Tennessee Smoking Ban Explained | Jackson Miller

Tennessee Smoking Ban Explained

You want to blow yourself up? Fine. Just don’t blow up a bus full of people at the same time. That makes you a terrorist.

You want to risk killing yourself with cigarettes? Fine. Just don’t risk the lives of others.

The smoking ban in Nashville has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with restricting personal freedoms of the smoker.

The smoking ban in Tennessee has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with trying to get people to quit smoking.

The smoking ban in Tennessee has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with being a nanny-state.

The smoking ban in Tennessee is about protecting the rights of the people who work in restaurants and bars. A bartender should not have to risk lung cancer in order to make a living. The rights of one hould never trump the rights to others. The right to life is the most basic right of all.

I understand how that same logic is applied to the anti-abortion argument. Personally, I don’t believe a fetus becomes a person until they are born. Still, I don’t see how anyone can be “pro-life” and not support the smoking ban, it is the exact same logic. So social conservatives should be jumping up and down with glee that the lives of wait staff across Tennessee are being spared. Then again, a 50 y/o bartender tends to look more like someone on death row than a cute and cuddly little baby. So maybe all life is not equal?

The death row reference comes from what I think is the greatest and most common hypocrisy in politics today, being “pro-life” and supporting capital punishment.

This entry was written by Jackson Miller, posted on October 1, 2007 at 2:56 pm, filed under Philos and tagged death, life, politics, smoking, taxes. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post. Post a comment or leave a trackback: Trackback URL.

15 Comments

fishwreck

Posted October 1, 2007 at 6:13 pm | Permalink

Amen, brother!
Joe Camel

Posted October 1, 2007 at 8:47 pm | Permalink

Jackson,if you can show ONE death caused by smelling smoke, your post makes sense. If you can’t, you’re a loudmouth fool regurgitating boob toob bool stool.

[editor's note] Joe (aka Ed Brown), must be a “scientist” for R.J. Reynolds in the 1950s.
yeahright

Posted October 2, 2007 at 7:33 am | Permalink

what a crock. Innocent babies compared to murderers.
If it looks like a baby, heart beats like a baby’s, has eyes, nose, arms, legs, toes,hair,and will in a few short weeks start to look like its mom and dad; maybe it is a baby. For sixty years I have been forced to smell and breath smoke from you idiot smokers. I dont tell you not to smoke. Just dont force me to smell and breath your smoke.
Jackson Miller

Posted October 2, 2007 at 8:03 am | Permalink

yeahright, you didn’t do so well in reading comprehension did you?

First, I am actually advocating the smoking ban, and I am not a smoker.

Second, how is the life of a baby different from the life of a murderer. Life is either sacred or it is not. Once you start judging which life is valuable you have taken the role of God.

Thanks for commenting though.
Sassy

Posted October 2, 2007 at 9:35 am | Permalink

I am a smoker and I totally agree with the ban. As i have nothing but respect for those that do not smoke. When i go to dinner i would sit in a not smoking section, i generally try to walk away from people that do not smoke, but nothing is better than not smoking at all. So i think this is a good blog KUDOS TO YOU.
brian

Posted October 3, 2007 at 9:25 pm | Permalink

i am sorry jason but you are wrong. i am not a smoker but i believe the government is overstepping its boundaries. the government has no right to tell the owner of a private establishment whether they can allow smoking or not. as far as the workers that you say the government is protecting, they have the choice of whether they want to work in the bar or not. the customers can also make the choice of going to the establishment or not.
Jackson Miller

Posted October 3, 2007 at 10:07 pm | Permalink

brian, it is supremely arrogant of you to assume that the workers have much choice to where they work. Still, choice of employment is beside the point. The US government has a long history of legislating worker protection.

I am a business owner, and I have laws that I have to follow that are designed to protect employees. So, you are entitled to your opinion, but precedent is on my side on that one.
Bill Hannegan

Posted October 5, 2007 at 2:40 pm | Permalink

Up until now, air filtration companies such as Air Quality Engineering have tried to address ETS in bars as a nuisance and irritant and have only tried to address the health risks of smoke in workplaces such as welding shops to OSHA standards. But such air filtration companies can readily and affordably custom design air filtration systems for bars that address not only cosmetic and aesthetic tobacco smoke issues, but also the worker health risks of secondhand smoke.

Let me suggest a new air quality standard for bars that might be the basis for a smoking ban exemption: any bar that can run all its air thru both electronic and HEPA filtration 12 times an hour should be allowed an exemption from any smoking ban. Such filtration would also remove bacteria, viruses, dusts, pollen, mold, radon progeny and other myriad airborne toxins, pathogens and pollutants as a welcome bonus.

http://www.air-quality-eng.com/
Adolphos Rignaldo

Posted October 5, 2007 at 7:05 pm | Permalink

The central issue here isn’t really smoking, it’s about rights and freedom. A business owner should be free to decide if they allow smoking in their establishment or not. In turn the public should be free to make their choice as to whether or not to patronize the establishment. Wake up kids.

If we are going to ban smoking then I think I’ll run for office and ban sausage, biscuits and gravy. Maybe it will save a few miserable lardy Tennesseans from dying a little sooner. You know obesity is a health risk too, and from the folks I see out in public there are a lot of lard ass Tennesseans at tremendous health risk due to their ability to access unhealthy fat laden food. I mean really, if the goverment is going to protect us let’s go all the way. Hamburgers aren’t really good for you either, maybe they should be banned. Also, the visual aspect would be improved as there would be fewer ugly fat people to spoil the scenery.

Wake up people, your government is after all your freedoms.

[ed. Adolph obviously doesn't get it. No business owner has the freedom to harm their employees or threaten their safety.]
Frank Moss, JR

Posted October 9, 2007 at 7:58 am | Permalink

“The smoking ban in Tennessee has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with being a nanny-state.”
Right. And up is down, and black is white, and the check is in the mail. It’s ALL about being a nanny state. Phil wants to turn us all into good little proeltariats.
Rajani

Posted October 11, 2007 at 8:18 pm | Permalink

It’s said the smoking ban is about rights? I personally think it’s about removing rights not protecting rights. It’s our american right to smoke if we choose too or choose not too. Resturants, Motels, Hotels, Bars ect… can have two sides to them as they always have had. Smoking and Non-smoking.
They say they are protecting the rights of bartendars, waitresses and such. I think that’s a bunch of BS personally, cause anyone who wants to Bartend knows alot of smoke in the bars, they choose the right to go in there and get the job as does a waitress choose the right to server as a waitress knowing she/he has to serve smokers.
Don’t like the smoke? Then your right is to find a job that doesn’t have the smoke. Instead, non-smokers go off ranting and raving about smokers, or about how it causes cancer, as second hand smoke they breath.
But it’s about Statistics really isn’t it?
Well here are some statistics:
“”The 16,885 fatalities in alcohol-related crashes during 2005 represent an average
of one alcohol-related fatality every 31 minutes”"

I believe it’s my right to drive on the road and know I’m not going to get hit by a drunk driver? but what are they really doing about that?
Or how about this one?
“”Dr Serge Renaud (1998), who also observed that consumption above 2-3 alcoholic drinks/day, significantly increases the risk of cancer”"
Or what about the Diet Factor and eating right? how long before they stop the fast food restaurants from operating cause it caues cancer, or deaths, over weight. Personally think that it’s all coming down to nothing more then the goverment taking our rights away, in such a way that so many agree with them, before they see it hit them between the eyes. Till the goverment takes one of their rights away then and only then will they see it’s effecting them too.

The Truth is, it’s not about saving lives, or about protecting rights, it’s about taking rights away. Nothing they do, now or later is going to stop cancer until they find a cure. Then and only then will it stop cancer.
And those are my thoughts on the whole thing.
And just for anyone interested, do i smoke? I use too. I choose to stop. it was “MY” choice too, not the goverments.
Johnny Autwell

Posted October 21, 2007 at 12:21 am | Permalink

Everyone makes a choice of where they work,eat,live,and it is not the goverments place to make the choice for me. Non smokers say they do not like the smell, well I do not like to look at fat people, so maybe they will put them on a diet, or put a fat tax on them. If you want to ban smoking, then just ban the cigaretts.
College kid

Posted October 25, 2007 at 3:27 pm | Permalink

I’m young, and I really don’t know too much about the government or care too much. I smoke, my parents smoke, my grandparents smoke, you see where I’m going here. At the last family get together we were all conversing over the public smoking ban and my grandparents humorously commented “hell, we ain’t gonna be able to go nowhere now, I guess we’ll save plenty of money to spend on more cigarettes though.” I think everyone should take into consideration what kind of effects the ban will have on business revenues. bars will ultimately sell less booze because even people who don’t smoke regularly like to light up when they’re drinking. These places that you can smoke, the 21 and up places, are going to lose a lot of their customers and workers who are over the age of 18 but under 21. Bars will overcome- within the next year outdoor decking companies are going to be booming, so if you’re looking for somewhere to invest in the stock market…overall this smoking ban just makes me hate the world even more and furthers my view of people as bitchy and selfish. I mean these health risks have always been present, but it seems people suffered a lot less before they slapped surgeon generals warnings all over the plcace. 50 years ago you could smoke anywhere, cartoon characters smoked, people in movies smoked, smoking was the norm. people breathed second hand smoke even more back then, but you never heard of anyone dying from it, just like you never hear about it today, because it’s a crock of shit.
Brian

Posted October 28, 2007 at 2:42 am | Permalink

Well, for once this is so good as the ban will really keep the air quality cleaner. It will be definitely cleaner if even vehicles are banned but I know that’s not really possible with our reliance on them. Well, good with the ban

Brian
Jeffb

Posted May 3, 2008 at 10:41 pm | Permalink

Whenever the smoking ban subject arises someone always raises the issue that bars and restaurants will go belly-up because smokers wont tolerate having their right to smoke revoked for an hour. I used to live in San Luis Obispo, California, which became the first town in the United States to enact a smoking ban. People bitched and moaned and made the very same doomsday prophcies about local bars going bankrupt. But do you know what? It never happened. The bars and restaurants there have thrived, and continue to thrive as they do throughout the state of California…and as they will in Tennessee too. The author is correct, your right to smoke ends at my lungs. If you don’t like it then why not enlist some good old fashioned American engineering know-how and create a completely self-contained smoker’s bubble that can be worn out in public, and you can smoke anywhere all you like. I’d go for that. Why should nonsmokers have to accomodate YOU! What’s so hard about considering how your actions affect somebody else? That’s called morality, bud.

One Trackback

By Volunteer Voters » Smoking Terrorists on October 1, 2007 at 4:05 pm

[...] Jackson Miller rejects the arguments against Tennessee’s smoking ban in enclosed areas by self-styled libertarians. Jackson asserts that your freedom ends at others’ lungs: You want to blow yourself up? Fine. Just don’t blow up a bus full of people at the same time. That makes you a terrorist. [...]

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This is my (Jackson Miller) personal weblog. I have been posting here with varying levels of consistency and authority since 2001. I live in Nashville, TN.
By day I work as a Business Intelligence consultant working with notable clients including several household names. By night I am a husband and a father of 4 boys. Since 2003 I have been a partner in L2M LLC which currently owns two Plato's Closet retail franchises in the Middle Tennessee area (Cool Springs and Murfreesboro). Eventually I will launch statzen, a content analytics tool for bloggers.
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Jackson H Miller | jackson.h.miller@gmail.com
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