DEATH LISTS FOR SMOKERS

I am not a morning person and I am particularly not an early morning person so the prospect of getting up at 5.30am for a 7.30am radio interview did not get my day off to a great start.

The reason for this very early rise was because I thought I would be debating the Smokerphobic idea of a (ahem) "Doctor" to name and shame dead smokers by publishing their names daily in tabloid newspapers and a bit of research is always best to have at hand. I was promised that some one from the local smoke free quango would be in the opposite - "and possibly someone from ASH." Ooh, I thought, that would be great if it was to be Debs. I always fancied pinning her down to debate which is usually that someone who defends their right to smoke must be in the pay of the tobacco industry.

However, after the interview with Rod Whiting, the BBC Radio Lincolnshire Presenter, the voice on the other end said : "Thanks Pat. That was great."

"Oh, isn't there a debate?" I asked him but the researcher told me that it was just me. How odd, I thought, but pleased that finally, perhaps, the usual agenda driven drivel was being replaced by someone who actually did want to hear what life has been like for smokers since the spiteful ban introduced and legalised discrimination and marginalisation of a minority group.

Instead, once I was kicked off air, the presenter threw it over to the listener to ring or text in their views as to whether they agreed with me and what more could be done to stop people like me smoking.

I only heard one response because I couldn't be bothered to listen to the whole programme. A former smoker rang in to say how in 1999 she had a heart problem that scared her and after being diagnosed with angina, she quit, relatively easily (proving my point about "addiction", incidentally. Those who really do want to stop and are not forced, bullied or shoved into quitting, have no problems in doing so.)

It kind of felt that I was put up as the "bad" smoker and she was put up as the "good" smoker.

Sadly, the early morning call meant that when you listen to the broadcast you will hear my mind whirring and my words stutter as I try to find the right ones. Really, for me, the debate was the wrong one. We should have been debating why this alleged public health "Doctor" Paul Jepson is ignoring the Hippocatic Oath's clause on confidentiality, art as well as science and compassion, in his quest to further denormalise and stigmatise smokers and whether he should be struck off or brought to task by those that regulate his work.

Someone over at Taking LIberties has suggested Jepson far from being a medic is actually a vet. I'd really like to know if anyone has confirmed this.

The lady who rang in did agree with me on one point though. The warnings are not for smokers. We ignore them.

If you want to listen to the whole interview, it will be available HERE for the next seven days. It begins at 1:37:21.

I'm beginning to wonder if I should have stayed in bed.

OUT OF CONTROL TOBACCO CONTROL

There's a great piece over at the Angry Exile on the efforts by tobacco control to make sure people keep smoking and one can only imagine it's because it gives them something to do to earn the billions in cash they steal from the tax payer.

It seems The swaztika No Smoking signs actually trigger a desire to smoke. And I thought it was just so that Nazi organisations in the Anti-Smoker industry could make a few quid from blotting urban and rural landscapes with their constant fly-posting.

According to Dr Carl Phillips Tobacco Control is so fed up with us pesky smokers spoiling their wet dream of a smoke free world with truth about smoking, and the futility of such nonsense as plain packaging, that they have to research how to lie well to further their ideology to ensure Govts continue to ignore us.

They've been trolling news forums to spy and pick up reasoned view from smokers and have then used our money on figuring out how best to discredit us.

Or as Carl succinctly puts it :

In tobacco control studying concerns with proposals is like entomologists studying the preferences of bugs in order to better kill them. ...

When everyone who disagrees with your worldly goal just needs to be hunted down and defeated, it sure must be easy to do "research".

Carl's piece also highlights how Tobacco Control is pushing the idea of a Tobacco Use Disorder - yep - that's right. The next generation is to grow up believing people who smoke are mentally ill.

Tobacco Control is taking us socially backwards. They remind me of those nutters who used to say being gay was a mental illness or a disease. It looks like zealotry is still around in central politics but they've changed their target for hate and the bigots who back them can't even see it.

The sign above is a good example of how the anti-smokers are trying to shift their own traits on to the smoker good guys. They employ fascism to enforce their particular ideology onto others and they make up words to describe anyone who opposes it like "denialism".

Smokers do not harm anyone else. If their choice to enjoy smoking tobacco is seen as genocide by the anti-smoker industry, and its followers and believers, then Tobacco Control is a willing accomplice in hastening the smoker's end. It has no right to take the moral high ground and Govts across the world are doing their people a very grave and dangerous disservice by giving it any authority.

SMOKER HYPOCRISY

There is an interesting piece in the "Observer about smoking, fashion and film which would be OK if the writer Euan Ferguson wasn't so obviously ashamed of being a smoker.

He says some things I totally agree with like the anti-smoker industry doesn't have to rely on evidence anymore to push through even more bans - even on our privately owned properties - but then goes and spoils it by saying things like even smokers don't like the smell of smoke and would take to task other smokers smoking in restaurant doorways. I think he should quit. Denormalisation has obviously got to him and hypocritical smokers like that are "friends" we could do without.

I've never stood outside of anywhere with other smokers without having mutual angry conversations about the way we are being treated.

Euan Ferguson talks about John Wayne who died aged 72 and how he supported the anti-smoking industry after formerly supporting the tobacco industry because he got cancer. The writer then goes on to say it was "because (smoking) does kill" and it killed John Wayne. I disagree. Cancer killed John Wayne in old age. 72 would do for me. I don't want to live to be 100. If this hatred continues, I don't want to live to be 60.

There has also been talk about how Wayne appeared on location somewhere as a younger man where nuclear tests had been done and many of those who appeared alongside him also died younger and later from cancer as well.

I truly believe that not enough research has been done, because of the waste of resources on one lucrative health issue, to determine what other polluting factors that we are in contact with daily also cause cancer. As my son says when I warn him about fizzy drinks with aspartame in them : "Mum, EVERYTHING causes cancer these days."

I did admire the spirit of artist Maggi Hambling in the above linked article and smokers like that I can relate to.

She said : "... I don't even go out to a dinner party unless there's a guaranteed ashtray. I hate anti-smokers. I did three, three, sculptures of Oscar Wilde. Bronze, steel and then hardened steel. In each case some lunatic anti-smoker managed to saw the cigarette off the end of the hand. The last one must have taken a real effort."

Maggi, apparently, quit five years ago but said : "...I started again the Thursday before last. I have to tell you – cigarettes have never tasted better!"

Taking a break to fully enjoy the taste again would be the only reason I'd ever consider quitting. I admire those smokers who are proud to be smokers. I hate those too cowardly to stand up for their beliefs. Smokers who hate smoking are just as much our enemy as those rabid anti-smokers who made them feel that way.

ANTI-SMOKER PREJUDICE

Anti-smoker prejudice is littered in the comments section of this article in the Daily Mail about women, apparently, smoking to lose weight.

The rise in obesity with the decline in smoking rates is probably worthy of debate but it's degenerated into open season on smokers. Prejudicial antis who haven't got a clue and make ridiculous statements like only smoking causes lung cancer can only add "stupid, inconsiderate, smelly, selfish, pathetic addict ..." into the mix.

It gets so tiresome and I can't be bothered to respond these days. It's like trying to teach algebra to toddlers. Smokers who do know what they are talking about certainly come out as the more rational side of the argument.

Another anti thinks we should all go out jogging everyday, like her no doubt, and she feels justified in her suggestion that smokers are "ugly."

I haven't read them all but I did flag up one comment for abuse - the first I saw. There is more verbal thuggery in there and perhaps some contenders for Dick Puddlecote's anti-smoker psycho page. I could have picked my way through the 42 comments but for being busy today and to absorb such hate gets quite exhausting and upsetting after a while.

MIDDLE AGES POLICIES DON'T WORK

Despite the bullying it seems these damn smokers still won't quit.

I don't know why others are not giving up but the reason I don't quit is because my mother taught me to stand up to thugs.

I toyed with the idea of quitting in the late 90s but by the time the 00s arrived, the more Nanny nagged the more I felt like reaching for my roll ups to prove I was the one still in control of my own body.

I'm told that smoking outside has become cool for young people in a stylistic sense despite the freezing weather. Non-smokers are happily chilling outside with the smokers while a bit of "smirting" goes on. The antis are still moaning as they sit inside on their own.

Govts don't seem to learn that social engineering doesn't work. People will behave as they want and have done for centuries despite the threats.

Tobacco use is millions of years old. Historically smokers were executed, persecuted, and imprisoned at about the same time that courts put animals on trials for crimes such as murder.

Just over 50 years after the first smoker was imprisoned during the Spanish Inquistion in 1493, a sow and her piglets accused of killing a child in France in 1547 led to the execution of the pig. The sow's family was spared because of their youth and the fact their mother set a bad example.

It's great to see that we don't put animals on trial for breaking the law any more and we did make progressive moves towards smoking and smokers but the anti-smoking industry has dragged us back centuries.

Thanks to their backward stance smokers are still being sent to prison and they say the smoking ban is ... errrr ...progressive...?

The fact is - as the evidence shows - that no matter what the anti-smokers backed with big corporate cash and the might of the bully state do to smokers they still won't quit.

Money poured into anti-smoking hate really is taxpayers' cash wasted.

STOP DENORMALISATION NOW!

I am none of these things so stop denormalising me. This is a programme that aims to encourage hatred against smokers - a minority group and all it's about is fat cats getting rich on the misery of others.

Wasn't "denormalisation" by another name what the Nazis used to make the majority believe that Jews were sub-human beings,.

Sorry for those of you who believe that smokers are less human than Jews and are offended that we complain about where the Govt backed hatred of smokers is leading but when we are promoted as ...

Smokers as malodourous
Smokers as litterers
Smokers as unattractive and undesirable housemates
Smokers as undereducated and a social underclass
Smokers as excessive users of public health services
Smokers as employer liabilities

...then perhaps you can see where this anger and fear of the future as a dedicated,lifelong and cultural smoker comes from.

Denormalisation should be illegal. Why is our Govt and our countrymen not standing up for us against this programme? Those of you who are fat or like an alcoholic drink will be next and then what? Denormalisation of those who have dark hair, dark eyes, and as far from Arian looking as Romanian Gypsies?

FFS - Wake up! This must stop. This is THE most important issue this century.

OUTRAGEOUS!

I can't remember if I was blogging back in July 2008 but I did post this outrageous photo on Facebook at the time and it stirred quite a debate - or rather a lot of agreement about the hate campaigning of the anti-smoking industry.

I asked if this sort of propaganda can ever be justified and pointed out that it is quite wrong to compare smokers with those who committed the worst terrorism act ever.

Dick Puddlecote has noticed it's back again and this time they've made a nice little video of abuse aimed at inciting yet more hatred against a minority group.

As Dick points out : "To finger-waggers the world over, 9/11 wasn't so much an unspeakable act of evil, more a handy occurrence on which to exercise their mentally disturbed fantasies."

Some events are just so harrowing they should not be undermined by advertisers in this way. What next? A video of children in Dunblane being shot at school to persuade people not to join gun clubs? How about a photo of a battered Baby P and all his horrific injuries to advertise parenting lessons?

I haven't been to see my GP since the twin towers anti-smoking campaign came out. My doctors surgery is always writing to me and inviting me to come for a smear test, a flu jab, holiday innoculations etc so when I was called in for a health check, I took up the offer.

The nurse I saw asked if I smoked. I replied with my usual : "I do not give details of any of my lifestyle habits on the grounds that I may be discriminated against. I will not say if I smoke, or drink, or eat 10 cream cakes a day or five apples and two pears. Neither will I tell you if I climb mountains or ride horses..."

She stopped me there. I explained that I was a pro-choice campaigner and told her about the above twin towers campaign and how offensive it was.

"Whatever you think about smoking, it is quite wrong to equate smokers with those who committed the worst act of terrorism ever," I said.

She said : "Well, there are many people who would disagree with you. Smokers are as bad. It's a good campaign."

This nurse, and others like her who infect the NHS with prejudice, is one reason why I don't go to my GP anymore and why I'd really rather drop dead than go to hospital if I was ill, suffering a heart attack or dying of cancer. I am not a terrorist, nor a murderer, I am a lifelong cultural smoker and I simply wish to be left alone to live my life as I please.

I really think it's time that the Government got some balls and stated clearly that it will not support such blatant hate groups.

The smoking ban of 2007 encouraged this hatred, legalised discrimination, and gave a licence to bigots like ASH to be as abusive as they like. That is the only reason I was ever against it.

I don't want to smoke near anyone who doesn't like it but I can co exist and there is room for both of us in this world. Tolerance is a virtue. It's such a shame that our Government doesn't encourage that.

PRIZE PRICK SPIKED

THIS STORY on Spiked effectively analyses the recent news that Smoker parents are child abusers and finds it full of nonsense based on the real actual evidence of child's deaths from illnesses.

The author of the article also calls into question the sanity of the "leading doctor" who put this libellous information based on nothing but propaganda into the public domain.

Personally, I think each and every one of us smoker parents and grand parents should sue that monumental dickhead Douglas Banantyne who followed up on that announcement with "smoking in cars with children present is child abuse FACT" . Clearly it is not and the scientific and statistical evidence disputes it.

Once that evidence is collected and collated, and the right lawyer sought to handle the case, then the likes of Mr Banantyne may well be forced to wash out his mouth with soap before uttering such libellous profanities in future.

STUDY TO "PROVE" SMOKERS ARE LEPERS

When the idea of THS (A load of bollox to you and I) or Third Hand Smoke, first reared it's bigoted head, most people laughed it off and saw it for what it was - a cranking up of anti-smoking propaganda aimed at encouraging fear of smokers and further exclusion of a minority group.

In fact, to be fair, it was greeted with the same derision as SHS 40 years ago. Like the concept of SHS, the antis have thrown money at "research" into THS to come up with results they paid for so no doubt it won't be long before we smokers are forced to shower before we can even be allowed to speak to a fellow human being.

Just imagine what that money could do in actually doing some proper scientific research into what causes cancer and how to cure it instead of spending it on inciting fear and hatred of a minority group.

It's another case for me to put my fingers in my ears and start with the la la la because it's just too terrifying to see the lies that will be created to incite such hatred. They really are going all out to "prove" we are lepers judging on the "expected" plan to prove standing next to us suddenly causes open sores to appear on those within a mile of us.

Sheesh - I've had five Ceasarians and the medical staff caring for me after the birth of my children were always astounded at how quickly I was on my feet and how quickly I healed. By way of information, for those who don't know, only two are recommended so it looks that the anecdotal evidence doesn't tally with this latest bigoted study which aims to use the same familiar tactics of junk science.

As someone on DP's blog points out, if this study is "true" then how come smokers are not walking around looking like lepers, full of sores and holes with their skin dropping off? But then, isn't that what the anti-smoking industry wants? It wants to prove smokers ARE lepers and then get the general public on side in treating them as such. Smokers should be given legal protection against the propagation of such hatred but then that isn't going to happen under the hateful coalition ConDem party is it?

Still think direct action is not necessary to make ourselves heard? I think it is.

SMOKES ON A PLANE

My guess is that thanks to the EU, duty free tobacco no longer exists. The price is level across Europe - except in Britain which really does have to push the knife in and twist it in a smoker's back as punishment for daring to enjoy something the righteous tell us we shouldn't - and it's the same price on the boarding side of the airport as it is in Italian shops.

I reckon the best bargain I got was the above packet at three Euros for 30g. This pack of Elixyer tells me that it was made in the EU under the arrangement with the Western Tobacco Corporation, Newark (USA). I had to admit being mildy amused by the warning on the packet which says "strictly for smokers!". Another example of a waste of space. I mean, would anyone who didn't smoke buy this stuff or use it? I guess the manufacturers, or their masters in the EU, think we smokers are so thick we'd consider buying tobacco as a present for those who don't smoke.

I found Pisa airport, frankly, rabidly anti-smoking. There was a tiny tobacco shop, with products mostly hidden in a cupboard and only a random selection of not very popular brands like strong, dark Samson, or Old Holborn. Popular Golden Virgina was priced at five Euros for 40g. Not worth it so I got the light Drum variety and a hope for the best of a limited choice.

Pisa airport also fired off the "This is a Non-smoking airport" every few minutes. Like we didn't know. Duh!

This was pretty much the same as the Ryanair flight but there was a twist. Immediately after announcing that Ryanair operated a no smoking policy on all it's flights - yeah - it's the law Michael O'Leary - it then went on to publicise the new "Smokeless" cigarettes which it was selling on the plane.

"It's a long flight of two hours so why wait for a cigarette when you can enjoy a smokeless cigarette in flight," said the voice over the tannoy as the air hostesses were walking the aisle offering packs of these things.

I was rather insulted and would prefer that the plane took a nose dive than consider buying this tripe. Either smoking is acceptable or it's not. I won't take any part in the promotion of false cigarettes to make some businessman richer on the back of the persecution of smokers. It's why smokers who go rushing for E cigarettes annoy me so much. They really are letting the side down.

I watched to see how many people would take up this offer of being able to smoke trash on a plane. Happily no one did but plenty of people who came off that flight lit a real one outside of the airport.