To wish cafes would have a designated smoking area...

[ilooklikemrsploppy]

..which is completely separate from non smoking areas so I would be able to sit outside and enjoy the 'fresh' air without smoking the equivalent of 20 fucking fags!

I wish cafés had a designated area for those prone to exaggeration.

Squoosh!

This ^^ x10000

My main problem with smoking outside a café is that it takes away somebody else's choice. Their choice not to breathe second hand smoke. Banning smoking outside a café doesn't take away your choice to smoke. You are just bound by the same rules and regulations which govern a lot of behaviour. Some things you can do in some places, some things you can't. It's part of being a society with respect for other people's comfort and right to enjoy common spaces. With smoking in particular it's remarkable because it does negatively affect people in a way other choices don't. Your vice affects my Dad's COPD for example or a small child or tiny baby who hasn't yet been able to make that choice. You have a choice not to affect your fellow human in that way AND still carry on with your habit. Your choice not to think of other people or determination to fight for what you see as a right, says a lot about an attitude towards more than smoking.

I have never seen an actual decent argument for allowing somebody to smoke outside a café. You like to have coffee and a cigarette at the same time? You can still do that, just not in that shared space. I can't have a coffee in that shared space and not be subject to second hand smoke. My choices cannot be allowed for if smoking is allowed. Your choices can be allowed for if smoking there is not allowed. You pick your vice, it's up to society to make sure it doesn't negatively impact on other people.

Is it not just common decency?

Oh and I like vaping for one reason only. I will NEVER tire of seeing one of the Dads at school, walking to collect his DSs whilst fellating a mini light sabre. It fair cheers me up of an afternoon. It's an actual mini light sabre. In blue.

Unreasonable me, getting het up about "smokers rights" while planning a funeral because of smoking. What an odd reason to be bothered...

Ironic. Words on a screen can't hurt you. Second hand smoke can. So why are you complaining about the former and defending the latter?

We're talking about people smoking outside - you are not going to get cancer from people smoking outside. Again, get a grip.

As mentioned earlier in the thread, smokers do have a choice in where they sit. They aRE choosing to limit their options in where to sit by choosing to smoke. And I did move, twice. Ironically each time I did another fucking smoker came and sat at the table next to me

Grantaire you're talking as if this 'shared space' you're banging on about is a 5x5 windowless room. It's the outdoors for crying out loud. At worst an offensive smell. And there's plenty of those around. Why just pick on the smokers?

"And don't get me started on Poor People, Rich People, People on Phones, People talking loudly, Cars, Buses, Dogs, Pigeons....

Or you could just accept the fact that you're outside & have to interact with different people with all their faults...."

All of the things above are necessities or impossible concerns. You can't stop people from being rich or poor. You can't cull or pigeons. You can't deny the need for or brilliance of phones, you can't stop people talking. None of those things are going to give you an asthma attack or make you smell or make somebody like my Dad v ill for the rest of the day. Smoking has no positive benefit and negatively affects the people exposed to it. It's not the same as other human interactions which don't involve a clear, personal choice.

You literally can't say "well I don't like people talking and I choose to be a non-talker so hate to be exposed to it". It's not a fair comparison.

Only popped in as I thought this was a thread about people wanting to bring back the smoking tables in restaurants...

Oh how I miss a nice cup of tea and a fag in wimpy while skiving off double geography

raffle I hear there's a Wimpy in north London with a BAR! Imagine THAT!!!

Actually Grantaire smoking does have positive effects - it's probably prevented me killing people as I've had a smoke instead!!!

I did move, twice. Ironically each time I did another fucking smoker came and sat at the table next to me

I think it's your animal magnetism.

Please don't say I'm 'banging on'. I was trying to have a discussion.

It is outdoors. Outdoors is a massive space and I wasn't suggesting you don't smoke anywhere at all. Outside a café where you are sitting a couple of feet from a table of smokers is very different to passing a smoker in the street where the smell is a brief thing and then gone. If somebody has spent a lot of money on an overpriced coffee and wants to sit in the sunshine and enjoy it, your vice may prevent that happening. That's your choice negatively impacting upon somebody else. You have a choice not to make that person's paid for activity a miserable one. You can still be a smoker and they can still enjoy their coffee.

I'd have a lot more respect if you just simply said 'yes I know my choices make other people unwell or unhappy and I know I have the choice not to expose other people to my smoke but I don't care about them enough to stop'.

It's the constant justification and excuses.

And why just pick on smokers? I'm on a thread about smoking so happen to be talking about smokers. We can talk about something else on another thread if you like.

I sit here smug in the knowledge that, despite all the yowling, there's fuck all you can do about it for now!!

And I don't even smoke - but I accept the right of people to do legal activities OUTSIDE.

WindMeUp, my friend says her smoking helps her asthma as it forces her to concentrate on and regulate her breathing. She does genuinely believe this btw.

IknowIAm exactly.

Grantaire so how dangerous is the 'exposure' when sitting a few feet from someone outside when they're smoking?

I'd have a lot more respect if you just simply said 'yes I know my choices make other people unwell or unhappy and I know I have the choice not to expose other people to my smoke but I don't care about them enough to stop'.

People generally smoke because they're addicted. Being dramatic about their cavalier disregard for your feelings is neither here nor there.

That's the thing sally, with any other form of body emitted smell - BO, bad breath etc, it's totally unacceptable and embarrassing for the person in question. But why with cigarette smell is it ok and no-one says anything?

I think it's pretty obvious why no-one complained in the case I mentioned. The other people present had been enjoying the meal and were polite enough to suffer the smell rather than add fuel to an unpleasant situation by complaining.
And if the smoker was as aggressive as some of the smoking defenders on this thread it would probably have brought the evening to an abrupt end.

"SDTG I'm sure it's a huge relief to you knowing your mum isn't smoking in bed any more. E-cigs really do have a lot of benefits."

Embarassingly, squoosh, it wasn't until she told me she was using her e-cig for her last cigarette in bed that the penny dropped for me, about what she had been risking beforehand. Serious dimness on my part!

And if the smoker was as aggressive as some of the smoking defenders on this thread

I suggest you re-read the thread and note the direction from which most of the aggression is coming.

Well the lack of digits should help them give up the fags then shouldn't it.

Aw come on! Smokers are the ultimate under dogs! I thought Brits were supposed to adore under dogs?

I am largely in agreement with Goodnessgraciousgouda.

I am not a smoker and never have been. My parents are heavy smokers though, and always have been, so I grew up with it all around me.

We see my parents maybe a couple of times a year, sometimes not that. I must admit that I am relieved that they can no longer smoke inside restaurants, cafes and pubs. It means that we can all enjoy meals out with them much more now. Whenever they have visited my house or my sister's they have always smoked outside in the garden, but have not left fag ends or pipe ash out there. They have always been very tidy with it.

People smoking outside though just doesn't bother me at all. The point of it being outside is that the smoke drifts away and dissipates much more, whereas indoors it would just build up far too much.

Even if you do have segregated smoking / non-smoking areas outside cafes, you can't stop smoke drifting on the wind.

Not something I can really get worked up about. Or maybe I just choose not to because it isn't worth a family rift to me.

Stinkersmum, if you sat on a table next to my Dad and lit up and he stayed there, yes you'd make him very ill. I'm not sure how you want me to quantify the danger to his health. As things stand, he has to get up and move away/leave.

I'm not being dramatic squoosh. I know smokers are addicted. I never said they weren't. I wasn't talking about the choice to smoke affecting other people's feelings, I was talking about the choice to smoke outside a café affecting other people. And I don't even really think that the choice I am miffed about is the choice of individual smokers. The cafes who own the public spaces should make the choice which is in the best interests of their customers.

Oh god, these smoking threads. When I read "but I don't WANT to smell their smoke and I WANT TO SIT OUTSIDE!" it just reads like when the kids are bickering and you hear Muuu-uuuu-uuuuuum!! He pinched me!

Well boo fucking hoo

Anti-smokers in World Does Not Revolve Around Me shock

Depends where the café is. If it's in an area with high levels of smokers the best interests of the customer (and the business owner) will be a smoking friendly café.

If it's in an area with vigorous opposition to smoking the best interest of the customer would be a designated smoking area.