If you’re indignant that your boss just shut the smoking room and outraged that you have to leave the bar to light up, take heart. Life could be worse. You could be Bhutanese. The tiny, trendy Himalayan kingdom recently became the world’s first nonsmoking nation. Since Dec. 17, it has been illegal to smoke in public or sell tobacco. Violators are fined the equivalent of $232—more than two months’ salary in Bhutan. Authorities heralded the ban by igniting a bonfire of cigarette cartons in the capital, Thimphu, and stringing banners across the main thoroughfare, exhorting people to kick the habit. As if they have a choice.
Meddling with an issue as personal as smoking is always tricky, and politicians err at their own peril. Yet Bhutan’s ban appears to be sticking and with little public outcry. Even the country’s smokers seem resigned to a smoke-free future. “If you can’t get it, you can’t smoke it,” concludes Tshewang Dendup, who works for Bhutan’s only broadcaster. He picked up his smoking habit while studying at Berkeley, but says he is now rapidly “downsizing” his consumption. So, how has Bhutan managed to pull off a nationwide smoking ban while other nations dither? Bhutan is a Buddhist nation, and many Buddhists believe smoking is bad for their karma. Then again, Sri Lanka and Thailand are also predominantly Buddhist, and plenty of people smoke there. Bhutanese officials say that, by banning tobacco, they hope to set an example for the rest of the world. Ireland recently banned smoking in public places, though the sale of tobacco remains legal. Other European countries, such as Norway, are enacting less-stringent smoking bans.
As an ex-smoker I know how difficult it is to quit. Yet there is something to be said for quitting on your own, cold turkey. This however, sets a slippery precedent, and it doesn’t take much imagination to see where it can lead.
Meh..Quitting smoking is easy. I’ve done it dozens of times.
But how will they pay for health care?
/no pun intended
Looks like it’s black market time in Bhutan. Just think of the wonderful business opportunities. We’ve already seen how well prohibition works here in the US.
This should go over about as well as One Armed Sam’s Shark Repellent.
Somehow there’s always someone around with a box of genuine Cohibas or Bolivas here in the US.
But opium is cheaper than ice cream…
right?
Their country.. their rules…
Why should we bother??
Living where smoking is not encouraged socially helped me quit. Smoking is one of those things like obesity that should be frowned upon.
This however, sets a slippery precedent, and it doesn’t take much imagination to see where it can lead. /// I guess I need some help on this. They now have prohibition and it could lead to the USA? to the growth in Organized Crime and repeal? to the above and NOT learn anything about leaving people alone==oops, I already said USA.
Every government makes ingesting something illegal.
Silly Hoomans.
Its fair enough to take the argument that all prohibtion doesn’t work. But at least if there was one candidate drug that could maybe be perfect for prohibtion it would be tobacco.
Tobacco kills everyone, and even if it does criminalize a whole bunch of people at least it will actually save lives as compared to the prohibtion we have to deal with.
#9–eaze==so you prefer the tyranny of others over the right to be ruled by your own stupidity?
Nice attitude for living in the home of the free.
Second hand smoke kills. Why should I accept someone shortening my life in a public place? Smoke at home, kill your own family. The smoking ban in MN has done wonders, even decreasing the percentage of bar/restaurant bankruptcies since it’s inception. So much for the ruining businesses argument…
If I was Bhutanese I wouldn’t care about a tobacco ban. Weed literally grows wild everywhere.
Tobacco is actually a medicinal herb, “when used correctly”.
Anarchy and Chaos is the only true freedom.
Dumb Dumb Dumb. Now they just created a black market for criminals to exploit.
“Second hand smoke kills. Why should I accept someone shortening my life in a public place?”
If you don’t hold title to the property you have no rights. Oh wait you think you own everything.
#10:
If I own the building, it’s not a public place. Shove off.
“decreasing the percentage of bar/restaurant bankruptcies”
I’d bet the crashing economy has done more to keep bars in business than a smoking ban.
So I’ll be the first to say it. The average altitude of Bhutan is 7,554m. I guess most people can’t imagine that daily life in this third world country at that altitude probably doesn’t support any indigenous smokers anyway. The government is probably just trying to keep the filthy, slimy habit from getting a foothold. Nothing wrong with that. Possibly trying to avoid people who can’t breath becoming wards of the state like they are elsewhere.
I grew up in the era when doctors promoted brands of cigarettes on TV. (Two out of three doctors recommended Lucky Strikes but Camels were easier on your T Zone. I was in the third grade when a classmate with asthma was allowed to go to the teacher’s lounge to smoke a cig if he felt an attack coming on. And my doc in the Army told me as long as I walked a mile a day, smoking wouldn’t hurt me. “I’d walk a mile for a Camel!”) But, thankfully, during my time in med school I gave ’em up. One of the hardest things I ever did and, to this day, there are still times I crave one. I watch as government tells us how bad tobacco is for us and then taxes the product heavily in order to finance government. WTF??? I praise the banning of smoking in public because that is shared space. I’ve been to Bhutan and didn’t see that many smokers there so maybe the habit is not yet deeply ingrained. Here in Thailand, there are already laws against smoking in restaurants. Try that in Laos where the French left behind a stroing tradition of puffing away. I say hurrah to Bhutan for a bold initiative. Those who simply MUST smoke will find a way and the next generation will likely grow up smoke free.
This is precisely why tobacco will not be banned nationwide here in the USA anytime soon.
Real progress will be made when they ban rap music.
It is refreshing to see an Honest government. The rest of them prefer backdoor prohibitions and stealing morality taxes from those addicted, to fund golf courses and daycare centers. All the while hoping the number of those who smoke never declines thus killing off the golden goose.
The MSA deal and cigarette taxation backed by investments from the cigarette patch industry and its gangsterist lobbies, are about as low a water mark as politics has ever seen in gauging ethics and integrity. The incredibly ridiculous fraud they call second and now third hand smoke, were invented to sign up the rest of the population to vent their legislation suppressed bigotry against smokers. A kind of science which was invented by the Nazis for their protection rackets, which smells a lot worse than the smoke in the Bingo halls.
Countries who deliberately develop bigotry to illicit profit are fodder for the same black markets and corruptions as we saw in the prohibition days. For America that corruption is as ingrained as the misguided notion that by electing a Black Prez. so ends racism. While the targets are no longer based in racial variants smoking and obesity and a long list of future favorites, are just another target for the medical community to repeat their historical tendencies of killing by bandwagon promotion, many more than they will ever save.
If people in the majority don’t like smoking, BAN IT!!! and be honest. The only people holding us back with all the whimpering of prohibition blues are the medical charities and rent seeking lobbies sucking billions out of our healthcare budgets every year. While blaming smokers for the costs when the economists and real numbers tell us; smokers actually save us a fortune by dying prematurely.
Does it follow any stretch of credibility; if we get everyone to quit smoking we will save money with more elderly people, living longer? Somehow their claims just don’t hold water when you take the time to look.
Be honest and ban them or shut the hell up because I am sick to death of money sucking hypocrites calling themselves medical charities and public health “authorities” robbing me blind.
I didn’t vote for them, did you?
Banning smoking is a great idea. In fact, more so even that banning heroine or pot or whatever, because unlike heroine or pot, people can only do so much to smoke illicitly, and if they do, they just won’t be able to do is very often. As Nimby says, even if people in the current generation continue to smoke, the next generation won’t.
#20–Kevin==how are you affected by a sin tax if you don’t engage in the heavily taxed activity?
An honest government is better than a dishonest one unless they are honestly imposing one version of morality over another without much behind it.
Cigarettes may be less addictive enough and too complicated for home grown activities so it might even work===in Bhutan. What more than PROHIBITION do you need to know about before thinking that a government should not outlaw things that many people, even if not a majority but ESPECIALLY when there are a majority of people, that want prohibited substances and activities.
I’d rather a FREEDOM supporting government than an honest one==but why not have both?
#20, kevin,
… blaming smokers for the costs when the economists and real numbers tell us; smokers actually save us a fortune by dying prematurely.
Bullpoop !!!
If you wish to die younger, go for it. What smokers conveniently ignore is the effect their smoking has upon other people. Second hand smoke has been shown to be carcinogenic. That means your smoke may end up killing someone else. Someone who does care about living.
Another place I will never be going to visit.
The number of statists in this thread is alarming.
Hey, let’s ban ice cream, because it makes people fat and die. Better yet, lets ban cars, because people driving them pose a danger to all of us just trying to enjoy the “public space.”
#23. and smokers generally wind up costing the medical system lots of $$$ before they croak.
presumably in the Perfect Libertarian State they will be left by the side of the road to die, but we in the Nanny State insist upon trying to save/prolong their lives.
smokers on Medicare/caid pick the pockets of taxpayers, smokers on private insurance pick the pockets of others insured by the same company, smokers without insurance pick the pockets of everyone who pays the shifted costs.
like they say – freedom ain’t free.
I’d support such a ban in the US, too. (with a slow phase-out, of course.)
I also understand that this will never happen, and puts me at odds with the many legalize drugs guys on this board.
Obama is a smoker. He received a ton of votes in the election. McCain didn’t even bother to try to raise the subject as an issue.
No one really cares about smoking as an issue.
I don’t get it. Why the hell don’t they make Nicotine and any other adictive substancase a ‘controled substance.’ and ban that instead of the ciggarettes.
Ohh… Nooo… that would make sense.
Damn Liberal commie wackos and conservative corporate whore Nazi’s getting in the way of common sense.
47% literacy rate, smallest economy in the world, the current king postponed ascending to the throne 2 years because of astrology. Yep, a well run country.
ROFL