This started off as a
response to Harry Khulamunh’s bulletin soliciting support for the Ban on
Cigarettes initiative. See https://mouthshut.com/account/ViewInboxMessage.php?m2mid=4137315
Harry also wants the MS
Mall to do away with the Gift of Cigarettes(possibly because it causes
Virtual Cancer and other unmentionable virtual maladies in our virtual minds).
Here’s my two bits:
khulamunh Saheb:
Without delving too much into the pros and cons of smoking(and there’s volumes
that has already been said for both positions), a ban on smoking is a
surreptitious undertaking for the enactment of even more severe discriminatory
laws yet to come. Laws, such as the one proposed, transform a great multitude
of productive, law abiding citizens into criminals overnight – based solely
upon their exercising the Right of Choice; a habit once regarded as socially
‘fashionable’ but now seen as harmful and perhaps even as(righteously?)
obnoxious. Paradoxically, those who sit in judgment show no scruples reaping in
the profits from this industry, long considered a major source of national
revenue.
OK. So we ban smoking
because the “majority” considers the habit offensive. What next? There are a
great multitude of responsible, educated, opinion makers in our nation(and
elsewhere) who consider wearing a ‘Pagadi”/”Shamla”, beard/long hair, as
extra-mainstream attire and being just as offensive(if not more so). And if
(when!) appropriate legislation is passed to “abate”/”sanitize” such
extra-mainstream practices, we will have(again) created a fresh category of
non-conforming criminals lawfully subject to criminal sanctions based upon
arbitrary public opinion! Nice way to homogenize a nation, eh?
khulamunh Saheb:
This won’t stop there, my dear friend! It will continue on forward to
segregate the population into “acceptable” and “non-conformist” Class Systems.
And if you have no clue about where we’d be heading, I suggest you read George
Orwell’s Animal Farm.
But being a reasonable
person, I’m willing to make a deal on behalf of Smokers: We will go along with
the “Ban” if the government shelves all public transportation as a first real
step toward providing clean air and curbing pollution that has been more
detrimental to the health of our entire population than cigarette smoking has
to the small section of smokers. So whaddya say?
P.S. Between you and
me, I’d love to quit but you know how everyone hates a quitter!;)