girasol
Addicted to handstands!
I think tobacco might be one of the oldest drugs there are though, no? along with fermented fruit (alcohol), weed & magic mushrooms?
Aotearoa: 14 y/o & under will never be able to buy tobacco, for life
- Thread starter Balbi
- Start date
I think tobacco might be one of the oldest drugs there are though, no? along with fermented fruit (alcohol), weed & magic mushrooms?
seeformiles
Lost in the wood
Last time I was in Amsterdam (2006) coffee shops were beginning to actively discourage tobacco use and advocating alternative methods (vaping, edibles) or providing herbal baccy instead. Not sure how things have panned out there since but friends of mine who smoke weed have largely abandoned tobacco altogether. I suppose Covid precautions is also affecting the traditional shared joint.
pogofish
Testicle Hairstyle
Its a bit of a false claim that "big tobacco" adds hundreds of chemicals - More that many are the residue of the various fertilisers/antifungals/insecticides used in cultivation and curing, plus a great deal of the rest are the byproducts of inefficient combustion when smoked. Which can produce a whole and rather unpredictable spectrum of nasty stuff!
pogofish
Testicle Hairstyle
Before they turned to agrichemicals, the traditional "organic" method to control pests on tobacco crops was to ring the fields with cannabis plants and use a wash made largely of nicotine, from boiling-up the stems/wasted plant matter from the previous years crop.
pogofish
Testicle Hairstyle
I don't think so - Vaping, hardware and liquids are very heavily regulated in Australia and New Zeland - At least as heavily as tobacco and in NZ's case, vaping is also covered by their "smokefree" strategy.
Australia maybe has the tighter restriction however, which has led to a thriving black/under the counter market in pens and liquids, plus a whole load of seriously iffy home-made liquids (google "popcorn lung") and of course it has made vaping the coolest thing possible for exactly the age groups the legislation seeks to deter!
ska invita
back on the other side
Yossarians link suggests otherwise
Adding loads of stuff for a variety of conscious reasons.
I'm sure there's pollution on top
platinumsage
HaveMyPassword123
There’s nothing special about tobacco smoke that is bad for your health compared to whatever herbal smoke, or bonfire smoke or whatever.
Inhaling smoke is just bad for you full stop. With tobacco, the nicotine makes you want to regularly suck an unreasonable quantity of it in to your lungs. Switching to herbal cigarettes would avoid that aspect, but it’s not in any way healthier.
Inhaling smoke is just bad for you full stop. With tobacco, the nicotine makes you want to regularly suck an unreasonable quantity of it in to your lungs. Switching to herbal cigarettes would avoid that aspect, but it’s not in any way healthier.
ska invita
back on the other side
They've legalised cannabis growing though in Oz? NZ just had a referendum on it too, narrowly not legalised
pogofish
Testicle Hairstyle
Not really - those are all common additives/aids in industrial food production anyway and regarded as reasonably safe. Some would not normally have to even be listed in the food context.
The "hundreds of chemicals" thing goes back a good couple of decades when the anti-smoking interests started putting out lists of all the "awful stuff" they had found listed in various types of analysis of tobacco and tobacco smoke, but listed them indiscriminately, without any reference to how they actually occurred. The impression that they were all "additives" took hold from there.
Then they did it all over again after that journalist was poisoned with Polonium by the Russians - which had also been found in a number of analyses of tobacco smoke since the 1960s.
pogofish
Testicle Hairstyle
girasol
Addicted to handstands!
Nicotine, caffeine, refined sugar, alcohol. All of these drugs can be addictive yet none will kill you in moderate amounts. However, a proportion of humans will become addicted to any of those and won't be able to control their use, such is the nature of addiction (I am one of those addicts, with regards to nicotine, although I only smoke socially these days, not continuously like I used to, I will always be an addict and can slip up quite easily). Alcohol is by far the most destructive - and the only one that can kill if withdrawal isn't managed - I am thankful that is not my poison. Nicotine is the most addictive - but even here, not everyone who tries it becomes addicted to it.
Do I want to live an a world where everything is prohibited because a portion of users will have an issue with the substance? Fuck no! What about young people who will and SHOULD want to have a few years of experimenting and trying different things? Are we going to criminalise them for things we could do ourselves, and things we did do for a few years and then stopped? What we need is education, not prohibition. Educate about healthy eating, healthy alcohol consumption. You want to smoke? Fine, but it'll be expensive, it ought to be something you do occasionally, not all the time. Same with alcohol and sugary treats/fatty foods.
I'm pretty sure unhealthy lifestyles and diet kill as many people as smoking (probably more?). So, are they going to ban unhealthy foods and force everyone to exercise? Where does it stop!?
p.s. don't get me wrong, I hate the tobacco industry, but I also hate the alcohol industry and the food industry...
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SpookyFrank
A cheap source of teeth for aquarium gravel
Makes sense. Nicotine was invented by the tobacco plant as an insecticide. Ditto caffeine IIRC.
There's a good argument for the banning of many unhealthy foods IMO, absolutely. This idea of allowing people the freedom to make their own mistakes and all that is all well and good, but it doesn't really work in a world of hypercapitalist multinationals which make huge profits from them making mistakes. The dice are loaded.
girasol
Addicted to handstands!
I added the last line after you quoted my post, regarding ALL the industries 
What concerns me A LOT more than tobacco is how my granddaughter at the age of 6 is already fully brainwashed into thinking gifts are the most important things about birthday and xmas AND seeing sweets/junk food as rewards and comfort foods - and this is all pervasive, because, no matter what we as a family say, it makes no difference. I had the same issue with my son. We cooked at home, healthy meals, fruit only, no refined sugar/junk food at home. As soon as he hit secondary school he was at it, because that's what everyone else was into.
Unless we remove our granddaughter from the world, home educate and deny access to internet and TV - this is what's out there. Tobacco is indeed one of the worries BUT I remember when my son started smoking and how heart broken I was - but then realising there were other substances much more damaging to him: weed being one of them - as it sapped all his energy and very nearly ruined his life. Tobacco didn't do that. And weed doesn't do that to everyone either, unless they smoke it every day. And don't even get me started on internet addiction...
well, that was an odd stream of consciousness, but there it is. that's where my brain got to...
What concerns me A LOT more than tobacco is how my granddaughter at the age of 6 is already fully brainwashed into thinking gifts are the most important things about birthday and xmas AND seeing sweets/junk food as rewards and comfort foods - and this is all pervasive, because, no matter what we as a family say, it makes no difference. I had the same issue with my son. We cooked at home, healthy meals, fruit only, no refined sugar/junk food at home. As soon as he hit secondary school he was at it, because that's what everyone else was into.
Unless we remove our granddaughter from the world, home educate and deny access to internet and TV - this is what's out there. Tobacco is indeed one of the worries BUT I remember when my son started smoking and how heart broken I was - but then realising there were other substances much more damaging to him: weed being one of them - as it sapped all his energy and very nearly ruined his life. Tobacco didn't do that. And weed doesn't do that to everyone either, unless they smoke it every day. And don't even get me started on internet addiction...
well, that was an odd stream of consciousness, but there it is. that's where my brain got to...
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Yossarian
Get thee behind me, Santa
Are there still many teen smokers out there? I thought with the rise of vaping, anybody under about 30 viewed smoking cigarettes as something done only by gross, stupid old people.
Another part of the New Zealand law might end up being a bigger step toward the elimination of smoking - it only allows the sale of tobacco products with extremely low nicotine levels, I think even hardcore smokers might balk at paying almost £20 a pack for ultralights.
Another part of the New Zealand law might end up being a bigger step toward the elimination of smoking - it only allows the sale of tobacco products with extremely low nicotine levels, I think even hardcore smokers might balk at paying almost £20 a pack for ultralights.
Plenty at my kids' school, yeah. She reckons vaping has gone out of fashion and they're all on fags now.
crush them all. I'm not sure how we'd go about this except legislatively thoughI added the last line after you quoted my post, regarding ALL the industries
ska invita
back on the other side
Smoking among young people increased by quarter during first COVID-19 lockdown
On a positive note, the study funded by Cancer Research also found an increase in the number of smokers quitting successfully.
Balbi
Hey, Dean Yager!
Having a real, "Physician, heal thyself", response to this post in particular unless you're no longer living in the UK, Sass.
SpookyFrank
A cheap source of teeth for aquarium gravel
And holding your breath for ages.
Balbi
Hey, Dean Yager!
I think there's a cultural difference here too, especially with alcohol arguments.
In Aotearoa, you can buy beer and wine but can't buy spirits at a supermarket, you can't buy beer at your local shop at all, you've got to go to a liquor store for spirits and a liqour store or chain supermarket for beer.
If you're in a licensing trust area, you can't even buy alcohol at a supermarket.
Much more of a home drinking culture rather than a bar/pub culture too, because the weather's nice and pints are $10+.
Switching all smokes to low nicotine and restricting sales sites is gonna do a lot, and reckon vape stores are going to do very well out of this.
In Aotearoa, you can buy beer and wine but can't buy spirits at a supermarket, you can't buy beer at your local shop at all, you've got to go to a liquor store for spirits and a liqour store or chain supermarket for beer.
If you're in a licensing trust area, you can't even buy alcohol at a supermarket.
Much more of a home drinking culture rather than a bar/pub culture too, because the weather's nice and pints are $10+.
Switching all smokes to low nicotine and restricting sales sites is gonna do a lot, and reckon vape stores are going to do very well out of this.
Sasaferrato
Super Refuser!
Last time I was in Amsterdam, 2019, I had stopped smoking tobacco. When my mate was about to spark up a spliff made with tobacco, I told him that it was illegal, a passing waiter told him that it was OK, the police came occasionally and fined them 20 Euros.
Sasaferrato
Super Refuser!
I don't smoke tobacco, but regard this as a very illiberal act. Was that in their manifesto?
Sasaferrato
Super Refuser!
The illegal importation will increase.
Balbi
Hey, Dean Yager!
Yes, the action plan for Smokefree 2025 was a manifesto commitment at the 2020 election. After two decades of raising tax on smokes only dropping use by 10% or so, they've decided to do something meatier.
Sasaferrato
Super Refuser!
They will end up with the perfect storm of smuggled tobacco, falling tax revenues and rising smoking related heath costs.
Balbi
Hey, Dean Yager!
Good to know you're being positive about it.
Our borders are preeeeeetty tight, the advantage of being fucking miles from anywhere.
Anyone who can currently smoke will be able to do so until they die, although they'll have to switch to ultra lites if they want baccy or vaping if they want nicotine.
The idea that this policy will increase the health related costs of smoking is, tbh, weird. Fewer people smoking = reduced costs.
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