got my big old judgey pants in a right twist!

[BlueFishWonder]

Stuck in a traffic jam. Infront of us is a family, 2 adults and 2 children, one toddler, one baby! In the space of an hour the adults have worked through 4 cigarettes with windows closed!! I am fuming and getting increasingly angry and starting to drive dh a bit mad! I am heavily pregnant so hormones not helping! I know I'm being judgey but really annoyed and needed to rant (and not to dh!)

[LadyMaryQuiteContrary]

You're not being judgey, it's vile. Poor kids. There's a thread on here somewhere about smoking around children.

[LividofLondon]

UANBU. What selfish people they are that their need for a fag (or few) overrides the potential health problems of their children.

[LadyMaryQuiteContrary]

My father was a smoker. I was always ill with tonsilitis, chest infections and coughs as a child. I remember having a constant barking cough for years! It all stopped when I moved out. He died of COPD a few years ago. I just wish the Government would ban it. I know people 'have a right' to smoke, but surely people also have a right to clean air? It's not nice to walk through a smoke cloud every time you want to enter a building or wait at a bus stop.

[gordyslovesheep]

judgy would be getting yourself all worked up over other peoples harmless choices - you are quiet right to be cross - they are being abusive

[SauvignonBlanche]

Poor bloody kids, YANBU at all.

[thebody]

Horrible but legal. You need to calm down op if you are heavily pregnant.

Others parenting choices will drive you dirty if you get this worked up.

[thebody]

Lol dotty not dirty!!!

[SteepApproach]

Like LadyMary, I also suffered constantly from chest infections, etc. as a child. Wear those judgey pants with pride!

[LadyMaryQuiteContrary]

I worked in a children's hospital for a while. I was shocked at the amount of parents who would take their sick children outside in the snow, rain and freezing temperatures so that the parent could smoke! Little babies with pneumonia/chest infections etc

[theodorakisses]

It doesn't bother me at all. What bothers me is children who are abused or neglected by their parents or have never known how it feels to be loved. I think it is one of those things you have to accept is not the end of the world. I think refusing to allow your child to eat sugar or watch tv is pretty shit but it doesn't mean I think the child is abused just unlucky to have crap parents in the same way as the smokers, crap and shit and negligent but not cruel so I would probably keep my pecker out of how they choose to bring up their children.

[MrsTerryPratchett]

It's illegal here, in Canada, to smoke in the car with children. However, I was reading a Bill Bryson book last night and he mentioned how rare death by passive smoking is. Does anyone know what the statistics are?

[SneakyNinja]

I'm not sure that the proven negative health effects of t.v deprivation are quite up there with second hand smoke theodorakisses

[EuroShaggleton]

The poor kids. I grew up in a smoking household and hated it. I was always ill with chest and throat infections and used to wheeze when I ran (no asthma). When I moved away to university, I suddenly discovered I was quite sporty after being the last one picked etc. for school PE. I am now vehemently anti-smoking. It's vile. I hate running the gaunlet of smokers outside stations and office. Yuk!

[LadyMaryQuiteContrary]

I bet the Roy Castle foundation know that, MrsTerryPratchett

It's not the same as refusing sugar or the TV though, smoking makes children ill What if I gave ds something knowing that it would make him sick. That would be child abuse, wouldn't it?

[LadyMaryQuiteContrary]

//www.roycastle.org

[MrsTerryPratchett]

I found something. Here Worldwide 1.2 billion smokers kill 166,000 children with passive smoking (also more adults but we are talking about children here). Every death, particularly preventable, is a tragedy but that does seem of tine number considering road deaths, accidental shootings and so on.

[Sparklingbrook]

I bet those children have permanent phlegmy coughs and colds.

[LadyMaryQuiteContrary]

1 death is 1 too many.

[MrsTerryPratchett]

I'm not saying its not bad. However, the hysteria that passive smoking seems to induce... I am quite boring about statistics because I think we are very bad at analyzing what is actually happening. Screaming at people about passive smoking and car seats is understandable. However, the level of censure compared to the actual risk is odd.

[OhChristHasRisenFENTON]

Sometimes it's okay to judge shit like this I think.

[SnotMeReally]

MrsTP - deaths from passive smoking might be rare, or hard to attribute correctly, or we may not yet have reaped the harvest of former years HOWEVER, childhood illnesses asthma, chest infections and such are much greater in families where parents smoke in the home - as is the incidence of cot death

OP YANBU I would be cross too, how can people choose to bury their heads in the sand - at least they could have had a window open!

[Sparklingbrook]

Do you think that as the DC are subjected to the fumes they are more likely to become smokers themselves?

[merrymuzzie]

YANBU.

It should be made illegal to smoke in a car with children present.

Absolutely vile and selfish.

[MrsTerryPratchett]

1 death is 1 too many. Yes but banning driving would save millions of lives. We have a cost benefit analysis of everything we do that is risky.

I agree that the illnesses caused aren't counted to those stats. But, there are 1.2 million deaths from traffic worldwide per year. The parents just having those children out in a car is putting them at much more risk.

BTW I don't smoke around children (I don't smoke and haven't for years), think it's pretty rank and support a ban in cars. I'm just trying to tease apart why this issue (and car seats) raises such passion when other, MUCH more dangerous things don't.

[LadyMaryQuiteContrary]

Snot is right; the numbers of children with asthma, chest infection, ear infections, coughs, colds, respiratory problems, SID's and growth delays are higher in smoking households. It's well known that expectant mothers who smoke have a higher chance of premature delivery and a smaller baby.