Anti-Smokers Stupidly Against Something That Curbs Smoking

The NY Times ran a rather odd story yesterday about how anti-smoking groups are freaking out over e-cigarettes. In case you are unfamiliar with what an e-cig is, they are those things sold from carts at your local mall where a douchey looking guy is standing around “smoking” what looks like a pen colored to resemble a Marlboro. Okay, let’s not be sexist; they are also often staffed by women, who also somehow manage to pull off looking like a douche as well, which is pretty clever.

The smokeless smokes work by holding a little bit of nicotine, which is vaporized and inhaled by the, umm… e-smoker? They have started referring to it as “vaping” which sounds like a 14 year old’s sci-fi fanfic term for smoking instead of something real people use, and it is apparently pissing off anti-smoking people. Now, I get hating smoking; I smoked for almost a decade and I smelled bad, coughed up a lung every morning, and drank like a fish all as part of my habit. I am happy I quit, because I don’t need lung cancer on top of cirrhosis and obesity I have earned from all the fast food I eat and beer I drink.

I get not liking smoking when you don’t; it smells like crap, it hurts your lungs, and spend enough time around inconsiderate douchebags and you too might sport some lovely lung tumors. But vaping? There is no “second hand vapor”, and even if there was, it’s not a carcinogen cocktail like cigarette smoke. Apparently, there is concern that it is a “gateway” to regular smoking. Folks, any kid who picks up a Bic version of cigarette gum to look cool will have the desire to smoke real cigs beaten the hell out of him by kids who’ve been puffing since they were twelve.

Plus the very concept of a “gateway drug” is pretty retarded. Schools teach that pot is a gateway to harder drugs, which I have never seen. I knew plenty of pot smokers in and just out of high school, and all pot lead them to was the Hostess rack at the convenience store. In this case, they are protesting something that early studies suggest can help people quit smoking entirely, or barring that, continue to get the nicotine they are hopelessly addicted to without it killing them. In reality, I think anti-smokers just hate the shit out of other people being happy.

Now should be encourage kids to take this up? Well, no. How about not getting kids addicted to anything? I will tell you this, quitting cheeseburgers is actually harder than quitting smoking. With “vaping” as far as we can tell, it isn’t hurting anyone, so anti smoking, people, maybe you should find something else to be pissed off about than people not-smoking a smokeless cigarette.