To think that smoking looks really, really cool?

[aperolspritzbasicbitch]

To start, I know it’s not, I know it’s dangerous, I know it stinks and is a horrid habit. I’m not going to start.

but equally….I’d bloody love to take up smoking 🤣

I just think it can look so chic, especially the skinny little European cigarettes.

I love the idea of sitting out with a glass of something, puffing on a little cigarette.

having a mid morning coffee outside a cafe on a cobbled street, cigarette in hand.

Or, the original ozempic…a cigarette and a can of Diet Coke of lunch.

like I said, I’m not going to start, I don’t like the smell and I’ve also been very vocal on my views on vaping.

but, at the grand old age of 40, there’s still something about it that I look at sometimes and think ‘god, she looks cool’

Think Caroline Besette in Love Story.

Oh yeah, I wouldn’t want to date a smoker at all.

or a vaper.

Same

I get what you mean OP. I have a photo of my mum in the 60’s smoking a cigarette in Paris sitting at a bistro with her mini skirt and cool hair and she still looks cool AF. Not so cool these days ofc but back then it was as are the photos of a by gone era

It was definitely cool in the nineties.

The cool kids smoked.

That’s what started me smoking. I gave up though so no regrets. I enjoyed smoking at the time.

There was something sexy about men who smoked. It looked rebellious and carefree.

Not so sure about older men (my age!) who still smoke now.

It looks completely skanky.

it does. Whereas vaping never ever does

It's never looked cool. The smell alone is enough to make anyone look ugly.

It was the sight of my mum puffing away on a fag that made me vow never to smoke. Not cool.

I agree; smoking is cool. It’s a bitch to quit though so better never to start.

It obviously did otherwise kids wouldn’t have started in the first place!

Yellowed hair
Cats bum mouth from drawing on cigarettes.
Yellowed skin
Squinting through cigarette smoke
Yellowed finger nails.

Not at all attractive in my opinion. The Yellowed nails really reminds me of my dad's final weeks with cancer. It was watching the yellow disappearing once he was bedridden.

Nope it looks horrible, and vaping looks quite frankly ridiculous (grown adults sucking on a device)

I started smoking as a teen because I wanted to look cool. In the 90s, it still was (just).

Now it’s all apologetic and embarrassing. You have to squirrel yourself away from others if you want to do it and then return to the group with utterly rancid breath. Not cool at all.

You mean apart from the stench, the yellow fingers, the wrinkles and the lung cancer. 🙄

Never thought it looked cool, even in the 70s and 80s before they (rightly) ramped up how bad it was for you and the smoking ban.

I know what you mean, but recently I saw a photo of Lily Allen walking down a catwalk with a cigarette and I just thought it looked so dirty and smelly, and really gross.

Covered two out of the four in my OP 🙄

When I was about 14 I was minding my own business when a lad I vaguely knew took a drag of his Woodbine and grabbed me and shoved his tongue in my mouth. I was raised to be nice but I spat and swore at him. I could taste that disgusting tongue for weeks, despite no end of scrubbing. And if you spend time with smokers you will smell like a smoker. It will be in your hair, your clothes. So no, it doesn't look cool to me, and it is repellent. I will never put my mouth on a smoker's mouth.

Come on. Of course it looked cool (and arguably still does). If it hadn’t, then it wouldn’t have become such a widespread habit especially amongst young people.

Peer pressure is a huge thing.

Not in my opinion, it's always stunk and looked revolting.

I wonder if people's views are age-related.

I mean I had plenty of friends in the 90s who were occasional social smokers, not everyone was smoking 40 a day!

@thejelliclecatsHow old are you?

Beyond it being nasty, smelly and polluting to others’ air, you really don’t want to watch someone die of lung cancer (my mum died from it in 2023). Sorry biggest NOPE!

Maybe it’s a generational thing, but my 21 year old DS and his friends all think that smoking is really chavvy.