Offensive on all fronts
The list of places where smoking is banned is expanding at an alarming rate. The authorities of many countries do not even hide what they want to achieve: that smoking should be allowed only at home. However, even in one's own home, a smoker should not feel safe. If smoke escapes from his apartment and reaches a non-smoking neighbor, the latter has the right to sue and punish the poisoner with a large fine. Such a law was passed in the American state of Maryland back in 2001. The fine is $750.
Maryland's example will surely be followed by other states, and then by countries. In Europe, the USA, Japan and Cuba, smokers are being systematically and ruthlessly pushed out of public places and streets. "Passive smoking kills thousands of New Yorkers every year. Inhaling smoke increases the risk of heart attacks and strokes!" – this is how in 2002 New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg appealed to non-smokers, who were supposed to appreciate the law banning smoking in New York bars and restaurants. Smokers' opinions, of course, were not asked, and they had nothing to object. After all, according to the mayor, over an eight-hour working day, a bartender's lungs receive as many carcinogens as when smoking a pack of cigarettes. Bloomberg had already banned smoking in other public places, and increased the cigarette tax by $1.5 per pack, so that its price rose on average to $7.
New Yorkers had become adept at ordering tobacco products over the Internet and by mail, but the mayor quickly caught on and punished customers with large fines. Himself a former heavy smoker, Bloomberg appears to have decided to make the fight against bad habits his life's work.
Positive discrimination
"Smokers need not apply" – this is the announcement that the World Health Organization posted on its website for job applicants. "All calls for a healthy lifestyle made in tobacco smoke turn into a farce," the WHO leaders said in explaining their action.
Tobacco addiction is increasingly affecting business careers today. Most American and European companies are unwilling to pay for their employees' smoke breaks. Meanwhile, according to statistics, this activity consumes on average about 40 minutes of working time daily, that is 3.5 hours per week, or 14.5 hours per month. Thus, if an employee's monthly salary is $1,000, the company pays $70-80 to the smoker for practically nothing. A non-smoking employee leaves the workplace only during the legally designated lunch break. Therefore, some companies increase the wages of non-smokers or allow them to leave work early.
And some firms simply do not hire smokers. Last year, an American woman, Sofia Blainman, sued an employer who fired her 45 minutes after the start of her first working day. The employer asked if she smoked and, upon receiving a positive answer, pointed the new employee to the door without explanation. In court, he stated that he had subjected the plaintiff to "positive discrimination": she would be better off, they say, if she gave up her bad habit. The court ruled that prejudice against smokers is not punishable, and the plaintiff's claims are groundless.
Historical bans
Today's offensive against smokers is merely a repetition of historical experience. The first to ban tobacco was the English King James I in 1604. He concluded that smoking is harmful to the brain and lungs and, moreover, causes bad breath. A little later, in 1632, a ban on public smoking was declared in the North American state of Massachusetts. In Russia, where tobacco was brought back under Ivan the Terrible, this potion was also not favored. During the reign of Mikhail Fedorovich Romanov, smoking and selling tobacco were prohibited, and violators were subjected to corporal punishment. Attitudes toward smoking became even worse after the Moscow fire of 1634, which, as they then believed, started from an unextinguished cigarette butt.
Smokers breathed more freely in 1646, when Alexei Mikhailovich ascended to the throne and monopolized the sale of tobacco. But the respite was short-lived – soon the tsar was forced to yield to the powerful Patriarch Nikon, who declared tobacco a godless potion that defiles the mouths of Orthodox Christians and demanded its prohibition. Already in 1649, the Sobornoye Ulozhenie contained these words: "If Russian people or foreigners keep tobacco or trade in tobacco, they shall be punished without mercy, under penalty of death!" True, in practice the death penalty was replaced by cutting off lips (for those who chewed tobacco) and noses (for those who smoked or sniffed it). Everything changed under Peter I, who legalized smoking in 1697 and even forced the boyars to smoke.
In the post-Petrine era, tobacco was no longer banned in Russia. But in America, such attempts were made regularly. In the early 20th century, women were banned from smoking in public places. They responded with an act of civil disobedience. Groups of girls walked around New York, demonstratively smoking cigars and spitting at policemen. The violators were arrested and fined, but they continued their protest demonstrations. In the end, the actions of persistent female smokers grew into a movement for women's emancipation. That is, largely thanks to this movement against the 1908 ban, the world got the sexual revolution with all its consequences – most historians agree on this.
Tobacco revolution
Modern Russian conspiracy theorist Alexander Dugin believes that the consequences of the current offensive against smokers will likely also be large-scale. Tobacco lovers cannot endlessly put up with the encroachment on their rights. They already feel driven into a ghetto, and soon, apparently, they will be denied even medical care (according to opinion polls, 34% of Americans support this).
Eventually, driven to despair, rejected by society, smokers will begin, as in the old days, to unite in secret unions. And these unions are sure to be quite extremist in nature. After all, it is known that a smoker, long separated from a cigarette, experiences nicotine hunger, in which pain sensitivity becomes heightened and nervousness increases. In such a state, a person partially loses the ability to control himself and becomes aggressive. Things are unlikely to go as far as creating terrorist brigades, but radical actions by the “oppressed smokers” cannot in principle be ruled out.
At first, of course, softer forms of protest will be used: organizing rallies and strikes, creating organizations that lobby for smokers' interests in government structures (for example, in England such an organization already exists). But events may take a sharper turn if big business intervenes. Smoking bans lead, in particular, to people beginning to consume less alcohol. A simple example: bars and restaurants in New York, when smoking was banned in them, began to close right after midnight, whereas previously they worked until morning. Now smokers prefer to drink at home, where they can also smoke to their heart's content. But at home they will not be allowed to drink much, so the consumption of alcohol has also significantly decreased. Thus, both tobacco and alcoholic beverage producers have lost out at once. Not to mention the owners of drinking establishments.
All of them can either wind down their business or defend their personal financial interests by organizing an attack on the authorities and promoting their agents into government structures. If something like a “tobacco revolution” is needed, one can be sure that the sharks of the alcohol and tobacco business will not stint on expenses. And when power passes to smokers, they will be able to take revenge on their oppressors. The pendulum will swing the other way. The rules, presumably, will be as under Peter I: whoever does not smoke is an enemy of the tsar and the fatherland. When hiring, personnel officers will ask: “How many cigarettes a day do you smoke?” If fewer than 20 – “please do not disturb”. Apparently, even asthmatics and kindergarten teachers will have to start smoking.
Marina AKHMEDOVA.
Газета.Ru