In the 19th it was a popularly held belief that radium had beneficial medical qualities. People would buy highly radioactive lozenges, get x-rayed with the miracle beams and so on. They also thought that aligning the bodies magentic field was also important. This was achieved by being electrocuted with higher and higher voltages, some times in a bath, some times with hand-held devices. Before that, the consumption of mercury, and all other kinds of piosonous minerals was lauded.
How silly they were we say now, didn't they know they were giving themselves cancer and how their so-called cures were lethal? How very quaint and foolish. Indeed, smoking was once considered healthy - a way to clear the lungs as an expectorant.
In the 1950s, the rise in cigarette related deaths finally couldn't be hidden. The medical research proving that tobbacco was a deadly poison and a lethal narcotic were irreffutable. Yet 50 years later any adult, and in many countries, any child can purchase this fatally addictive substance.
How will history judge us as we continue to make this freely available. When future generations look back at the truly massive death toll smoking has caused, that it outshadows the dead of two world wars and pretty much every other disease thoughout human history, will they be proud that we let people choose?
That their opinion was more important than their health?
That consumerism won out over common sense?
Or will they look at us with a sense of horror and disbelief that so many opted to murder not only themselves, but to sacrifice the health of their loved ones through passive smoking just for their own gratification?
Now, i'm not a health nut, I'm pretty much an obese fat soaked slob, who could easily be called a hypocrite for hating smoking but comsuming large quantities of saturated fats etc. I'll even admit my defense is pretty lame - What I eat will kill me, and no one else araound me. it is my choice and it effects only me. If smokers can make that same claim, that they ingest this drug without it effecting the health of anyone else - fine. Go do it. And I'm not talking abbout going outside, or only to the smoking room. A way that effects no one else - basically patches, gum or injection - not an enviromental pollution. That way, you're accepting your choice, and you alone take responcibility for it.
In the begining, you made the point that smoking looks cool, and fair play, it does. But if your doing it for it narcotic effects then why not take snuff, chewing tabacco, again, patches and so on. Why smoke a ciggarette not a pipe, or a hookah? Is the reason you're indulging your addiction in this way pure selfish vanity?
