Age restrictions on tobacco?

[SilentCom]

After reading and posting in the "Ideas on the legal drinking age" thread, it got me thinking about tobacco products and age restrictions. Here in America the age restriction on tobacco products is 18 if I am not mistakened. Considering tobacco products can be damaging to any age, why is there an age restriction on cigarettes and the like? Tobacco products do not cause DUIs or anything like that and people have to deal with second hand smoke and other air pollutants all too often so its not like kids haven't been exposed to it.

What is the age restriction (if any) on tobacco products in your country and do you think there should be restrictions?

 

[Raineheart]

The age restriction is there to prevent children from purchasing harmful products.

The limit is 18 in Australia. The first cigarette I ever had was at 18, and I liked it.

Yes, there should be restrictions. Why? Because after the age of 18 people children tend to stop growing so much. Tobacco products stunt growth and the like.

 

[SilentCom]

True about tobacco slowing growth, however children are exposed to second hand smoke and will often smoke before 18 due to peer pressure. Also, is it really so bad if some people are a little shorter? I'm not trying to advocate tobacco products but merely try to further discussion.

 

[Brandon237]

True about tobacco slowing growth, however children are exposed to second hand smoke and will often smoke before 18 due to peer pressure. Also, is it really so bad if some people are a little shorter? I'm not trying to advocate tobacco products but merely try to further discussion.

I am sorry to say this, but if someone smokes because of peer pressure then they are somewhere between a weak-willed husk and plain pathetic. If you do not want to smoke (knowing the risks) and do so anyway out of peer-pressure then you have no respect for yourself.

Personally, I'm all for the banning of tobacco in public areas (including out-door areas, the wind is not enough) and think that keeping the legal age to 18 here is a good idea.

 

[Nibblitman]

It's to protect kids from their own immaturity. At some point it is deemed you are mature enough you get to decide if you want to slowly kill yourself.

This is pretty much the best reason and a really nice way of saying that until they are older people are really stupid. So you don't get to do stuff like sign contracts, get guns, or buy stuff that can mess you up till your old enough to really get it.

 

[Coffinshaker]

it's a physically addictive substance that causes damage to your body. a bit different from, say alcohol, because alc takes quite a bit of abuse to become addicted... though still causes severe physical damage if taken in improper doses.

the reason it's got the age limit on it, is because of the mental/physical addiction. do you think a 10yr old can comprehend the pros/cons of smoking? do you think a small child understands what lung cancer is? or even mortality? or even addiction?

when they say 18, they are saying you are now an adult, with the knowledge of consequence, and should be able to understand, legally, what would happen to you when you smoke. also, for the same reason, I'd say alcohol could be lowered to 18.

I am totally against bans of tobacco in public areas, like outside, AND against bans of tobacco in places like restaurants or bars. it should be the CHOICE of those establishments if they want to allow tobacco to be smoked there. a public notice at the door should suffice to alert non smokers that smoking will take place on the premiss. If YOU don't like smoke and don't want to be around it... DON'T GO TO THAT BAR OR RESTAURANT!! I'm sure I'll be unpopular for my opinion on that... but I just don't like how the choices of the few can impose on the rights of the many. people can choose not to go somewhere, but when you make a law preventing the choice of an establishment to have a smoking section or not, that's an imposition on their rights.

Oh... and I don't smoke. never have, never will. but just cause I don't, doesn't mean everyone should have to stop.

 

[Scrubiii]

Both tobacco and alcohol would be class A drugs right now if they hadn't been in use so long that they've become ingrained into society.

Interpret that how you will.

 

[Shodan1980]

Its 16 here in the UK for the reason if you're old enough to fight for your country, have sex, marry or all of the above, you're old enough to slowly poison yourself (I say that as a smoker) As others have said, kids can't understand the reasoning for why its bad. A few may have lost people to smoking related diseases but all they know is that everybody says these things are evil, but yet many, many people still do it. Plants the idea of an illicit, tempting danger in their heads and its hoped by 16 they can make a more reasoned decision

 

[LostCrusader]

it's a physically addictive substance that causes damage to your body. a bit different from, say alcohol, because alc takes quite a bit of abuse to become addicted... though still causes severe physical damage if taken in improper doses.

the reason it's got the age limit on it, is because of the mental/physical addiction. do you think a 10yr old can comprehend the pros/cons of smoking? do you think a small child understands what lung cancer is? or even mortality? or even addiction?

when they say 18, they are saying you are now an adult, with the knowledge of consequence, and should be able to understand, legally, what would happen to you when you smoke. also, for the same reason, I'd say alcohol could be lowered to 18.

I am totally against bans of tobacco in public areas, like outside, AND against bans of tobacco in places like restaurants or bars. it should be the CHOICE of those establishments if they want to allow tobacco to be smoked there. a public notice at the door should suffice to alert non smokers that smoking will take place on the premiss. If YOU don't like smoke and don't want to be around it... DON'T GO TO THAT BAR OR RESTAURANT!! I'm sure I'll be unpopular for my opinion on that... but I just don't like how the choices of the few can impose on the rights of the many. people can choose not to go somewhere, but when you make a law preventing the choice of an establishment to have a smoking section or not, that's an imposition on their rights.

Oh... and I don't smoke. never have, never will. but just cause I don't, doesn't mean everyone should have to stop.

I agree with almost everything here, just don't think we should tell people they can't smoke outside. I think of that as more of a common courtesy issue, although that may be wishful thinking.

 

[FamoFunk]

Its 16 here in the UK for the reason if you're old enough to fight for your country, have sex, marry or all of the above, you're old enough to slowly poison yourself (I say that as a smoker) As others have said, kids can't understand the reasoning for why its bad. A few may have lost people to smoking related diseases but all they know is that everybody says these things are evil, but yet many, many people still do it. Plants the idea of an illicit, tempting danger in their heads and its hoped by 16 they can make a more reasoned decision

It's 16 to smoke them but 18 to buy now, I remember buying them myself at 16 and a few months before I turned 18 it went up!

I think 18 is a better age to have to buy them, at 18, again I see that as you being an adult where you can make any decision you want and if one is to smoke... so be it.

 

[Shodan1980]

Both tobacco and alcohol would be class A drugs right now if they hadn't been in use so long that they've become ingrained into society.

Interpret that how you will.

Seconded. Alcohol is just as deadly as tobacco, and its infinitely more socially damaging, you could start now and be dead of alcohol poisoning before the morning. But most of us enjoy a drink, some of us enjoy a cigarette, so its just part of society cause it always was and nobody really looks at it.

 

[Ickorus]

It should stay the way it is because people can make a more informed decision when they're older and not so heavily subjected to peer pressure.

the human mind isn't fully mature till around about 25 so you're more likely to make better decisions as you age, most people I know who began smoking at a young age wish they had never started.

 

[Dags90]

It's 19 here in New Jersey. I think the idea was to prevent high school seniors from legally buying tobacco, so they aren't tempted to sell it to minors. I don't particularly care. I'm neither 18 nor a smoker.

 

[Caveworm]

Get the kids on pipes I say! Give them a bit of class and sophistication it would.

 

[Socks and Shoes]

I'm a smoker, and I think it should be 18.

However, it ain't like I couldn't find ways to get smokes was I was 16-17.

 

[TheHecatomb]

I'm actually not sure what the age restriction is around here. I think 16. Having said that I don't think I've ever met anyone who gave a damn about the age restriction. Ever since I was an eleven year old boy people around me who wanted to smoke, just smoked. People are more concerned with hiding it from their parents than breaking some kind of law.

 

[exessmirror]

i dont really care i dont smoke and i am 16, here it is 16 and ppl say you stop growing when you hit 18. that is not true your brains grow till 23 and your body till 21