D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban

Posted by: Dignan

D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban - 04/01/2006 20:34

This was a good bit of news in an otherwise awful day for me. I'm sorry that smokers will be put out by this, I really am, but I can't say I'm too upset. My girlfriend was recently diagnosed with asthma, and it's really pretty bad for her when we're in smoking spaces. For me it's just highly annoying. We go to small clubs to see local bands all the time (my best friends' band plays a lot), and sometimes it gets really bad. Sometimes I'm suprised the smokers can take the air in these places.

Anyway, I just wanted to share. I wasn't sure if we had discussed the bans in other cities here before. How do you New Yorkers feel about it? Any smokers happy? Any non-smokers upset?
Posted by: msaeger

Re: D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban - 04/01/2006 21:17

I find smoking repulsive but it's pretty ridiculous how the government keeps banning smoking from everyplace while still depending on the revenue generated by taxing tobacco.

Minneapolis banned smoking in all bars and resturants a little while ago. The bars complained about losing money because the smokers went to bars in other areas that did not have the ban. Also some bars closed. They are now talking about allowing smoking in bars but not resturants.

I like watching live music but drunks are as annoying as smoking so getting rid of the smoking doesn't make me want to go more.
Posted by: robricc

Re: D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban - 04/01/2006 21:40

Quote:
How do you New Yorkers feel about it?

It has become a part of life at this point it seems. I thought people would just revolt and smoke anyway at first. It doesn't seem that ever happened. The only place people still smoke like they don't care is at mid-size concert venues... the types of places a band like Staind would play.

I'm not a heavy smoker, so it's not a problem for me really. Even when you could smoke in restaurants, I never sat in the smoking section. I will say that I've only gone to a bar to drink a handful of times since the ban though. Previously, I went drinking with my friends pretty regularly.
Posted by: SE_Sport_Driver

Re: D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban - 04/01/2006 23:25

I'm not a smoker and I hate being around smoke.

However, I think this is bull. People should be allowed to do what they want unless I'm in a place where I can't escape it (airplanes, movie theaters, etc). I support bars that voluntarily are smoke free, but they often don't do well in the Detroit area. That probably says something about the demand for such a thing.

If the decision is made by a property or business owner, I support it. But I don't support actions like this by government. This is an actual, not conceptual, civil rights issue that directly effects millions of people daily in their lives but other than libertarians, I never hear a peep from "civil liberties" activists about this.

The one exception I'd support (at first glance anyway) is banning smoking around children. I get so pissed when I see a mother smoking in a car with the windows up while she has two kids in the back. But I imagine enforcement would be impossible and where would government draw the line? Would speeding then be child endangerment too?

Is this stuff ever put up to a vote?

Oh well, I guess there is nothing I can do about it. I just hope they don't come after whiskey and vodka drinkers.
Posted by: wfaulk

Re: D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban - 04/01/2006 23:28

How can you escape it more in a bar than in a movie theater?
Posted by: Laura

Re: D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban - 05/01/2006 00:01

Another city I won't visit again.
Posted by: robricc

Re: D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban - 05/01/2006 00:12

Quote:
How can you escape it more in a bar than in a movie theater?

You can drink at home just as effectively (and cheaper).
Posted by: adavidw

Re: D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban - 05/01/2006 00:52

Quote:
This is an actual, not conceptual, civil rights issue...


Which one is the civil rights issue? The right of a business owner to dictate what happens on their property? Or are you saying that smoking in public is one of our fundamental civil rights?
Posted by: msaeger

Re: D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban - 05/01/2006 01:01

Quote:
The right of a business owner to dictate what happens on their property?


I say this one.
Posted by: jimhogan

Re: D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban - 05/01/2006 01:20

Quote:
Minneapolis banned smoking in all bars and resturants a little while ago. The bars complained about losing money because the smokers went to bars in other areas that did not have the ban. Also some bars closed. They are now talking about allowing smoking in bars but not resturants.

They had a few false starts here in Washington State including a county-wide ban in Pierce County (Tacoma) that were reversed under pressure. Then anti-smoking forces wised up and went for a state-wide referendum. Game over.

The ban won handily, took effect December 8 and public indoor smoking has disappeared with nary a whimper. I went to a bar last evening with 5 friends (a school night!) and we all rejoiced. The owner (who we know pretty well) seems relieved -- no more bitching from people like us and to the smokers he can say "Sorry! I didn't do it".

From the standpoint of effectiveness, the state-wide bans have been a great success. No decent counterattacks, legal or otherwise. So if committed smokers *really* can't live without indoor smoking, you might want to start planning that move to Raleigh or Vegas.

I have met smokers who profess to *really* want to smoke forever -- one guy who fulfilled a promise to his wife to quit smoking for 5 years. Actually, he was at the four-year mark when I met him, and he said "When my 5 years are up, I'm smoking!" he couldn't wait.

I think that guy is really the exception, though. Most smokers would pay some dough if you could wave a magic wand and make them not addicted. I think the public health effect of this progression of state-wide bans will be quite salutory. Smoking with a lower profile, less prominent, less integrated socially, less convenient, probably fewer people wishing for a magic wand.

So while I kinda feel bad for the few folks standing in the drizzle in the sidewalk last evening, I had a much nicer time at a place that I had often begged off on, and I think their children will be thankful.

Twenty years ago you could duck into the very small conference room smack in the middle of a 10-bed ICU (ventilating many emphysema patients!) and have a smoke. No more. the march of progress.
Posted by: gbeer

Re: D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban - 05/01/2006 02:38

In Calif. it was tackled as an occupational hazard to be mitigated. Bar/diner/whatever workers were not to be exposed to second hand smoke.

Regulations will get you just a surely as legislation.
Posted by: Redrum

Re: D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban - 05/01/2006 12:15

I’m a non-smoker and my thoughts are:

«» Smokers are getting the shaft
«» This is one more law in a country with too many
«» Smoking is a terrible habit that will shorten your life and reduce your quality of life
«» Second hand smoke for is not a good thing
«» People should be able to do what they want as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else.

To me it seems like other things could be done besides a ban. Maybe smoking areas (bars, restaurant, etc..) could have better ventilation to remove second hand smoke (I know, probably would have to be another law). Perhaps people could respect each other a little more. Smokers could refrain from blowing smoke in the face of non-smokers and diehard non-smokers could lighten up a little bit and not have a fit when they slightly smell cigarette smoke. .
Posted by: SE_Sport_Driver

Re: D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban - 05/01/2006 12:24

Quote:
How can you escape it more in a bar than in a movie theater?


I guess when I go to a bar, it's under the assumption that my clothes will smell like smoke when I get home. It just comes with the territory and I take it as part of my choice when I decide to go to a bar or not. I know a lot of people that only have a smoke when they are having a drink and I don't see a reason to deny them that. If it bugs me, I can go to a smoke free bar or to a restaurant that has a bar. I just see it as more appropriate in a bar than in a theater.

EDIT: (Added this instead of spamming the thread w. multiple posts.) My guess is that this will not lead to people quitting smoking (as implied or hoped for). It will instead lead to a large group of people not going to bars, restaurants or concerts anymore.

Imagine some dingy bar on the wrong side of the tracks. You have all these patrons, the workers and the owner wanting to let everyone have a smoke with their beer but they aren't allowed to because some people who will never ever visit that bar, even if it's smoke free, decided they don't like when someone smokes within 20 feet of them. Something just seems wrong.
Posted by: tman

Re: D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban - 05/01/2006 12:42

Quote:
Maybe smoking areas (bars, restaurant, etc..) could have better ventilation to remove second hand smoke

That'll be quite difficult unless you have a whole section sealed off from the rest of the bar/restaurant. Recently I was in Toronto visiting friends and a bar we went to had a glass wall partition between the main bar and the smokers section. Another solution would be a cone of silence
Posted by: Redrum

Re: D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban - 05/01/2006 12:51

I loved the cone of silence, that was great.

I just remember when I went to Vegas a couple years ago I was amazed at how smoke free many of the large casinos were when half the people were smoking. They have some killer ventilation systems. Seems like zoning laws could be setup so that if you wanted to allow smoking you would have to install ventilation to remove the smoke like the casinos do. In the long run it might even help their business.
Posted by: wfaulk

Re: D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban - 05/01/2006 14:27

Quote:
So if committed smokers *really* can't live without indoor smoking, you might want to start planning that move to Raleigh

Raleigh's been fairly smoke-free for years. Not completely, but much more so than you might imagine based on the image of NC as a tobacco state. You can smoke in bars, and restaurants are required to have a separate non-smoking section at least 1/3 the size of the restaurant if they want to allow smoking. But, by and large, it's pretty easy to avoid smoke unless you want to go to a bar. The only place like that I go regularly is a music venue and smoking is banned there (or would be if it were in Raleigh, but the law seems to be the same in Carrboro), and it's a godsend.
Posted by: Mataglap

Re: D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban - 05/01/2006 16:39

Coming home from the Black Cat lor Nation and not having to deal with stale smoke on clothes or hair is a pretty appealing possibility, however it happens.

--Nathan
Posted by: jimhogan

Re: D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban - 05/01/2006 19:43

Quote:
Raleigh's been fairly smoke-free for years. Not completely, but much more so than you might imagine based on the image of NC as a tobacco state.

Now that I hear you say it, I think you have made this point previously in response to my incorrect tobacco state generalizations. My bad.

Well, guess it's Vegas, then.
Posted by: JeffS

Re: D.C. Council Approves Smoking Ban - 05/01/2006 22:12

Quote:
Maybe smoking areas (bars, restaurant, etc..) could have better ventilation to remove second hand smoke (I know, probably would have to be another law).
In fact, this was exactly the way the law is in San Antonio- resturants can have a smoking section, but it has to be ventilated so that the smoke doesn't get into the rest of the resturant. Practically this means very few resturants still have smoking there, but there are some.

I remember when this first happened thinking that it wasn't right for the government to force resturant owners policy, but that it was certainly a lot nicer to go out and eat.