Cigarette Smoking: Murder by Proxy

Murder and drug use are punishable crimes in society, today, and it’s not hard to understand why.  It’s all very elementary.  You do harm … you do time.  But, when we see someone walk past us on the street with a cigarette hanging from their mouth and a trail of smoke lurking behind them, how many of us would consider this a crime scene in and of itself and the perpetrator a criminal of sorts?  Perhaps not many of us would.  But, perhaps we ALL should!

Lung cancer is one of the most prevalent causes of death in the United States. And while it can be caused by a number of different factors such as exposures to asbestos (mesothelioma), it is mostly the effect of one form of drug usage: cigarette smoking which lines the lungs with tar and nicotine.  We are also seeing an alarming increase in another life-threatening form of lung disease (asthma); and, unfortunately, our children are the main targets.

Asthma is an inflammation of the airways that causes a constriction of the airways, and it can be brought on by an adverse reaction to primary AND secondary smoke. Primary smoke is when the individual is a smoker.  The effects of secondary smoke, on the other hand, is the potentially-lethal effects of the cigarette smoking from individuals around us.  Cigarette smoking (actually, any kind of smoke) harms not only ourselves, but those around us.  And, it has the potential to kill.  Murder by proxy.

Many states are cracking down on second-hand smoke by enforcing a no-smoking policy in public places.  While smokers may be politically correct in having the right to destroy their own bodies with the bad habits they formed over the years, it makes sense that non-smokers (especially children whose phyhsiological systems are more sensitive to toxic materials) will have the equal right to clean air without suffering the consequences of someone else’s drug habits.  And that  is precisely what smoking IS: a DRUG HABIT.

As a society, we have frowned upon all sorts of drug usage from pot to coke.  How is smoking differemt? Not so very much! Smoking is a habit-forming behavior that causes us to “need” that fix every so often. Nicotine is the urge behind that need and it causes us to do all sorts of crazy things to satisfy that insatiable urge to light up.  “Crazy things,” you ask.  “What sort of crazy things?”  Well, how about being willing to stand outside that public building shivvering in the cold just to be able to suck one more puff out of that drag?  That’s pretty crazy.

What’s worse, the high you get from your cigarette today won’t cut it tomorrow.  You’ll need to light up more and more often just to satisfy that same urge.  Tolerance sets in.  And then you’re hooked.  That’s the way drugs work.  And that’s how bad habits drag us down the road of destruction. And, worse yet, we follow that urge to the harm and destruction of everyone around us … including our own children, as we blow the leftover filth into their face and into their lungs. 

Should smoking be restricted in public places?  Well, that’s as simple as answering the question: “Should we consider murder to be socially acceptable?”  Well, should we? As absurd as that question may seem, we should ask ourselves that question each and every time we light up a smoke.  If we do not have the guts to end our obsessions, then somebody must do it for us so that we don’t drag other people down with us.  While smoking is legal and we do, indeed, have the right to destroy ourselves in our own homes, it MUST be restricted in public places where other people will not die in our wake.