Evidence of dangers of spicy food pale compared to evidence of dangers of smoking, yet you imagine spicy food has caused your health problems even though it seems vastly more likely that smoking did. Whatever, believe what you need to believe.

I have sometimes thought about what could be done about obesity if it were to be regarded as an unacceptable health-risk, in much the same way that shooting heroin is currently regarded as legally unacceptable.  Certainly we would not want to just kill all the obese people, any more than we have made drug addiction into a capital offense.  We can't pretend that we are killing people in order to safeguard their health.  That's a bit too ridiculous, even if we accept the Puritanical morality which has lead to the disastrous war on drugs.  What we could do, however, is to round up all the fat people and put them into compulsory weight-loss clinics, which they would not be allowed to leave until they reach an appropriate weight (however long that might take).  Although most people would consider this to be an unreasonable intrusion into people's private lives, it is really no more intrusive or less justifiable than the war on drugs.  It also has one significant advantage.  You can't tell that someone is using illegal drugs just by looking at them (even if they look terrible, since there are other reasons why people can look terrible, and not all drug addicts look terrible) but you can diagnose obesity very easily.  It would be hard for the obese to escape detection.

And to be consistent, people with anorexia could also be rounded up and placed in compulsory weight-gain clinics.  And this would do more good than we are currently doing by means of the war on drugs.

You could always build prison gates around major cities and force everyone to do everything for their own good.

Compulsory fat farms does rub my funny bone though. It reminds me of compulsory LSD camps for over-35 people from 'Wild In The Streets", but I should probably save my favourite quote ("Give me the tools, give me the laws, give me the Power!") for thread with favourite movie quotes.

Statistically speaking it's much more likely that drinking and or smoking caused your oral cancer.  Maybe it didn't.  But since we can't run clinically controlled trials on a single person, we will never know in your case.  But what we do know is that smokers and heavy drinkers are much more likely to get oral and throat cancer than teetotaling non-smokers.  

I mentioned my father earlier in the thread.  He had a persistent soar throat for about six months before he went to the doctor.  Why did he avoid the doctor?  Three of his smoking, drinking bar buddies had previously died of throat cancer.  He was afraid that his drinking and smoking had finally caught up to him is well.  Turns out it had.  

Oddly though, he never really consciously admitted it could have been the drinking or smoking that caused the cancer, thus leading him to smoke and drink until he was no longer physically capable.  I sincerely hope you avoid this fate, it's not a good way to die.

Sometimes I just shake my head in wonderment at you nmiguy.

I have that effect on people sometimes.  

But Mayorbob, we all know, and have known for a long long time that smoking and high risk behviors really increase your chance of getting cancer.  My father is a heavy smoker.  He all but expects to get cancer, I think.  He wouldn't say as much, but he avoids doctors like the plague, afraid to take a chest x-ray or whatever.  

A few years back he was getting the numbness and tingling in the arm and chest pains.  They did some arterial plasty or some such procedure to remove a blockage and he felt better.  Didn't quit smoking, though.  He keeps trying to quit and keeps failing.  He had 3 brothers who died from lung cancer, all of them smokers.  

Shake your head, Mayorbob, but there is some echo of truth in my callous comment.  "Well, what did you expect?" is my position.  So yeah, if you smoke, work in an asbestos plant, have unprotected sex with prostitutes, you'd be daft or willfully ignorant to NOT expect to get ill from it.  

I say to all smokers out there, if you don't quit, then you are risking lung cancer.  Expect the "golden years" of your life to have respiratory illness, emphysema, lung cancer, asthma, heart disease, something.  If you smoke (alot) over your lifetime, you're likely to develop one of these terribel illnesses.  

Serious question:  Did the melanoma start on the left arm?

It's the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fine

Serious answer:  No, it was on his back.

there's only one way to find out...

Thanks...the reason I ask is that I knew a guy back in Florida who had skin cancer that started on his arm near the shoulder.  He said his doctor said it was because he always drove with his window open and arm on the sill.  I thought this was bs, but still  wondering just the same.

It's the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fine

Good question and answer, though.

When I was younger, everyone drove with their left arm hanging out the window of the car.  Now, just about every car has air conditioning, so almost no one does that any longer.  

As I said, sometimes shit just plain happens.  

there's only one way to find out...

Only smokers believe that second hand smoke hasn't killed anyone. NIH knows that second hand smoke kills. Anyone else not employed by tobacco companies who has ever studied matter has concluded that second hand smoke kills people. Smokers tell themselves what they need to believe because they don't retain capability to be rational about risks of smoking. What you tell yourself three times doesn't become true.

"Pot smoking isn't healthy", but that doesn't excuse much greater risks of cancer and heart disease associated with smoking cigarettes. Pot smoking has been criminalised in most Western nations. Does your comparison of these two forms of smoking mean you think tobacco smoking should be criminalised as well?

Sadly, despite your lies to yourself about second hand smoke, you most certainly do spread disease. You can't help yourself. You make distinction between yourself and homosexuals where one doesn't exist; you present as grave health dangers to general public as they do, and you lie to yourself about it even as many of them do. If you could bring yourself to acknowledge that second hand smoke kills instead of denying science and lying to yourself about it, you could limit damage you do to others, just as gay people who understand risks of their behaviour can minimise risks to others if they choose to do so. Many gay people don't choose to, just as you don't choose to.

If you like, please feel free to do writeup on fat people and race car drivers and I will see if I can meaningfully compare risks they present to others with risks you present to others even as you live in denial.

From your link: "There is no safe amount of secondhand smoke"

So if you see someone smoking on the street, run in the other direction! There's no safe level of exposure! There are safe levels of exposure for all these toxic chemicals
, but not secondhand smoke, the deadliest substance mankind has ever devised.

The real risks of smoking are exaggerated, the non-existent risks of second hand smoke are fabricated. The health risks of other activities, like gay sex, are not treated similarly. It's all hysteria.

Smoking has a calming effect, maybe you wouldn't be so deranged if you smoked.

Everything would be better if only everyone smoked, right? Then you could spread your habit far and wide without being outcast, without being compared to homosexuals and other people you hate, without having to build up defensive walls to tell yourself that science and scientists have it all wrong, that only you know true health risks of second hand smoke. (Not.)

No one tries to stop you from smoking in street, where breezes sweep almost all of your smoke away. We try to stop you from smoking in enclosed places where your smoke unquestionably sickens many people and kills some people. Real risks of cigarette smoking have not been exaggerated, they have been underestimated so as not to alienate people like you, who would rather believe anything than that your habit kills you and others.

But I shouldn't be so harsh. After all, you Americans have become famous for believing all manner of incredibly idiotic things and imagining you know better than scientists even though you have no training. Saddam Hussein had Weapons of Mass Destruction (almost half of you believe that groaner), Bush doesn't order torture (35% of you buy that one, and when evidence becomes too plain to ignore, then your backup becomes "waterboarding doesn't constitute torture" or "there want to kill us all"), universe was created 6,000 years ago (27% go for this one, together with ancillary madness that dinosaur bones were put in ground by god to test your faith), human beings don't evolve (over half, even as scientists find humans evolving faster than ever), and your personal favourite, second hand smoke doesn't really hurt anyone, and if we all just smoked cigarettes everything would be better.

Funny about you calling me deranged. King of all Ranters, man who publicly hates "Negroes", Mexicans, "homosexualists", and almost everyone who doesn't look and act like him calls me deranged, advises me to take up his killer habit to become "calm". Priceless. You say intentionally hurtful things to people every day because you enjoy hurting people and then claim that you only speak "Truth", but then can't allow yourself to admit that your sadism extends to efforts to kill people around you, people you supposedly love and care about. "Truth" means nothing to you, and science means nothing to you, unless it offers excuse to injure others. Lying to yourself about cigarettes really shouldn't strike anyone as something new for you, since you lie to yourself about almost everything about your personality and intentions.  

-You can sit a short distance away from two sex-crazed homosexuals going at it like a very crazed thing and you won't get teh gay disease (unless you join in, of course)

-You can sit in a coffee shop sipping your decaf soy-latte while Jumbo at the table next to you goes for the the Guinness book record for most éclairs eaten at a single sitting and you won't get teh fat disease.

-You can sit next to a heroin user shoving a "heroic dose" into his arm and you wont get teh junkie disease.

-Sitting next to a nicotine addict doing an his Sudbury Super Stack imitation...well, you take your chances.

And before you move the goalposts and say, "all of those behaviors have a negative effect on society" let me remind you that I'm talking about direct effects.

And before you say that "there's no proof that second hand smoke blah blah blah" allow me to direct you to the NIH.

And, at the end of the day, if driving smokers out of restaurants and public places means I finally enjoy a meal without having to choose between the smoking and second-hand smoke sections and STILL have my food taste like ass, I say good fricking riddance.  I am sick to death about smokers going on about "this is MY choice wah wah".  Well, if I have to sit next to a smoker...guess what!  That smoker's "choice" is now forced upon me...if not through disease than certainly through discomfort.  What gives smokers the right to inflict their addiction on other people?

It's the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fine

You can sit a short distance away from two sex-crazed homosexuals going at it like a very crazed thing and you won't get teh gay disease (unless you join in, of course)

...unless you receive blood from an HIV+ donor, of course. I concede that smoking has ancillary effects on nonsmokers, which means some restrictions are beneficial, in much the same way that gay men are declined as blood donors for the sake of the unsuspecting recipients.

That said, note how novy's argument goes far past the need for regulation for the sake of third parties. He appears more than willing to ban smoking for the effects on the smokers themselves.

He appears more than willing to ban smoking for the effects on the smokers themselves.

Well, that's pretty much Novy's opinion.  I can't say I totally agree with it.  See, I don't want to ban smoking.  If a smoker/eater/junkie/sex addict wants to indulge in any of theses activities until they see god, then that's fine.  It's only when any of those activities directly effect me that I tend to get techy. (Unless the sex addict is cute, of course)

It's the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fine

How many times must I say I wouldn't outlaw cigarettes or gay sex before you cigarette smokers and gays notice? Public health considerations pale in comparison to breakdown in social order that comes with making big chunks of your population criminals at one fell swoop. But characterise my arguments in any way that amuses you, any way you have to in order to kill that straw man.

"AIDS kills more quickly than smoking on average, and currently costs more to treat, too."

A bit OT, but there are an estimated 1,000,000 HIV+ people in the US.  About 13,000 of them die every year.  That's a death rate of 1,300 per 100,000.  Compare that to the overall US death rate of about 800 per 100,000 - 1,000 per 100,000 for men (in the US, HIV+ skews male).  About 1.3% of all HIV+ people die of AIDS each year.  At that rate, you have a 50% chance of dying after 50 years.  Remember that most HIV+ people are over 20, with the average age even higher than that.  So being HIV positive is not much of a death sentence.

And before you jump to the conclusion that these marvelous statistics are the results of our wonderfully successful AIDS drugs, remember that according to the estimates, 500,000 of those million HIV+ people don't know they have HIV, and are not being treated.

It's not just AIDS. Homosexuals incubate MRSA, which can then spread to the general population. So unlike smoking, banning gay sex is actually justified for public health reasons.

Casual contact with skin passes MRSA. You wouldn't have heterosexual sex with someone who had MRSA, would you?

Banning smoking would save as many lives as banning gay sex. If only public health reasons mattered, such bans could be justified. But other considerations enter in with respect to both smoking and sex.  

I don't think that banning gay sex could be justified even if the desire to prevent the spread of disease were to be accepted as being so important that it takes precedence over all other concerns, such as human rights.  Unless you have some way to observe all people all the time, you really cannot prevent people from having gay sex (or any kind of sex).  You might be able to prevent it in public washrooms, but not in people's bedrooms.  It is also well to remember, as gay activists have often had to point out, that AIDS is caused by a virus, not by homosexuality.  And there are perfectly safe ways to have gay sex even with a partner who is HIV positive.  Not all gay sex consists of anal intercourse, and even anal intercourse, if you do it really carefully with condoms, does not necessarily transmit disease (although it is still likely to result in hemorrhoids if you do too much of it).  And heterosexual sex also transmits HIV (particularly from men to women; it does not transmit as readily from female to male, although that also happens to some extent).  The epidemic of HIV in Africa is believed to result largely from heterosexual sex, not gay sex.

Given the failure to eradicate the smoking of marijuana, I also have to doubt that the smoking of tobacco could be completely eradicated, even if it were to be made illegal.  However, it is much easier to grow marijuana than tobacco, so there is SOME possibility that a smoking ban, if such a thing were to be introduced, could be effective.  And particularly if alternative forms of nicotine, such as nicotine chewing gum, were to remain legal while smoking becomes illegal, we might be able to actually bring an end to smoking.  Whether this would be an acceptable public health measure, or an unacceptable infringement on the human rights of smokers, could be debated, but I personally think that it would be justifiable.  Smokers, as you have already pointed out, harm others as well as themselves, by means of second-hand smoke, so it is a particularly objectionable form of drug addiction.  In general, I think that people should legally have the right to endanger their own health if they so desire - you are the owner of your own life - but they do not have the right to endanger other people's health.  That should be the basic principle for any drug legislation.

Sex, even when it does harm people's health, remains a consensual activity except in the case of rape, and rape is of course already illegal.  The other problem with sex is non-disclosure.  I do think that it should be a serious crime to have sex with someone without advising them of an existing medical risk that you know about, particularly if you are HIV positive.  Still, it is wise to always take suitable precautions.  Your partner may be HIV positive without even knowing it, and we can't disclose what we do not know.  Sex is very dangerous these days.  Of course, so is driving a car, and few people advocate banning cars.  I think that we all do need to take a certain amount of risk in our lives, there is no practical way to live a totally safe life.  But we also need to be careful in choosing the risks that we take.

I don't think banning gay sex makes any sense either, and I have already said that I don't think banning cigarette smoking makes any sense either. If I support euthanasia for people who request it, I can't call for banning cigarettes. I can only call for keeping it out of my face and my lungs.

I have already argued that key to public health problems caused by risky behaviours (which I have also said include heterosexual sex outside of monogamous relationship) would be awareness of dangers and effort to make sure we don't harm others to best of our ability.

Does gay sex get equal time anywhere but on Internet, where cigarette smoking gets equal time?

As for heterosexual sex, considering how many diseases have been associated with it, including AIDS, does non-marital heterosexual sex also qualify as detrimental personal behaviour? You wouldn't have sex outside of marriage or a committed relationship, would you? Everyone knows sex should only be considered moral if it can result in pregnancy.

Mommy, stoners come to take away my cigarettes! Waaaaah! Look at how mean they act! Nerd-stoner majority persecutes me! First they took over California, then France. How can we stop march of nerds and stoners before they conquer entire world?

What paranoid delusions won't you feed yourself to explain why your self-destructive behavior should be blamed on someone else?

It's true many pot smokers stupidly favor cigarette smoking bans. It's why I no longer support their efforts to legalize their vice - it seems only fair. Otherwise (unlike you) I would have no objection to marijauana smoking. From what I can tell, heroin users are solid on the smoking issue. So I continue to support legalizing heroin.

It's true that if every pot smoker in US favoured smoking bans, that would amount to perhaps 5% of population, yet you blame them for fact that most Americans, like most French, think smoking cigarettes kills people who don't even smoke. I don't favour outlawing cigarettes, since declaring 1/5 of population criminals would cause more harm than it would solve, I just favour not letting you kill people other than yourself. As for marijuana and heroin, it doesn't matter what you think, does it? Both will stay illegal anyway.  

"As for marijuana and heroin, it doesn't matter what you think"

Obviously to you it does.

Huh? It doesn't matter what you or I think about heroin or marijuana, does it? Why do you imagine it does?