Fight the ban, fight for choice
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Rebecca Lowe writes: On behalf of everyone at FOREST, we wish all our friends and supporters a smoker-friendly New Year. If you believe in freedom of choice and want to support our 'Fight the ban, fight for choice' campaign please continue to visit FOREST Online and post your comments on our blogs (The Smoking Room and Smokers Corner).
Most important, MAKE YOUR VOICE HEARD by writing to your MP, local councillor, national and local newspapers - and encourage your friends and family to do the same. In addition, register your support by posting a short response to this post (click on 'Comments').
Friends of FOREST (smokers and tolerant non-smokers) represent the moderate majority but we have to make ourselves heard. Over to you ...
posted by Simon Clark @ 19:25
77 comments
77 Comments:
I am a strong supporter of your belief in the rights of people to live their lives as they see fit within reason and wish you success and support in the year ahead.
I would just like to add my voice to your campaign for a tolerant, choice-based approach to smoking in so-called public places.
I must reveal my vested interest as a smoker and as one who quietly enjoys the habit, if I am honest. However I believe my strongest objection to an outright ban on public smoking is not based on my own incovenience but on the principle of freedom and tolerance of others.
It is on this basis I objected to the outright ban on hunting of foxes. I don't hunt foxes myself and find it somewhat distasteful and whilst I can understand the pleasure of the horses, dogs and
pageantry I'm not convinced a fox should have to die at the end of it all.
However I believe that the ban on hunting foxes represents the creeping agenda of a very vocal minority. If they achieve their objective they will undoubtedly round on shooting and fishing in the same manner until those activities are also banned.
May I also take the opportunity to commend your organisation for putting news stories and
commentary on your website, even when it does not support your own
arguments. I believe that this shows which side of the debate has the least to hide. Keep up your excellent work.
I am very pleased to see that someone is doing something about a very sinister situation - bureaucrats and politicians invading and strangling our everyday life.
Personally I am a non-smoker. My concern is not so much about anti-smoking issues but the idea of governments/pressure groups invading and making decisions about our private lives. What´s next? An outright ban on any form of immoral enjoyment?
I want to take a stand against the banning of smoking in all public places - and every other piece of overweening, over-protective legislation that serves only to restrict our freedom of choice.
This is not just about smoking, it is about our right to be treated as adults. Already our pubs and restaurants are more like nursery schools than places of adult entertainment.
Now we are hearing that the NHS will have the right to refuse to treat people whose lifestyle does not equate to some arbitrary opinion of 'healthy'. First smokers, now the overweight. How long before they start refusing to treat people who have injured themselves playing sport ("it was their choice to play")?
Please keep me informed about your campaign - I don't want to live in a police state!
Just wanted to express my opposition to a total ban. As a smoker I have no problem with no smoking/smoking areas and fail to see why this is "difficult to
police". Most people (even today) in UK can read!
Wishing you well - and for all your work on our civil liberties!
I think the New Year will have to be the time for a huge effort to put across in the media (would they allow it) the extremism and lies of the anti-smoking lobby. Your cartoon is spot on! What's happening in this country?!
As an ex-smoker I am in complete agreement with you that smoking should be a matter of personal choice and that it is undemocratic and unfair to victimise smokers who have now become a minority by banning smoking in all public places.
As an ex-smoker, I am contacting you to express my support for your opposition to a blanket ban of
smoking in public places.
I feel a blanket ban of the type proposed would be a worrying encrouchment into the right of individuals to make up their own minds on what is a personal rather
than a public issue. Good luck with your campaign
Having visited your website for the first time this evening i am heartened to see that your philosophy is more about freedom of choice than encouraging people to smoke at all.
I have smoked for many years and have long worn the 'leper' label. I enjoy smoking, I do not inflict it upon others and never smoke in anyone else's house, nor in my own, but I do enjoy the freedom to smoke in public places, especially pubs and restaurants where I believe smokers have as much right to relax as non-smokers.
I urge you to keep up the campaign to make the government realise that they cannot dictate to us how we choose to spend our disposable income or our disposable time, which, for most of us nowadays, is hard earned. I will be watching the news and visiting your website again.
Having visited your website for the first time this evening i am heartened to see that your philosophy is more about freedom of choice than encouraging people to smoke at all.
I have smoked for many years and have long worn the 'leper' label. I enjoy smoking, I do not inflict it upon others and never smoke in anyone else's house, nor in my own, but I do enjoy the freedom to smoke in public places, especially pubs and restaurants where I believe smokers have as much right to relax as non-smokers.
I urge you to keep up the campaign to make the government realise that they cannot dictate to us how we choose to spend our disposable income or our disposable time, which, for most of us nowadays, is hard earned. I will be watching the news and visiting your website again.
I would just like to register my support for your cause. Keep up the good work.
I totally support your campaign. I am not and have never been a smoker but thoroughly disapprove of the nanny state. The next thing will be to ban alcohol!
I am registering my support as I agree that more no-smoking areas and better ventilation are preferable to an outright ban.
Please continue the good fight to allow those of us who wish/have to smoke to continue to socialise with other like minded people in pubs and clubs at the discretion of the owners of the premises. Slainte mhath!
Please add my name to your protest against a total smoking ban. I am a 74 year old widowed pensioner and a chain smoker. A recent scan showed that my lungs are fine and a blood test gave 'all systems normal'.
I have lived in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus for the past 18 years, and this is a smokers' country - ashtrays on every table in every restaurant, waiters springing forward to light your ciggie, and, as most eating and drinking is done outside, the long-faced European tourists can't complain.
Our local pub has a sign on the inside of a window above a sheer drop - 'No smoking beyond this point'.
I fully support your campaign for freedom of choice in the subject of smoking.
I do think though that the root of the problem lies in our politicians' inability to perform within the terms of a democratic framework.
Our politicians have lost touch with real people. Oh yes, they can cite cases, but only cases put to them by people with an axe to grind. So everybody becomes subjected to laws conceived originally by various pressure groups and professional bodies - so-called experts.
Ultimately, rather than do the will of the people, politicians would rather take the easier path by engineering society to do the will of government, claiming it to be the will of the people, citing clamouring minorities as supporting evidence.
You have my support.
I fully support this effort.
Please continue your efforts!
I agree that more no-smoking areas and better ventilation are preferable to an outright ban and herewith register my support for FOREST's 'Fight For Choice' campaign.
I would like to register my support for your campaign to prevent an outright ban on smoking in public places. I am only an occasional smoker but feel very strongly that people should have a right to choose when and where they smoke. I would naturally support more no-smoking areas and better ventilation for those who don't wish to sit in a smoky room.
An interesting comment from a friend who lives in New York where there is a total ban: instead of being able to smoke in bars and clubs, smokers are now forced to smoke more at home and around their children! Not a great result.
I wish you every success in your campaign.
I pledge my support to your campaign against a ban on smoking.
I would like to register my support for your campaign. We are constantly being told how to live our own lives and this goes one step too far.
I would support a choice of non smoking and well ventilated smoking areas. Is it not about time that our government listens?
Thank you for doing something against these fascists.
We totally support your stand against increasing tyranny.
I am a moderate smoker who enjoys lighting up in pubs and restaurants etc. I totally support the idea of no smoking areas for people who do not wish to smoke but I also think it’s disgraceful the government is considering banning smoking from almost everywhere.
I was in a pub in Bedfordshire recently where the ventilation system was so good you could hardly tell that almost everyone in the pub was smoking. These ventilation systems would be a great way of minimizing the (alleged) effects of passive smoking.
I wish to add my support for your campaign. I am a non-smoker but regret the stifling regulation of our society by self-serving politicians bereft of any true convictions.
I don't womanise. Money is not my god. I go to Church. I don't drink. I don't even drive.
If they're going to be unreasonable in their attempt to bully me into not smoking then I'm afraid they'll have a fight on their hands.
Please record my total support for your campaign. If people want "no smoking" areas the relevant commercial interests will provide them.
I am especially concerned about the fate of small country pubs. These have already been hit by the laws on driving and drinking. They usually make a small profit and survive by serving food, but they also provide a valuable social resource as a place where people can gather for a quiet drink and a chat and - if that is their choice - unwind with a smoke.
Better ventilation would answer many of the objections to smoking.
I support your campaign.
I support choice and totally support oppose a ban on smoking. I have already boycotted two local pubs because they have banned smoking. I am so fed up with the nanny state.
Yes I support your choice campaign. It is completely practical to provide the very necessary safeguards to protect the health of hospitality workers by appropriate extract ventilation.
Yes it will cost, but the market will meet that cost. Entrepreneurs must have the right to test that market in smokers bars. Smokers who have spent any time in New York will have joined the crowds in the few "smoking lounges" that help maintain the diverse cultural life of that city.
Thank you for your continued commitment to sensible freedom from populist legislation.
I support you fully. There should be choice. This Government believes in direction not choice.
In my opinion, it's undemocratic for governments to ban smoking in pubs, clubs and leisure areas.
Licensees should have the option to ban or allow smoking in their establishment. This will allow people the option to choose where to go and enjoy themselves.
As somebody who has never smoked except as a kid in the late 1950's I have no axe to grind. I oppose a total ban on smoking in public places each individual private establishment should have the choice and public places should have rooms set aside, just a bit of good old fashioned tolerance and common sense should prevail.
For too long we have been the puppets of those that think "they know best" and wish to control all aspects of our lives. Let us live our own lives!
I congratulate you as being one of the few groups prepared to stand up for the rights of a minority
who smoke - and for the majority who are being continuously regulated by this government.
Fact: smoking is not an illegal act or substance.
Fact: the dangers of passive smoking are greatly exaggerated to promote the arguments of a minority of non-smoking diehards.
Fact: between 25-30% of the adult population smoke and you, Mr Blair, were elected by the lowest ever popular vote (20% of the electorate). Do you really think you have a mandate to dictate our lives?
Keep the good work up, FOREST. Stop this nonsense.
I am not in favour of a total ban. We should have the right to choose without interference from the government. No smoking areas are perfectly acceptable and give everyone the right to choose.
I think it is all preposterous. We need to have freedom of choice!!
My wife & I fully support your campaign against an outright ban on smoking in public places.
My wife & I fully support your campaign against an outright ban on smoking in public places.
I am now 84 years old. Ever since my birth both my parents smoked, and everyone who visited the house smoked - it was the thing to do in those days.
During my army days, although I never smoked, my colleagues did, and I never shirked going into a pub or restaurant because there were folk smoking. So much for the effect of so-called passive smoking.
What I have always detested is people in a restaurant who light up between courses, and I have never understood why they do it.
So the one caveat I have is that smoking should be banned where food is being served and consumed.
Otherwise, be gone, nanny state.
No to a total ban. Let common sense prevail and allow each establishment to make its own rules.
Mr Blair should remember that more than 25% of the population smoke and he cannot go on antagonising them and not suffer a backlash at the ballot box.
Although I stopped smoking over thirty years ago, I would not impose my views on anybody else and I have no time for those who seek to ban smoking in all public places.
The common sense approach is to create both smoking and non-smoking areas with good ventilation systems. I wish you all the best with your campaign.
We oppose a total ban. Live and let live. Let non-smokers have their own premises/rooms/space, etc. We do not aggravate others with our habit. We take home our stubs to dispose of and respect other peoples' homes.
We would like to point out, though, many smokers give us a bad name for the "butts" dropped in public places.
When I was 12 years old 80% of people smoked, and they smoked everywhere - shops, cinemas, buses, trains etc. Asthma amongst schoolchildren was rare.
Today 20% of people smoke and where they can smoke is severely restricted. The Health Taliban claim the increase in asthma amongst schoolchildren is due to passive smoking!
What has increased exponentially since I was 12 is the number of cars on the road, so once the HT have achieved their goal with smoking will cars be next?
I support your campaign for choice not only because I am a 71 year old smoker but because if the current demand for banning everything continues we will not have a society worth living in.
Keep up the fight.
I, as an adult cigarette smoker, want the right to smoke in public places if I so wish and am totally opposed to a complete ban on smoking in public.
I want register my support for the fight against any form of smoking ban.
I would like to register my support for the right of choice campaign. I fully endorse the notion that no-smokers have a right to breath clean air, but smokers have rights too.
I support choice. Unfortunately, as I live in Scotland, it seems to be a lost cause. I'll have to join the dopeheads on the pavement outside my local!
Please add my name to your campaign for choice.
As a "reformed" smoker I have exercised my right to not smoke. I believe others have a right to waste their money on smoking if they wish to do so and, incidentally, make a huge contribution to the Chancellor's coffers.
I wish to support your campaign, which in part must also be a protest against nanny state always knowing better than we do how to run our lives. Good luck to you.
I wish to register my support of CHOICE- and my opposition to a total ban of smoking in public places - too much like dictatorship
As a non smoker I do not want a ban on smoking but non smoking areas and areas where smokers can have a smoke if they so wish without the do gooders taking away one of their last pleasures in life.
As an ex-smoker I wholeheartedly support your opposition to a total smoking ban. I do not believe that the evidence of the effects of so-called "secondary smoking" are conclusive as all the research does not seem to be impartial.
When will this government realise that certain free thinking people are sick and tired of being told what to do and when to do it.
We seem to be hit each day with new regulations and laws to restrain our freedom by this ever increasingly intrusive social engineering government. New laws, rather than exercising the existing ones, introduced for "health and safety" or "the fight against terrorism". Any guise will do so long as the path of introduction is dressed sufficiently for the masses to accept them.
I do enjoy a cigarette but respect the wishes of other people in my immediate surroundings, many of which have been "engineered" into believing that a smoker is to be deprived of his/her enjoyment because they are an enemy of the environment and some sort of mass murder committing yet another crime.
The world of public buildings seem to be getting more and more unfriendly with signage creating aggressive undertones, signs seem to start with that little word NO followed by parking, smoking, mobile phones, drinking. The words of fines, clamping and police then are used to drive the message home - even smoking a cigarette in my own car on hospital grounds now is outlawed. Yet this same government introduce laws to allow 24hr drinking of alcohol and ease the crime of smoking cannabis?
With the above in mind could it be that the only reason our leaders wish to make smoking an anti social monster is to justify the high taxes levied against it, much the same as speed cameras, in order to fill the treasury coffers.
Whilst I have every desire to respect and act responsibly to non smokers I would ask for consideration from them without the stigma often expressed.
Please continue with your fight to support my freedom of choice and human rights.
It is time that the truth comes out, not spurious ”statistics”. I smoke, yes, but with total consideration to non smokers. Our freedoms are being reduced year by year. Let’s stop it now before the PC brigade kill all truths!
Who's human rights are being infringed here?
The intolerant anti-smokers who may have to put up with what they consider discomfort, or the smokers who they ostracise?
There can hardly be a more convincing display of intolerance than to compel other people to stand outside in all weathers to enjoy their personal pleasure, whilst remaining in the cosy warm to enjoy your own.
I support your campaign against a total ban in public places - but more than that, I would like to see more provision made for smokers. Most smoking areas are crowded when compared to some sparsely populated non-smoking places.
Just a quick note to register my support for businesses to choose whether to be a smoking or non smoking environment - thus giving individuals the choice to choose where they socialise.
I currently will not visit non-smoking pubs, restaurants or clubs. If a total smoking ban comes into place then I will no longer have any choice of
where I go! This must be an infringement on my freedom of choice. Keep up the good work.
I am disgusted at the Government's proposed ban and I am pleased that
somebody has finally made a stand for the smoker. We suffer enough
restrictions as it is. When is there going to be a crackdown on Government crackdowns?
As a non smoker, I support the choice to smoke or not. My brother smokes, a lot of my family smokes.
I am against a total ban on smoking as are most smokers and non smokers I know.
I just want to add my support to your great campaign. Living under this bloody government - "New Labour" - is bringing us ever closer to the Orwellian nightmare of 1984 with every passing day.
Best of luck.
I would like to add my support that we should have a choice and not a ban on smoking in public.
It is time for smokers to stand up to the health fascists. Enough is enough. The anti-smoking brigade won't be happy until smoking is illegal and punishable by fines and imprisonment.
There is a desperate need to get the real facts to the general population to counter the propaganda and scaremongering now being used to turn ordinary people into public enemy number one.
If they are allowed to get away with this England will become a much duller place to live with once lively pubs and clubs closed and boarded. Let's make a stand and stop this attack on our very way of life.
You can bet your bottom dollar that if smokers made up the majority of the population the government would not even begin to entertain smoking bans. They are such a pile of pathetic hypocrites!
This is of course an attempt by the government to garner votes by playing to what it considers to be a popular gallery. However, it is, in fact, going to lose many votes because of this policy and deservedly so. It's usually the little things that get people through life that matter most, you see.
Stick it to 'em Forest
I fully support the fight for choice.
As a smoker myself, all I ask for is to be able to smoke at my local while having a drink. (Not to much to ask you'd think)
I also think it's about time that the media was taken to task for its use of non-proven statistics as fact and the one sided reporting of any smoking story.
I thought that organisations like the BBC were not allowed bias, but I have yet to see a single report from them that gives any pro-smoking view, aside from a few, severly edited, or out of context quotes from Simon Clark.
I fully support the campaign against all out bans.
As a tax paying, law-abiding citizen who just happens to enjoy smoking, I thank FOREST for their ongoing work towards choice-based approach to smoking in public places.
Let market forces dictate what people actually want....not governmental busy-bodies.
I am heartily sick and tired of central government telling me what I can/cannot do, and your stand against the total banning of smoking is to be applauded.
It is high time that our government concentrated on the aspects of running this country that really matter to the majority of our citizens rather than waste time and money by attempting to turn Great Britain into some kind of nanny state or dictatorship.
Please continue the good work you have done so far.
employ people who smoke to work in smoking only pubs. whats the problem.
Dear Forest
PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE TAKE MORE ACTION. Before we know it, they are going to win - we need to fight for our rights not just sit and whinge. I am pasting a copy of a letter I sent to my MP. Can we please encourage more smokers and their supporters to do the same.
Keep up the good work - and more!
Dear Mr Bayley
I have recently heard that there is to be a free vote to try and ban smoking in all public places by MP's. As one of your constituents, I would ask you not to vote for this. This has nothing to do with whether I am a smoker or not, but I feel this one more step towards a nazi state that this government seems intent on imposing on the populace. You have recently brought in 24 hour drinking, thereby saying that alcohol is a good thing (!!!!), yet the next step is to take away the same freedom of choice from smokers.
Commen sense, granted not something this government is over-endowed with, dictates that choice is the option - not lack thereof.
Sixty years ago, my grandfather and yours I presume, were fighting to ensure our freedom. Freedom of thought, word and deed and your government are making a complete mockery of their sacrifice.
The correct way to go - and to lead - is to install more air cleansers. Make more smoking and non-smoking areas available. No-one should force their smoking choice on anyone else, either smokers or non-smokers - so give people the freedom to choose - don't turn this country into a autocracy - give us ALL our freedom of choice!
Yours sincerely
Judith Morris
I wish to register my total support for your campaign to "Fight the ban...". I do so, however, with a heavy heart, as I sense that the fight is already lost. Now that boy Blair has caved in to the shrill sirens of the anti-smoking lobby, through the authoritarian control-groupies on the Labour backbenches, it looks like the draconian ban is coming, and with it will be the end of pub culture as we have long known it in this once great land.
I am an unapologetic life-long smoker, with no desire or intent to give up. Indeed, the more the baying hounds of the anti-smoking fascist lobby try to 'denormalize' me, the stronger becomes my determination to resist and to fight them.
And, I do mean fight!
I think we are past the point where we will win any argument against the outrageous lies about 'passive smoking' - the truth seems to matter nought to our politicians and the media, none of whom seem willing to even listen to our point of view, never mind to hear it.
Similarly, all of the well-reasoned debate about the merits of introducing sensible ventilation systems are only swatted away by the 'antis' who will allow no sensible argument to get in the way of their winning streak.
So I feel that a real fight is the only way to restore sanity (to renormalize the denormalized), and I am willing to take any steps to recover the ground lost through the coming ban. And, yes, if this means participating in mass civil disobedience, I am perfectly willing to do so, given the anger that I currently feel both against the anti-smoking lobby and the supposed 'great and the good' of our establishment.
I must add that I am a normally law-abiding, 50-something, Maths graduate, and have spent my whole working life (so far) in the cause of presentation and analysis of health statistics, both for and within the NHS. So, I don't take this position lightly.
So, what is the future for FOREST? Does it become a languid and diminishing forum for disgruntled smokers to moan about how badly the world is treating them, or does intend to do something?
If the answer is the latter, then count me in. I am ready to give ASH the biggest shock of its miserable existence - is FOREST?
I'd like to register my support for your campaign.
Despite my opinion that the dangers of passive smoking are routinely overstated, I also appreciate that non-smokers have the right to disagree with me. Furthermore, I understand the distaste amongst non-smokers for smoky establishments. Provision of ventilated smoking areas solves this conflict of opinions - insist on better ventilation for smoking areas under law, fine.. (I'm sure the smokers will be happy to pay for it - and we can take our own glasses out if it endangers the staff) - however, none of the anti-smoking lobby seeem remotely interested in compromise solutions that cater to the "rights" and "freedoms" of all parties in the debate, but instead enforcement of opinions that unfortuantely seem rather tinged with a distasteful level of self-righteousness and hysteria.
Support given, emailed MP, mys smoking friends would like to support it too but they have either no computor or knowledge on how to use one can they register their votes on here. Just saw Simon Clark on Anglia late edition in a smoking debate good for him. But how biased in the end when they had three people who were anti-smokers and no smokers in the last debate. Very democratic as usual. How are they allowed to keep exaggerating the passive smoking figures.
I wonder how many air/rail/car trips all these sanctimonious MPs take, contributing to the pollution of our atmosphere. Maybe there's the drip drip effect of cigarettes, but I should imagine it takes a heck of a lot of cigarettes to equate to what comes out of an aeroplane. Not that I'd ban air travel. Yes, I know that smoking is a nasty habit and I know that I should give up for the benefit of my health. But standing on a busy street is bad for my health too. Will the government ban cars? By all means create pedestrian only areas ... limit night flights over residential areas ... encourage more use of the bicycle. It's all about balance. So, why not allow some public places to put up a big sign banning smoking then those poor sensitive souls who can't abide the nasty habit will know where to go. The rest of us can go to all the fun places!
It is an absolute disgrace that smoking has been banned in all public bars etc. Ok non smokers have human rights so DO SMOKERS why should we be marginalised, it is LEGAL, are we going to go the way America went with Prohibition (which was repealed)and Prohibit smoking altogether in the future??
I am completely opposed to this action, and wholeheartedly support this campaign.
I try and live with respect towards animals and yet I have to continually see dead animals and by-products in public places.
Perhaps there should be a new law after this one whereby you can't serve dead animals in public places when I'm trying to smoke. I wonder how successful that would be....mmm...probably not very I would guess!
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