Why is it bollocks then...? You just said that you'd rather be in your garden than go out to the pub... I get the impression that would mean regardless of whether people were smoking there or not.... Listen, I can count the number of non-smokers who object to people smoking in pubs around my particular sub-culture on the fingers of NO HANDS... No one gives a fukk mate, in fact most of us are a bit peed off about the detrimental effects a ban could have, if people are stopped from smoking they might not go out, and our beloved venues might get closed down... Or maybe us in the alternative/gay/metal/goth scenes just have more of a 'live and let live' attitude perhaps, that we aint so uptight about things like this....? I really dont see it as the problem you do... And I never have, even while I was still living in almost totally unpolluted Dundee for most of my life, I never let it stop me from going out, and neither did the rest of my non-smoker friends; my mum and stepdad (who certainly cannot be described in any of the sub-culture areas which I illustrated... :lol: ) are non-smokers too, ditto for most of their friends too, it never stopped them going out to their local of a Saturday evening.. In fact, guess what, their local actually has LESS punters now because of the sodding ban..... <_< So, just where and who is this theoretical 'majority' who are being 'excluded' from pubs then, and why aint they going out NOW in order to make up the numbers for the smokers who've been actually 'excluded' from the locals they've been going to for bloody years....?

 

As for your jibe about "selling nukes to arabs"... Christ, and you had the nerve to criticise my comparison to car exhaust fumes and pollution.... :lol: :lol: :lol: At least what I was going on about can be linked to the overall debate about the health of the nation (which is the main reason for this ban in the first place, supposedly..) and it was a riposte to the person who went on about breathing "clean air", I have no idea where you got the nukes thing from or how it even remotely relates to this issue... And "sod the consequences"... Well, okay, you can tell that one to Clare as well if she loses her job mate... <_< With that statement, you've just said it all... Sod the fact that people aint gonna have their place that caters for their tastes (cos the ban'll likely put them out of business), sod the fact people are gonna lose their jobs, sod the fact that pub culture as we know it will be effectively destroyed. Do you actually know what the demographic for pub/club goers is..? The majority are aged 18-30, single or unmarried/with partners, just how many 18-30 year olds actually give a FLYING FUKK about whether someone is smoking or not in a pub..? How many 18-30 year olds are gonna let it actually stop them going out for a night out...? Please.... This is, for my mind, yet another example of the OLDER generation dictating to the YOUNGER generation... For someone who objects to Political Correctness so much, you sure are a big cheerleader for it here, because this whole thing just reeks of PC and the Nanny State, and it's a far worse stench than a smoke-filled bar... But you just enjoy yourself in your smoke-free, homogenised, safe, sanitised, family-oriented little Wetherspoons/Yates/Lloyds (cos they'll be the only pubs you will be able to go to, seeing as how all the real ones will likely go out of business...) sipping your Merlot or Chardonnay, listening to Dido and Coldplay and other "Dad Rock" classics piped through on endless fukkin' repeat play. The rest of us will be organising loud, noisy, obnoxious-as-fukk house parties with no rules and "the man" aint gonna be on your back about smoking whatever you want to smoke, or getting drunk in parks.... And I think we can draw a link on all this to another thread elsewhere where some bright spark has come up with the idea of raising the drinking age to 21... You mark my words mate, that's gonna be the next action of the Nanny State/PC brigade....

 

You know, I would like to see the Govt actually have the guts to take on other people, yeah...? Maybe less easy targets than smokers and the tobacco industry... It's real easy to take on them cos nobody likes them... I've already mentioned the car industry, the oil companies, etc, how about the govt take on the fast food industry next, your KFCs, your McDonalds, your Burger Kings (or are they just gonna leave it all up to Jamie Oliver..?) - another, bigger IMO, bunch of body-polluting scumbags who are a direct cause of the growing obesity problem in this country, especially childhood obesity..... Or maybe you dont think that's a problem or summat......

 

very eloquent... but you still have not told me why smokers have the right to infest me with their filth!

 

the nukes thing was to demonstrate just how silly this argument could be, you in particular likes to drag in side issues and not address the issue of non smokers rights!

 

you know as well as i do that if fags were invented today, theyd be banned. we have moved on now from the old chavanistic days where 'men' could do wtf they want... drink, smoke, beat 7 shades out of their downtrodden mrs... its high time to move on, smoking is obnoxious, its filth, its poisonous, and i do not want it in my system. everybody should be free to go out wherever they want to and not get that filth in/on them.

 

i see this ban GENERALLY as a good thing, its a step into the future. destroying the pub trade?...pmsl... it hasnt happend where these bans have been enforced, so why should it happen here?.. maybe its time for pubs/ men, to evolve above it.... the point is... you dont HAVE to smoke to have a good time! it is unnecassery, how many people actually smoke for ENJOYMENT and how many out of habit? a habit they unwittingly started in a bloody pub just to be 'in' with the crowd?.....

 

smoking is totally irrelevant, it benefits no one (except the exchequer), tobacco growing countries should be growing FOOD CROPS for their indiginous (starving) population, there is no need to smoke let alone inflict it on others, bring on the ban and let everything move on.... pubs arnt some quaint little thing stuck in a time-warp... thankfully.

very eloquent... but you still have not told me why smokers have the right to infest me with their filth!

 

the nukes thing was to demonstrate just how silly this argument could be, you in particular likes to drag in side issues and not address the issue of non smokers rights!

 

you know as well as i do that if fags were invented today, theyd be banned. we have moved on now from the old chavanistic days where 'men' could do wtf they want... drink, smoke, beat 7 shades out of their downtrodden mrs... its high time to move on, smoking is obnoxious, its filth, its poisonous, and i do not want it in my system. everybody should be free to go out wherever they want to and not get that filth in/on them.

 

i see this ban GENERALLY as a good thing, its a step into the future. destroying the pub trade?...pmsl... it hasnt happend where these bans have been enforced, so why should it happen here?.. maybe its time for pubs/ men, to evolve above it.... the point is... you dont HAVE to smoke to have a good time! it is unnecassery, how many people actually smoke for ENJOYMENT and how many out of habit? a habit they unwittingly started in a bloody pub just to be 'in' with the crowd?.....

 

smoking is totally irrelevant, it benefits no one (except the exchequer), tobacco growing countries should be growing FOOD CROPS for their indiginous (starving) population, there is no need to smoke let alone inflict it on others, bring on the ban and let everything move on.... pubs arnt some quaint little thing stuck in a time-warp... thankfully.

 

Woah, woah, wait a minute, I dont see any correlation between smoking and "beating seven shades out of their downtrodden mrs"..... I think you'll find alcohol plays more of a role in spousal abuse (and violence in general) than fags mate... Couple that with the fact that just as many, if not more women actually smoke than men, then I reckon that's a very silly, innaccurate and downright dishonest argument.... And fags weren't "invented" as such, as I said in a previous post, the smoking of tobacco goes WAY back to the native American tribes who would smoke tobacco and ingest other substances such as Peyote to aid spirit quests... Okay, different context, but I think worth noting all the same.... I dont see cigarettes as having chauvenistic connotations at all, women have always been just as great a group of smokers as men have... Or maybe you've never seen the average Hollywood 40s Film Noir mate, all the great Hollywood actresses smoked fags dude, and all their female fans copied their idols.... I reckon you're thinking more of LAAAARGGGERRR, LAAARGEERRRR, LAAAARRRRGEERRRRR!!! Beer swilling, pot-bellied c/unts getting a skinful before the footie and then beating the c**p out of the wife if their pathetic team loses.....

 

I for one do smoke out of enjoyment and cameraderie, and ONLY when I'm out.... I can take it or leave it, I aint an addict, it's purely a social thing for me....

Woah, woah, wait a minute, I dont see any correlation between smoking and "beating seven shades out of their downtrodden mrs"..... I think you'll find alcohol plays more of a role in spousal abuse (and violence in general) than fags mate... Couple that with the fact that just as many, if not more women actually smoke than men, then I reckon that's a very silly, innaccurate and downright dishonest argument.... And fags weren't "invented" as such, as I said in a previous post, the smoking of tobacco goes WAY back to the native American tribes who would smoke tobacco and ingest other substances such as Peyote to aid spirit quests... Okay, different context, but I think worth noting all the same.... I dont see cigarettes as having chauvenistic connotations at all, women have always been just as great a group of smokers as men have... Or maybe you've never seen the average Hollywood 40s Film Noir mate, all the great Hollywood actresses smoked fags dude, and all their female fans copied their idols.... I reckon you're thinking more of LAAAARGGGERRR, LAAARGEERRRR, LAAAARRRRGEERRRRR!!! Beer swilling, pot-bellied c/unts getting a skinful before the footie and then beating the c**p out of the wife if their pathetic team loses.....

 

I for one do smoke out of enjoyment and cameraderie, and ONLY when I'm out.... I can take it or leave it, I aint an addict, it's purely a social thing for me....

 

 

i wasnt suggesting it was fags that made men violent, i was painting a picture of the typical old style working class chauvanist that frequented pubs.. not the sort of place youd find lauren bacall!!! so obviously i wasnt refering to her!

 

ive worked with these blokes.... back in the 80's, them who voted for thatcher! were sun readers, bigoted, racist, homophobic, just plain THICK. lol. dispite requests from non smokers to wait at dinner time to light up (as we were in rather cramped messrooms) whilst people were still eating "ill do wtf i want, ill smoke when i want, where i want".... ive lived with that attitude, hence im not very keen to accomodate smokers needs.

 

last night pub... packed.... one smoker... yes ONE smoker in our area. again i say that ive not heard anyone else... on tv, other internet sites, or in real life who are painting the picture of doom that you n russ are portraying. in scotland they just go outside, or in the bogs!...... and no one has the right to inflict their smoke on others who dont smoke.