Smoking: Still Healthier Than Fascism
Michigan has been on the tobacco-offensive lately, raising the per-pack tax from a slapping a stupendously regressive 2500% tax on roll-your-own tobacco, and they’d like to be the next in a growing line of States to ban smoking in bars and restaurants.
The policy debate about “workplace smoking bans” in Michigan has been on the radar here at No Third Solution for the last few years (see my posts from 5/08, 12/07, 8/06). So far, it’s gone nowhere, but the Demopublicans in Lansing are inching closer to a compromise that would (fortunately) exempt most tobacco/specialty shops, but would apply to all bars and restaurants, but would exempt the Detroit casinos.
Some House Democrats won’t support a smoking ban unless Detroit casinos are exempt, fearing that tribal casinos not subject to the state law could gain a competitive advantage.
It is so absurdly short-sighted to suggest that the tribal casinos would gain a competitive advantage, all-the-while ignoring the fact that right now some restaurants (the management/ownership of which have chosen to go smokefree) will lose that competitive advantage the moment a ban is enacted.
There is no shortage of smokefree places to eat, drink or play. The casinos already have non-smoking Poker rooms (and probably other game rooms, too.) Ninety-nine percent of franchise fast-food restaurants are smoke free and have been for years (voluntarily). Nearly every independent deli is smoke free. Plenty of diners and upscale restaurants have also made the move, and smoking is not permitted inside any of the major sport venues.
With that in mind, you’d think the “small-government” Republicans might be opposed to the ban. And you’d be wrong. Spokesmen for the Senate Republicans argue that since “consumer demand [is] already…creating smokefree options” that,
[I]f there is a ban, it should be a complete ban… “A level playing field for everyone is the only fair course to chart.”
Right now, any restaurant or bar owner can choose whether to make his or her restaurant smokefree, or smokefull. The playing field is level. What makes (or would make) the playing field less-than-level is government intervention. Rather than recognizing this objective and painfully obvious fact, ending once-and-for-all the “discussion” about whether government has any business regulating the affairs of individuals, in their individual and voluntary capacities, government decides to stay the course, and as a result, more government intervention should apply in order to rectify the injustices brought about by government intervention. Epic. Fucking. Fail.
This is fairness and equality of the Harrison Bergeron strain: it’s not unfair if we cripple everyone.
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Coming from one of the smoking ban states (WA state), I can't agree more with this post. When the ban came up here, there were three major issues that were brought up:
1) Smoking in areas where children will be subject to it.
2) Smoking as it effects employees of venues where it's allowed.
3) The ethereal idea that somehow non-smokers have been avoiding bars for years, and would come out in droves once the ban was in place.
These are all ridiculous arguments.
1) Why would you as a parent take your child somewhere that smoke is prevalent? Do we need the government telling us how to parent? When smoking was allowed in bowling alleys here, for example, I knew a ton of parents who would simply find other activities for their children, and no one seemed to care about it (otherwise, some enterprising bowling alley owner would have long since opened a 'family friendly' bowl aimed at all those supposedly displaced families).
2) The argument that smoking should be banned for the sake of employees is ridiculous to me. Hey, maybe you shouldn't work at a bar/bowling alley/etc if you are worried about it. Or if you are somehow specialized in that profession, go work at a place that DOESN'T offer smoking (there have always been lounges that don't allow smoking, for example). The argument from the employees themselves of "we don't make as much money at those places" is just patently crap to me. Hey, guess what, the window washer outside my work (hanging from climbing gear from 22 stories) gets paid more than the guy washing windows at street level BECAUSE HE ACCEPTS THAT THE RISKS ARE WORTH THE REWARD.
3) As for the idea that these non-smokers will somehow come out in droves, I've yet to see evidence of that. In my experience, people who are inclined to go out drinking at a bar didn't care about smoking — and those who do care aren't that inclined to go out anyway. In the meantime, the ban has sent cigar bars to close, martini bars to lose a ton of business, and has driven UP the business at tribal casinos unfairly (since they are exempt from the ban).
Of course Seattle is always leading the pack in these things — after all, we banned lap dances at strip clubs too.
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Although I may be selfishly happy when I am in a state or city where smoking is banned in public places, I am at the same time extremely sad. I really do not believe the government should have the right to tell a private business owner what they can and can not do…AT ALL. The market will take care of itself.
What's ironic, IMO, is that no government (to my knowledge) has banned smoking in public, i.e., on the sidewalk/roads, which the government arguably "owns." If the government has any legitimate interest in banning smoking (and I submit that it does not), it would have that interest only on truly "public" property. Bars and restaurants do not qualify.
But yeah, the problem is that most people are either apathetic, or selfishly unbothered by these advancements. It's the same with gay rights or a lot of things; a lot of people say "It doesn't affect me, so I don't care," and that's how it starts…
Yeah, sometimes it is very difficult to get people to see that things like banning smoking in a privately owned business or banning gay marriage is setting a precedence for more legislative actions. Next they will be banning smoking in the home. Legislators don't want to risk children's healths, right?
With less and less people really caring (i.e. voting for their true beliefs, taking a strong stand against improper government actions), more and more extreme people will take office and will use these already extreme cases as the basis for their legislative proposal.