I have always said that I don't like government intervention in things that don't concern them. One of my biggest pet peeves is smoking bans. If a person owns an establishment and he/she prefers for WHATEVER reason to allow smoking (even if it is designed to DECREASE the family atmosphere), that is their right. It is, after all, their private property. Conversely if another person owns a similar establishment and decides for health, economic or astrological reasons that they don't want smoking... even better. They have also made a choice in how to administer their property.
Now as consumers/customers we all have a choice. Do we want to keep the status quo and go to a place that is more open to whatever it's patrons would like to do there or do we want to frequent a location that has been proactive in eliminating what most people see as a disgusting habit? You can even lobby the smoking establishment to change it's rules to make itself more friendly to health conscious patrons. Those are acceptable choices. To go run to mommy (aka big government) and tattle on establishment #1 is a 5 year old's mentality. The bottom line is this....
Talk with your pocket book!
Support places that have the environment that you like and refuse to give another dime to those who you don't. I don't want a pedicure, so guess what? I don't frequent nail salons!
That bring me to our date. We went downtown CS for a little Josh and John's followed by a stroll. As we walked I recalled that I had been looking for a pub or tavern that shows Premiership football early on weekends. I figured that the first check should be with Jack Quinn's, the most popular/trendy place in CS of supposed Irish extraction.
We walked in the door to ask the hostess if they showed the games and if they had a schedule of those they would be airing. She looked at us and before I could ask my very simple and reasonable question, she abrasively told me that we would have to throw our ice cream away. Not "we don't allow outside food here" or even more informative "the health code says that you can't bring in food from outside," which I later learned is the case.
Understanding that servers sometimes are very busy and tempers can get short, I explained that I just had a quick question and we'd be on our way. Before I could continue, yet ANOTHER person (I think the manager) proceeded to jump into our conversation and told me that I wasn't allowed in with outside food (not the food wasn't allowed... I wasn't allowed) in an equally obnoxious tone - still never explaining that there was a health code issue involved.
To add insult to injury, this employee (the first one) of a purportedly Irish-style pub looked at me like I was syphilitic when I DARED ask about something so boorish and uncultured as sport... even one beloved by Irish people.
So..... I am voting with my pocketbook. JACK QUINNS will not get a cent of my money... ever.
The nice hostess outside JOSE MULDOON'S kindly explained that bringing in outside food is indeed a violation of the health code and for that nicety, they will be getting my mealtime business when I am downtown.
Despite this, Sarah and I had a nice walk in the beautiful Colorado evening. It turned out to be a nice affordable date night with only a touch of "aggro."
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I agree -- boycott Jack Quinn's. Rude people get no money from me either.
ReplyDeleteOn the smoking thing, not a chance. Forget for a moment the people who just go to eat there [that you can call a choice], but allowing smoking in restaurants is a health hazard for the people working there. You can't force a person who needs a job to put their health, cost of cleaning clothes, etc on the line because some ass decides that their right to smoke presumptively trumps everyone else's right not to.
I have asked people to come up with another habit that, when done by one person, automatically affects the people within their proximity. No one has been able to come up with a single other habit, so maybe the readers of your blog can be the geniuses to that end.
People who insist on smoking inside public facilities are like people who cut you off on the freeway -- they are so convinced that what they want to do, or where they want to go, is more important than anything else.
I have ruffled a lot of feathers with my strong stand on that, but tough. If people want to free base heroin while sitting on a bar stool next to me, feel free. If you want to systematically poke yourself with a dull knife, poke away. Shoot yourself in the thigh with a loaded .38. But don't puff on your cheap fiberglass and blow your carcinogenic smoke in my direction. We have laws against driving drunk to protect other people, and preventing smoking inside is in the same vein -- hardly a raging example of over-regulation.
Full disclosure -- I smoke cigars on a rare basis, but you can bet I don't do it inside, or any other place where it affects other people.
Whew.
PS -- In case it got lost in my rant, I support the organized boycott of Jack Quinn's, and I don't even know where it is.
I have decided to break my streak of not commenting on my own post.
ReplyDeleteI repeat, it's your choice to sit next to heroin junkies, dull knife wielders, suicidals or smokers.
The thing with workers in a smoking establishment is that they hired on with the full knowledge of that situation. It isn't like when they started there was no smoking and the bar decided to implement a mandatory smoking program. If you don't want to work in a uranium mine, as a bomb squad member or a waitress at Smokin' Joe's Tavern... DON'T!
In fact, this further supports my free-market thesis. The work force can talk with their feet by either demanding more money to work in a hazardous environment (like crab boat workers and deep sea divers) or even better, just don't work there. Then only smokers or those with iron lung insurance will work at those establishments and more place might decide it's more cost effective to ban smoking themselves. Either way everyone wins... including the constitution.
I challenge you prove to me that people who smoke in front of a building cause more damage to the public (in a real, not aesthetic sense) than city bus exhaust, people who fart in airplanes or janitors who forget to put up "wet floor" signs. That 2 seconds of holding your breath when you walk past a smoker isn't life threatening. Even momentarily breathing it in isn't appreciably more toxic than the rest of the crap we city folk breath on regular basis.
Either way it's bad policy and a bad precedent in the arena of individual rights.
So I wrote a great response involving words like asbestos and commenting how I don't choose to sit next to people who smoke, but I shouldn't be subjected if they sit next to me. Tragically, it would appear that it didn't appear here. It answered the issues Matt pointed out very astutely, but since it didn't post for whatever reason, and I don't have the time to recreate it, folks will just have to trust me.
ReplyDeleteI will retype the fact that the option of not working somewhere is easy to talk about when you have never had to make a choice between your health and a job. I wouldn't want to stand on that high horse with some people I know who have had to do that because that would make me a fool. Additionally, claiming that regulations that attempt to keep people safe isn't exactly a precedent I fear -- unless drunk driving should be allowed as well.
Again, if anyone can come up with another habit/inconvenience/whatever that has the exact combination of variables that smoking in an enclosed public place has, I am all ears. Until then, the slippery slope doesn't look real steep to me.
Now when you say the choice between your health and your job you are of course referring to the job that a person took in an establishment that allows smoking. We aren't talking about people who are surprised by smoke at their place of work. They APPLIED for a position at said establishment.
ReplyDeleteI might reconsider the validity of that argument if we are dealing with a person who has zero possibilities for employment in a non-smoking environment but I don't think that a person like that really exists. If you can serve at a smoking restaurant, you can serve at a non-smoking restaurant. Apply at the ones which fit your particular health habits. There are plenty of smoking bartenders and waitresses to employ at the aforementioned Smokin' Joe's.
I never mentioned a slippery slope but since it's come up, here is that slope. There are now also efforts to limit people smoking in their cars and in their homes. If the government can tell people what unhealthy habits they are prohibited from enjoying by themselves in their own home then we truly have a slope.
I have no love for cigarette smoke but I am a big fan of the rights of person choose what LEGAL activities they can engage in on their own private property - whether that be a bar, restaurant or their home.
Sometimes in a free society we must stand on principle even when it is inconvenient. Unfortunately in order for us to have freedom of expression, the Klan must be allowed to have their filthy parades.
Wow, some thoughs:
ReplyDelete1) You both have valid points.
2) Jack Quinn's is obviously a pom.
3) One's right to expression of self ends at the nose of the person in closest proximity - this includes smoking AND...
4) ...Lack of personal hygiene (for you Tammi, another habbit that directly effects others in close proximity - and a legal one at that).
5) I love to read siblings argue, it takes me back home, sometimes your your home as well...
I am getting the impression that I am being misunderstood.
ReplyDeleteWhile it is legal to smoke, I am not arguing for the rights of smokers in a privately owned location, I am arguing for the rights of the OWNER of that location to encourage (think cigar club), allow or ban smoking according to his whim, without being imposed upon legislatively by people who are not being forced to be in his establishment.
sorry about your bad experience at jack quinn's! bummer! i commented back but on my site, i thought about commenting here but it seemed out of place.
ReplyDeletebest! mkk
Politicians have this way of thinking that if a little bit of something is good then a lot of that thing should be great.
ReplyDeleteYou see it in the excesses of Afirmative Action, and you see it in Smoking Bans.
I agreed with the early smoking bans in offices and on airplanes.
I think that social areas like bars and restaurants should be allowed to chose their environment. I enjoy smoking the occassional cigar, especially with a glass of a fine Single Malt Scotch Whiskey while listening to jazz is a smokey gin joint. People can choose to patronize such places or not. People can choose to work in such places or not.
I think outdoor smoking bans are ludicrious. Whether I like the smell of cigarette smoke or cigar smoke or not, its not any threat to me, just an annoyance. No more or less annoying than screaming babies, or people with bad breath or body odor or flatulence. None of which are illegal.
Sometimes we, as a society, go to far in trying to protect each other from things we dont' like just because we dont' like them.
Hey Walt! Our resident lib has come in from the cold. Hahahah!
ReplyDeleteJust when I thought we might find common ground within the fam, I have to bring up smoking bans. Oh well. I know Tammi's take on this and respect it because of the spirit in which she arrives at that conclusion.
One of these days I'll have to come up with a topic where we can all agree.