PhilG wrote:
So we bloody well stop them!! What - are you prepared to just sit on your thumbs and let people kill themselves? Are you serious?? If we have a chance to stop people from hurting or killing themselves WE DO IT!!
Christ lets ban, cars, alcohol, junk food, electromagnetic radiation (some links to cancer), and any physical activity that exposes its participants to ultra-violet rays....
I hate smoking and detest it, but everytime the booze and cigarette excise goes up I think of the people at least one standard deviation below the mean in socio-economic status who are disproportionately represented in our population as drug users, alcoholics, obese and smokers those that can least afford it are being asked to pay more.
Yes I know that some of that excise will go to their health care later on but for some of them they just can't quit because a lifetime of addiction to a drug that when they started the habit was socially acceptable neigh even cool, and despite several attempts their reliance on that drug makes them unable to quit.
Christ do we make it an immigration question - with the tobacco companies increasing their marketing to 3rd world countries. Some poor bastard is getting politically persecuted and meets our refugee status and on entry into the country we say sorry you can't come in because you smoke??
I support all atempts and encourage people to give it up but despite societies best efforts some people are just unable to quit an addiction.
I have pesonal experience watching someone try and try repeatedly to give them up even when presented with the strongest motivation but has been unable to do so because of the addictive nature of that drug.
Prohibtion and punitive actions don't work education does.....Especially when punitive actions are most likely going to effect those that don't have the resources or the intelectual forsight to deal with those actions...
Let that be a lesson to you Port, no one beats the Bays five times in a row in a GF and gets away with it!!!