How are cigarettes legal?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13803326/

Quote :

"WASHINGTON - If current trends hold, tobacco will kill a billion people this century, 10 times the toll it took in the 20th century, public health officials said Monday. Tobacco accounts for one in five cancer deaths, or 1.4 million deaths worldwide each year, according to two new reference guides that chart global tobacco use and cancer. Lung cancer remains the major cancer among the 10.9 million new cases of cancer diagnosed each year, according to the Cancer Atlas."

12/20/2006 8:01:50 AM

How are cars legal? And cheeseburgers?

12/20/2006 8:22:55 AM

cars are a medium of transportation.

cigarettes are a medium of death.

if cigarettes are legal, why are other drugs banned?

12/20/2006 8:26:31 AM

To say that cigarettes will kill people is, at best, misleading. The truth is that, until recently, most of these people would have died of something else before any smoking related ailments. It's also important to distinguish that cigarettes increase your risk of certain diseases. It doesn't mean that it will cause disease.

Health risks aside, what does any of this have to do with legality?

12/20/2006 8:29:12 AM

only morons still smoke.

12/20/2006 8:50:53 AM

Ah ha, that is so cool. the Map is a measure of how prematurly people die, not cigarette use.

It is no wonder people in Africa are unlikely to get cancer before the age of 65: they're all dead by the age of 40. And if they had cancer no one will ever know!

12/20/2006 9:01:50 AM

Quote :

"only morons still smoke. "

12/20/2006 9:09:05 AM

Other drugs are legal. Caffeine and Alcohol are available almost everywhere.

Now, please go chew the twigs or whatever you people do in that shithole you live in.

12/20/2006 9:27:37 AM

even if other drugs were legal, i doubt they would all kill a fraction of a billion people combined.
alcohol, dunno. probably pretty far up there.....

12/20/2006 9:41:21 AM

"HOLY MISLEADING GRAPHIC BATMAN"

Please note that the risk of developing a cancer and the risk of developing lung cancer from cigarette smoke are two distinctly different things.

Quote :

"if cigarettes are legal, why are other drugs banned?"

That's easy enough to answer: timing and social momentum. Oh, and Nixon.

[Edited on December 20, 2006 at 9:46 AM. Reason : ...]

12/20/2006 9:42:08 AM

That is a pretty damn funny graphic. You could probably change the title to "Areas where people live past age 65" and only have to change 1 or 2 shade categories.

12/20/2006 9:50:03 AM

fuckit. life has a zero percent survival rate.

if it wasnt tobacco itd be something else.

12/20/2006 9:51:29 AM

Quote :

"How are cigarettes legal?"

For the same reason that alcohol and caffeine are still legal in this country. Alcohol in particular is probably a lot more dangerous than cigarette smoking as a whole to public health and safety, but you won't see that being re-banned anytime in the near future.

Besides, in this country we've probably pushed cigarette regulations as far as one can go short of banning it (ie. no smoking in public areas, age restrictions on purchase, high taxes). I bet that most of those cigarette deaths will be in third world countries. It's up to their governments to implement crackdowns.

12/20/2006 9:59:40 AM

This Just In...

Well-informed intrepid anchorman knew of the risks and still smoked himself to death.

Developing....

12/20/2006 10:33:22 AM

Dude

A fuckton more people smoke in Turkey then they do here.

And by a fuckton, i mean walking into any public place and right into a mist of smoke.

That graph is lollers. Other factors are contributing.

Nice try though.

12/20/2006 10:35:55 AM

people know smoking is bad.

the government made sure of this through ads, warnings, litigation, legislation, regulation, taxes.

if you still want to smoke it is your own damn problem.

dont blame the government.

12/20/2006 10:37:00 AM

the fact that pot isnt legal is completely retarded.

12/20/2006 10:37:50 AM

^Agreed. I've never even smoked pot, but adults should be free to do so if they please.

12/20/2006 10:43:52 AM

yeah but then the mexicans will go crazy or something

12/20/2006 10:47:23 AM

Come again?

12/20/2006 10:49:04 AM

i watched this tv show about how weed was made illegal because people thought mexicans were smoking it to much and going to rape all the white women.

12/20/2006 10:50:35 AM

I think I caught that same show.

Anyway, my guess is that personal use of it will be legal in 25 years. I think it should be legal, but sold in state-owned stores and heavily taxed. If you ever want hippies to get upset about high taxes, this is the only way to show them how much they suck.

12/20/2006 10:56:41 AM

^i watched that....it also said that up until the mid 1910's the federal gov had no drug laws at all b/c it was in the constitution that the fed's couldn't regulate b/c it was considered a personal choice (and it was the states' reserved right). Until the minority fears, drug laws weren't even considered.

^^even if it was heavily taxed, it would be way cheaper than currently, we would cut gov. spending, add gov revenue, curb some dealers, and clear prison space.

[Edited on December 20, 2006 at 11:01 AM. Reason : .]

12/20/2006 10:59:43 AM

Quote :

"Anyway, my guess is that personal use of it will be legal in 25 years."

whats your reasoning behind this? unfortunately, i think the stigma thats associated with pot is going to be hard to shake.

its going to be political suicide for the first politicians (maybe any politicians) that try to push it....so much, that i doubt anyone would make a serious push for it.



[Edited on December 20, 2006 at 11:12 AM. Reason : fg]

12/20/2006 11:07:51 AM

Quote :

"How are cars legal? And cheeseburgers?"

lololololololololol

12/20/2006 11:12:19 AM

the history channel show had an interesting point....any drug's legality is based on it's use in the middle class....if many middle classers are using, there is pressure to keep legal or legalize, if not, there is pressure to criminalize

More and more middle classers are taking up the wacky backy (especially as our gen gets older)
so there will be more and more pressure to reform laws.

12/20/2006 11:13:51 AM

the people that are middle class will never be in the high class if they keep spending all their money on reefer

12/20/2006 11:14:46 AM

Quote :

"the history channel show had an interesting point....any drug's legality is based on it's use in the middle class"

i heard that too, but i never heard any supporting data for that statement (maybe i missed it). what drug (other than alcohol) has been legalized after its been illegal for a lengthy period of time?

i can see that working when the middle class wants a drug made illegal..or keeping a current legal drug legal, but has it ever really worked for making an illegal drug legal?



[Edited on December 20, 2006 at 11:17 AM. Reason : d]

12/20/2006 11:16:40 AM

^i've never thought of that....I guess i just assume the history channel is usually accurate.

12/20/2006 11:18:59 AM

the thinning of the herds.

12/20/2006 1:09:20 PM

I wouldn't pretend that our generation is more likely to take up pot smoking than our parents'.
In fact, I think the incidence of use it lower now than it was when they were our age.

I'd doubt usage will increase in the adult population as we get older, it will probably stay about the same. Of course, if it is legalized and people won't be fired from their jobs for it, its usage will go up in all segments of the population, at least initially.

12/20/2006 1:17:30 PM

^but people are finding out that it is nowhere near the problem that it was made out to be even just 20 years ago.

one of the quirks about illegal drugs is that when they're made illegal, it usually halts all research on the drugs in question, so the stigma attached sticks....there have been many independent studies refuting much of the "bad" stigma that surrounded pot, and there will only be more in the future.

[Edited on December 20, 2006 at 2:08 PM. Reason : .]

12/20/2006 2:05:45 PM

well, when i refer to the "bad stigma" im not talking about its health dangers or anything like that...im talking about the stigma of a lazy hippie who contributes nothing to society. true or not, thats that face of marijuana, and its going to take more than independent studies to turn that around.

however, very few people with enough respect and authority to change that stigma are going to be willing to risk their well-being for the cause.

12/20/2006 2:09:16 PM

^in the current climate, I agree....but once the barrier is broken, it will snowball....See Nevada, and i believe that decriminalization was recently upheld in Alaska too. I'm not saying it will be soon, but slowly, marijuana is being seen in a different light. Sure some people will never change their opinion about it, but, it's becoming more and more evident that its not the scourge on society that even alcohol is, and the facts can't be denied forever.

12/20/2006 2:19:59 PM

Don't forget Denver.

12/20/2006 2:29:00 PM

Of course, people in developed regions are more likely to be diagnosed with cancer than people who live in places with poor healthcare.

12/20/2006 2:44:19 PM

^haha didn't even think about that......China's going to be blowing up in about 10 years.

12/20/2006 2:52:53 PM

^^ Or they die of other causes before the cancer gets them.

12/20/2006 3:25:49 PM

All the Australian cancer is caused by dingo dogs.

[Edited on December 20, 2006 at 3:26 PM. Reason : .]

12/20/2006 3:26:02 PM

Quote :

"How are cigarettes legal?"

What is the point in trying to protect people from their own stupidity? As long as I am not inconvenienced with inhaling other people's smoke (which might affect my health), I don't care.

12/20/2006 3:32:55 PM

[Edited on December 20, 2006 at 3:33 PM. Reason : .]

12/20/2006 3:33:11 PM

i despise papa roach but they probably said it best:

its in our nature to destroy ourselves
its in our nature to KILL ourselves
its in our nature to destroy ourselves
its in our nature to KILL KILL KILL

12/20/2006 3:36:51 PM

You know that a lot of people said before some D-list psuedo-goth pop band put it in a song, right?

12/20/2006 3:49:16 PM

Quote :

"How are cigarettes legal?"

money talks

its a reality

12/20/2006 4:03:21 PM

I don't know about ya'll, but I don't want big bro deciding what I should and should not do any more than they already do.

12/20/2006 4:29:24 PM

Quote :

"whats your reasoning behind this? unfortunately, i think the stigma thats associated with pot is going to be hard to shake. "

My reasoning is that eventually the libertarian side of the two parties will unite and be mainstream. It is about then that candidates can endorse policies like that without fear of backlash from the party base.

Eventually there is going to be a viable third party made up of like-minded people, and I'm just praying it is within 25 years

12/20/2006 4:51:53 PM

[Edited on December 20, 2006 at 8:15 PM. Reason : Nevermind.]

12/20/2006 8:14:52 PM

Well, we ARE suffering from overpopulation...

12/20/2006 8:31:40 PM

Yep, too many of you, too few of me.

12/21/2006 12:48:59 AM

i'm pretty sure all those people would have died one way or another...

12/21/2006 1:09:00 AM