To wonder if people were actually healthier when everyone smoked

I don't believe that if everyone was given 'permission' to smoke again it would stop the overeating. Also, don't forget the effects of passive smoking on other people, especially children. It was not a good experience being a child in the 60s surrounded by smoking adults.

You are confusing correlation with causation.

People ate sensible portions, didn't spend the day snacking, and got more exercise back then.

It was also fine to point and stare and mock fat people. There was a lot of pressure to be thin. Women in particular were always dieting (Slimcia bread anyone?)

My father in law died of cancer last year and didn't touch a cigarette in his life! This is a stupid statement!

It has more to do with minimal screens, properly active lifestyles, minimal processed food

Something like 97% of smokers don’t get lung cancer, but that’s not really the point - there are so many other health risks associated with smoking.

Also having a mouth like a cats bum 😂

I get what you are saying OP. My parents smoke. Of their siblings they are the most mobile (due to significantly lower weight). However I think they are sadly heading into the danger decade. So life expectancy will likely be less.

Of my peers; I smoke. But not many of my friends are overweight. We are all equally mobile and functioning. I am sure they are much healthier than me, and when I (if!) reach my parents age I am sure they will be much much healthier than me.

So I get what you are saying. But it’s not that smoking is healthy. It’s that obesity is in many ways can be worse than smoking.

YABU because they may have seemed healthy at the time but the number of older people with COPD due to smoking as well as heart disease and lung cancer is enormous

I've pondered this. Back in the day the message was the one thing people could do to improve health was to stop smoking. Now few people smoke but we're more unhealthy than ever. I wonder which is the lesser of two evils.

Nobody would smoke if they really understood what it’s like to die from any of the many diseases it causes .
The very idea that people who smoke could be healthier is horrific to those of us who have watched people dying from the effects of cigarette smoking . My very first nursing job in a hospital when I was 17 was caring for a man dying of lung cancer . Day by day he had less and less surface area in his lungs which could take up oxygen . He effectively drowned slowly and made me promise him ( between horrific gasps ) that I would never smoke & I would tell people about him .
No one who has worked with patients suffering from head & neck cancer , as I went on to do ,would ever suggest smoking was better for people’s health . Such cancers and their treatment are the stuff of nightmares.
My Mum is currently dying from right sided heart failure caused by exposure to secondary smoke at the moment after running a pub for many years . My grandfather died of oral cancer & my father of bladder cancer - primary cause of both - smoking . Horrific deaths .
The tobacco companies suppressed the info re cancer for profit for as long as they could .
Utter wickedness .

Of course there were some fat people in the 50’s 60’s and 70’s, but watch any documentary from that era but you’ll be shocked how thin people were in general.

Also the current wave of obese children, teenagers and younger adults haven’t reached old age yet, so we’ll have to wait and see. Life expectancy is bound to fall though.

Yes they can.
Online pharmacies all sell it.

My father smoked a lot and he's aged early 70s now. He's always had problems with obesity. On the whole, he's probably been lucky to have not had more serious problems, but it's caught up with him in later years. He stopped smoking about three years ago due to COPD. Smoking is never a good idea.

Smoking probably did help him cope with his undiagnosed neurodiversity and anxiety, but there are other ways of doing that, just as there are other ways of dealing with his weight issues.

It also affects my memories of him as a father. If there wasn't money for food, there was always money for smokes.

Smoke and you wouldn't be able to afford takeaway.

My job is to price life insurance. When we underwrite one of the key questions is are you a smoker because your life expectancy is so significantly reduced when a smoker. So the statistics and don’t seem to be agreeing with your theory…

I’m in my early 70s. I knew several thin people who smoked. Knew is the operative word, they have sadly died. Some of my more chubby friends are still enjoying life quite happily. Of course the healthiest neither smoked nor were significantly overweight but smoking was definitely the biggest predictor of poor health and early death.

Smoking is absolutely NOT good for people with anxiety and is one of the many reasons quit. Your heart rate increases and exacerbates anxiety symptoms

There are some benefits to smoking (reduced appetite, reduced weight generally, boosted metabolism) beneficial to some people with mental health problems such as anxiety.

However, the cons by far outstrip any pros.

Alcohol is now to what cigarettes was then. In a couple of decades alcohol will be something only "old people" do too. (Thank god)

You can always count of the French for style 😂

Except in France they've banned smocking in nearly all public places.

No. I smoked for years. I'm overweight and suffer from anxiety. Nicotine addiction increases anxiety. I was always in a state of withdrawal and needed to smoke to relieve the nicotine cravings and anxiety. When it was the nicotine addiction causing the anxiety in the first place.

I quit a few years ago and am healthier and calmer now.

Ah yes, people weren’t fat in the 70s when more people smoked so the two are definitely connected.

Did you also know alcohol makes you immune to electrocution? Tis true, in the Middle Ages everyone drank beer or wine cos the water was bad, but hardly anyone got electrocuted.

Why do you see addiction to food as a moral failing but not addiction to cigarettes?
Is it about aesthetics? You think smoking looks cool and fat people don't?k

Have to admit, made some good connections in smoking shelters when I used to go out!

Yes, smoking to to blame.for obesity, not the other massive lifestyle factors that have shifted in the past 30+ years 🙄

Enjoy fishing OP?