Alcyon
Well-Known Member
I'm quickly approaching my fortieth year of using tobacco: cigarettes, cigars, especially the pipe, snuff, dip, snus; if I haven't consumed a particular product, I've probably used something quite like it. I do, however, marvel at how things have changed (mostly for the better) in regards to tobacco use; forty years ago, who would ever have imagined a doctor not smoking his pipe in a hospital, or people not smoking while on an airplane...the list is endless.
At this point, beating people over the head with facts about what tobacco use can do is just silly, mildly offensive, and counter-productive. Tobacco isn't good for my health? No sh--! Cancer doesn't just run in my (non-smoking) family, it gallops; I've seen six members die from it. But there are a lot of ways to die, not many of them are particularly pleasant, and unless I choose suicide or assisted-death, I don't get to choose how I go.
As with any addiction, given that the addict is often very aware of the negative consequences of their addiction, it's always both interesting and useful to ask what is the addict getting from their usage? That's a (largely subjective) discussion for another thread.
I don't unreservedly defend tobacco use, particularly cigarettes. But I find that simple "yeas" or "nays" aren't particularly illuminating or constructive. Not too very long ago, while I was waiting to find out the nature of a lump that I had, I reflected upon all the things I have done or am still doing that leave me prone to developing cancer: I was okay with it all. Whether as a troubled teenager living on the street taking some measure of comfort in hand-rolled cigs, or as an adult sitting down to a cup of coffee and a pipe of good tobacco in the middle of a long, hard day of work, tobacco has added, in many ways, to the quality of my life. As to what effect it will have on the quantity of my life, well, I won't know until it's over will I?
At this point, beating people over the head with facts about what tobacco use can do is just silly, mildly offensive, and counter-productive. Tobacco isn't good for my health? No sh--! Cancer doesn't just run in my (non-smoking) family, it gallops; I've seen six members die from it. But there are a lot of ways to die, not many of them are particularly pleasant, and unless I choose suicide or assisted-death, I don't get to choose how I go.
As with any addiction, given that the addict is often very aware of the negative consequences of their addiction, it's always both interesting and useful to ask what is the addict getting from their usage? That's a (largely subjective) discussion for another thread.
I don't unreservedly defend tobacco use, particularly cigarettes. But I find that simple "yeas" or "nays" aren't particularly illuminating or constructive. Not too very long ago, while I was waiting to find out the nature of a lump that I had, I reflected upon all the things I have done or am still doing that leave me prone to developing cancer: I was okay with it all. Whether as a troubled teenager living on the street taking some measure of comfort in hand-rolled cigs, or as an adult sitting down to a cup of coffee and a pipe of good tobacco in the middle of a long, hard day of work, tobacco has added, in many ways, to the quality of my life. As to what effect it will have on the quantity of my life, well, I won't know until it's over will I?
