Smoking

[weebarra]

I'm 36 and have been being treated for breast cancer for the past 9 months. I was diagnosed when DC3 was 8 weeks.
I've had 6 months of chemo, a bilateral mastectomy and now I'm doing the radiotherapy bit. AIBU not to want to walk through clouds of smoke at the entrance to the oncology centre?
I get that people are addicted. I've smoked myself and both parents do. It's just that I feel really pissed off when I see both staff and patients puffing away.
I was going to get cancer anyway - I have the BRCA2 gene, but these people don't have to get it. I just want to shake them.

Acknowledging that car emissions are bad, doesn't make my body vomit any less when I'm exposed to fag smoke!

It would be like me telling you to tolerate heavy perfume more because fag smoke is more dangerous. Pointless, because you can't control the smells you do/don't like or your bodily reactions.

Why do we have to be tolerant though?

I've said several times I don't have an issue with people who smoke, I don't want it to affect me though. So where do you want that tolerance to go?

But I DO tolerate perfume!! That's what I'm saying

I want people to stop singling smokers out as 'vile' 'filthy' 'disgusting' and 'stupid'.

I fail to see how someone who smokes is more entitled to subject me to it, than I am entitled to hate it and react (through no fault of my own) negatively to it.

Why aren't people who smoke in enclosed/compact public places like doorways, more tolerant of asthmatics, or babies, or pregnant people, or anyone who doesn't like the smell? After all, they are choosing to do it, not the other way around.

The smell is vile, filthy, and disgusting.

As for the person doing it, I've no idea, I don't know them.

And if someone chooses to believe that someone who actively makes a decision to do something which is known to be dangerous is stupid - well they can feel free! No doubt there are people who would class eating fast food every day as stupid, or sky diving, or swimming after eating! When people make difference choices to us which are perceived as dangerous, then yes, maybe that person comes across as stupid.

Personally, I think anyone who makes that decision to first pick up a fag, having been told of the risks, is making a stupid decision. And I include my 13 year old self in that.

My uncle who lost his parents at 17 was particularly stupid starting smoking.

However, I can't comment on if they are stupid to still do it, because I don't know the powers of addiction.

So you didn't answer me. Good for you to tolerate perfume.

I hate the smell of smoking. It makes me cough and on bad days vomit. I'm pregnant and have to visit the hospital for that and for my one year old for his various issues. I HAVE to enter the hospital, and usually it's through a cloud of smoke.

I've never said a damn thing, but I still hate it and still end up with a coughing fit.

So what is it you want my tolerance to be?

So get on to your local hospital slithy and petition for an enclosed smoking room further away from the entrance.

People are free to smoke, just don't do it outside a hopsital door where people have to walk through your smoke.

Drives me mad when I am taking DS into a and e mid asthma attack to have to walk through the smokers

Sorry slithy I'm not glued to my phone 24 hours a day. I've made all the points and am not going to argue with you for the sake of it. You disagree. I get it. I don't agree.

Nothing to do with being glued to your phone, you responded without addressing my question, which you have now done again. I can only conclude that you don't know how much tolerance you want people like me to show to those who smoke without regard for others.

Thanks for the instruction star, it's been petitioned for and declined as the whole hospital is theoretically non smoking. Despite the copious signage backing this up, people do as they please and it's not policed.

It's extremely selfish to smoke close to any entrance so that people can't avoid getting a lungful. Let alone an entrance to a hospital!

Smoking should be banned for a large radius around the doors.

And I say this as an ex-smoker, so I know how hard it is to quit and I will defend people's right to smoke as long as cigarettes are legal. But that right ends when it negatively affects non-smokers' health.

As slithy says - a policy that has back fired somewhat
Our local hospital is smoke free in the grounds ...has been for a few years now. If people smoke outside the entrance there is an announcement on the tannoy asking them to extinguish cigarettes...
There used to be an enclosed area with overhead shelters away from the doors for smokers (you could see it but didn't have to go near it) ....but of course that has been done away with - because the grounds are smoke free...

Except obviously they aren't...

I've seen more and more smokers outside the doors now...and they ignore the tannoy (have realised that is all that happens) ...and more as inpatients - still less than in the shelter though - and they are near the doors because there is a slightly sheltered bit - the only sheltered bit...
There still is an outside smokers area - (for long term patients) - difficult to get to and hidden away ...which last time I saw it was full of patients (and staff) ....
Last time I was there someone had been smoking in the outpatients loos...

I can't help but think they would have been better off leaving the shelters...

Second hand smoke is so bad for us - I can't understand why there is anyone alive older than 40 - all the 40, 50, 60, 70 ,80, 90, 100 yr olds who grew up when people smoked in cinemas, pubs, restaurants, the tube, buses, trains... their mothers smoked while pregnant, held them with one hand while puffing with the other ...especially when just a whiff of a cigarette in the open air can be so dangerous for DCs...

I am not supporting smoking near doors - or smokers - it is a disgusting habit - but think people are hysterical about it...and think a lot of posters don't appreciate it is an addiction - one that is obviously very hard to stop (hence story of woman having her legs amputated etc etc etc) and maybe they should be shown pity rather than bile....
(And also worry about making smoking so 'bad' that teen rebels will be desperate to start...)

It's really very simple Slithy- I want you to tolerate smokers whether you like it or not, the same way I would expect you to tolerate other things you're not keen on, without resorting to rudeness and insults.

Feel free to point out where I have at any point been rude to or insulted a smoker. Or are you referring to me coughing/being sick/ my chod having an asthma attack?

Since you don't follow me around in every day life, I think you'll struggle.

And unfortunately, I do tolerate them far more than my dislike of smoking is tolerated apparently!

It really fucks me off that people who don't like it are somehow unreasonable or intolerant.

Smoking is a pretty anti-social habit. There are lots of threads on here about other anti-social habits and activities, and very rarely is it suggested people tolerate them.

Blimey. I'm not saying YOU are rude to smokers slithy. But lots of people on this thread have been, and my posts are a general plea to the population at large to try to be a bit more tolerant of things they don't like. I'm not saying you have to like smokers or smoking, that's up to you, obviously.

Agreed wee it can be fairly antisocial, but if people are smoking where they are allowed to then they shouldn't be harassed about it

Ah I see, that does change things! I didn't realise you meant the general you.

Well personally I don't see the need to condemn people for the different choices they make no matter how distasteful one might find them. I find it very easy to hate smoking without hating smokers.

However, I can understand completely (because I've been there and held my tongue) why some people would want to say something when they have taken their ill baby through a cloud of smoke for the nth time, or when they have to walk past pregnant women smoking, having just had their baby die.

It doesn't have to be rude. But perhaps if public buildings did their jobs and refused to allow smoking within the entrance, the non smoking public would be less upset at the smokers.

Well I do think the only answer really is for hospitals for provide proper smoking shelters away from the entrances

Agreed

And so should supermarkets and other places with loads of footfall

My deepest sympathies slithy.
OBVIOUSLY we're not fully understanding Inspace's many points. When we breathe other peoples smoke as we pass them where they are 'allowed' to be we should not hold our breath, but, simply, continue breathing and tolerate them! Encroyable!!!
Inspace, here's what you keep failing to get; we have a right NOT to breathe any cigarette smoke anywhere. Smokers DO NOT have the right to smoke anywhere it might affect ANYONE else!
I find tobacco smoke disgusting as do a fair few people. I shouldn't have to go out of my way because others have an addiction.
I dislike car exhaust fumes, I don't know any sane person who does! We ALL try to avoid these fumes but it's nigh on impossible and something that is directly or indirectly caused by EVERYONE.
I know this still won't enlighten you Inspace and that's fine, you're entitled to your opinions. We should all be able to debate without creating animosity between us.
(I hate strong perfume too, off-topic)

Christ I really can't be bothered with this any more. It's like trying to debate anything with a Tory.

I'm a non-smoker who is tolerant of smokers, doesn't bother me BUT smoking by a hospital entrance where ill people have to go in and out is selfish behaviour. You could walk 50 yards away, so poorly people don't need to walk through the smoke.