Cool smoking

Smoking Blog

As a smoker I was interested in this lecture. To start with the lecturer asked for a show of hands for people who smoke, I was very surprised to find I was in the minority (either that or people were not admitting to it) he then gave us some very interesting statistics, too many to list here but here is one I found surprising; around 114 thousand deaths a year in the UK are smoking related, that about one fifth of all deaths. RTA, Accidents,Overdose, Algol related, murder and suicide do not collectively equate to this figure.

The lecture questioned what was our fascination with smoking, and what made it attractive as a pursuit?

When I was younger and even more naive than I am now I looked at smoking as a cool thing to do, I went to a very big very “mixed” secondary school and anybody who was anybody was a smoker. When we look at images in recent history of smoking they are usually depicted by a rather attractive person smoking a cigarette (not pipes, Roll ups etc) So immediately the media presence has brought us up on this kind of picture, screen icons, pop stars etc… peers? Smoking has been glamorised and it has done us no favours. We all read about it being bad for our health not to mention highly addictive, the problem is once you start, particularly in our society is its association with life style, e.g. I don’t like to go out for a drink without having a cigarette. This is a hilarious web page dedicated (non factually) to smokers, very funny how they have tried to say having cigarette breath is a good thing. Ten out of ten for trying though - http://www.ninjapirate.com/smoking.html

Look at the recent smoking ban and how leisure trades like pubs and clubs have suffered as a direct consequence? What I don’t understand (or rather I do understand I just don’t agree with) is what is with our government slapping all these morbid signs on fag packets banning advertising almost altogether and yet we still sell them (very expensively) ummm capitalising?

Earlier this year I went to Egypt, a fascinating experience, but in terms of smoking they are very fond of the shish pipe. What was most interesting about this is one of the main reasons they smoked this type of (nicotine free scented tobacco) was its “Social” advantages, what I mean by this is smoking the shish pipe for Egyptians is like going for a coffee with friends, an activity everyone is involved with, often having more than one person smoking at any time.

Before I go on and on, Id like to draw your attention to the smoking advert (link on you tube) “loose the smoke, keep the fire” does anyone agree with me that she did just look cool smoking?!! I thought it was a very ineffective advert to influence people into thinking smoking doesn’t look good.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lrnvEQ0uVO8 – please have a look see what you think.
Got to go for a cigarette now. Addiction. Emma Skipp said...

(Responce copied from her blog)
Helen
Great point well made. Absolutly, now all the smokers are huddled to gether outside cold and looking quite stupid. The reason you are coughing more now is because (and I know) you have smoked recently, your lungs are reparing themselves!
Em x

08 May 2008 11:26