the Union did have no-smoking zones before. The bars, for one, and I think the Graduate was supposed to be non-smoking. But it wasn't practical to enforce them when there were 30 stewards on in a night, let alone when that got hacked down to fifteen, or the half dozen or so badged door staff they have now - much like the rule about taking drinks on to dance foors, toilets and stairwells (don't believe me that that was against the rules? Check the back of your old skool Union Tickets).
Knowing uni students, this will end badly if the policy isn't simply ignored by the staff. But they won't be allowed to ignore it because there will be the usual busy-bodies who will snitch on anyone having a crafty fag and demand the strict enforcement of all rules (that suit them).
People will get hurt*, there will be a fuss, and as usual the union staff will get the blame.
*- their pride that is, which is a very delicate, yet important thing, to most students.
Robert
Rather more practically, whether a vene allows smoke or not is a consideration for me - I was agonising over my choice of coffee shops near uni, with Utopia (independent, funky, nice food but smoke) vs Starbucks, and I often ended up checking out how smoky Utopia was before deciding.
The Union was always reasonably smoke free so it probably doesn't make too much difference anyway - it certainly wouldn't here in Sheffield if similar were to happen...