Smoking bans in bars & restaurants - fair?

Restaurants--absolutely fair.

Bars--at first I was more inclined to say why bother, no one's going to a bar to be healthy. but then i thought of the people who have to work there all the time, so yeah it's probably fair then too although not as clear-cut.

Can someone please explain the difference between public and private places of business?

People are now saying that a bar is a public place. But how can that be if the bar can choose whether or not you get to enter (based on any number of criteria - dress, cost, desirable male to female ratio?)

A bar is a public place just like any restaurant or the movies theater ..which also has rules about dress (shoes and shirt required). They can have rules and still be a public place…

A private club might be the VFW or American Legion halls

I'm pretty sure that smokers (at least in NY) carry more than their financial weight. They pay roughly $2.50 in taxes per pack!!!

Say they smoke a pack a day seven days a week.

Thats $17.50 per week. $910 per year. Say they smoke for 30 years, thats $27,300 total. And considering that you really can't prove that cigerettes CAUSE cancer, you really can't bitch about having to subsidize them, espically considering that we all engage in unhealthy behaviors that may end up costing money in the long run.

A bar is a public place just like any restaurant or the movies theater ..which also has rules about dress (shoes and shirt required). They can have rules and still be a public place…

A private club might be the VFW or American Legion halls

$27,300 will get you about a one week stay in the hospital. You think the average smoker with cancer spends only one week in the hospital?

And if lawyers can't sue docs for being negligent, expect that price to rise. eeeeek!

" fewer avenues to help them quit"

cold turkey costs nothing and doesn't take a lot of smarts to follow the program

yes, smoking should be banned. the damn smell of smoke is awful to get out of my clothes. thank God i live in a city that bans those deviants outside (and in the cold right now..ha!) where they belong....not stinking up my clothes and infringing upon my breathing.

health wrote:

Restaurants--absolutely fair.

Bars--at first I was more inclined to say why bother, no one's going to a bar to be healthy. but then i thought of the people who have to work there all the time, so yeah it's probably fair then too although not as clear-cut.

Where are these bars that force people to work? I thought people had to apply at these places, I didn't know they "have to work there all the time". In my area people go out and try to get the jobs they want, I sure hope this place where people are forced to work in bars is a long way from me, it sounds very scary!

This isn't logical thinking. Just because it is a private business, doesn't mean it "makes the rules."

It isn't illegal to have a dirty kitchen or a dirty bathroom, but a restaurant can't have them. It is because of Public Health. It is a public place and they have to operate a place that is healthy for the PUBLIC.

Maturbation isn't illegal in your own house, should I be allowed to do it wherever I want? Whenever I want?

It isn't hurting anyone is it?

Brent wrote:

[quote]Liberty guy wrote:

A smoking ban is just one of dozens (maybe hundreds) of public regulations with which that owner must comply. Just to name a few: if the restaurant owner wants to pay his dishwashers $3/hr and the dishwashers are voluntarily willing to work for that wage, the owner is prohibited from entering into that private contract because of minimum wage laws.

Okay 'Mr. Gradgrind'... And why don't we also go back to sweat shops of england 19th century England. 12 - 14 hours of work a day for barely a living wage. And if you don't like it... you fired and they will hire someone else.

Nay Sayer wrote:

And considering that you really can't prove that cigerettes CAUSE cancer,

Might want to check your facts there. You should be able to find some info in medical journals that will back me up (I'm just going off the top of my head). At the molecular level, DNA adducts can be formed by smoking. If not repaired by the cell's DNA repair mechanisms, they can be misread during DNA replication and lead to mutations, ultimately causing -- CANCER. There's also a bunch of correllational data out there supporting the cigarette and lung cancer cause and effect.

Then there's the whole vascular disease aspect of things, too (i.e. atherosclerosis). In addition to the standard heart attacks we all hear about (probably costing near or more than $27,300 when all's said and done), there's also the less publicized peripheral vascular disease--potentially costing you your legs (or a stroke, or renal failure) if it's advanced enough. And I believe just about any interventional cardiologist or vascular surgeon will tell you right away that smoking is a contributor. It's pretty interesting to see angiograms (basically an X-ray) on some smokers--whereas they normally need a contrast dye to see arteries (otherwise they don't show up well), some are so heavily calcified that you can see them almost as clearly as bone.

step up wrote:

" fewer avenues to help them quit"

cold turkey costs nothing and doesn't take a lot of smarts to follow the program

Least successful method too.

Smokers are gross- I dated a smoker and she tasted like an old toilet seat.

Yeah but was she hot?

And how do you know what an old toilet seat tates like..

Millertime? wrote:

And if lawyers can't sue docs for being negligent, expect that price to rise. eeeeek!

I hope you're being sarcastic. The reason health care costs so much is because of people suing docs for millions over "pain and suffering." So all those people with no health insurance can thank those who sued the docs when it turned out the doc wasn't a miracle worker.

how often are you guys seriously bothered by secondhand smoke? how many times in 2006 has it been a serious disturbance to you and a threat to your health?

stoutchemist wrote:

Millertime? wrote:

And if lawyers can't sue docs for being negligent, expect that price to rise. eeeeek!

I hope you're being sarcastic. The reason health care costs so much is because of people suing docs for millions over "pain and suffering." So all those people with no health insurance can thank those who sued the docs when it turned out the doc wasn't a miracle worker.

Geez, you're both wrong. The reason health care costs so much is because people are unhealthy and because people abuse their health insurance. They had a show on last night about robotic surgery for prostate cancer. They said it was ridiculously expensive and offered few benefits to traditional treatment. Then they interviewed a guy that had it done and he said, "I don't care what it costs, I have insurance." So that a-hole basically ran up a huge hospital bill that everyone has to split now through increased insurance premiums. That happens a lot more often than frivolous lawsuits. And doctors like it, because they get paid more for doing these expensive procedures.

A personal example. I hurt my wrist in an indoor soccer game. I went to the doctor and she examined it and said it was probably nothing, but she wanted to do an x-ray and some other tests. I asked her how much that stuff cost. And she told me a couple hundred dollars. I said, "You're pretty sure it's nothing, but you want to flush $200 down the drain?" I left and just like her examination predicted, it was nothing and got better in a couple weeks.

These are just small things that happen millions of times each year and nobody thinks about them and they are why our stupid health care costs are so expensive.

Oh, and on topic, establishment owners should be able to decide if they want to allow smoking or not. Patrons have a choice of whether or not to go there. If patrons really cared, there would be a huge market for smoke-free bars and restaurants and they would already exist.