Reason Magazine
- reason.com
- reason.tv
- reason.org
- Donate
- Site Search:
Reason on Facebook
Reason on Twitter
Reason on YouTube
Reason RSSGet Reason E-mail Updates!
Manage your Reason e-mail list subscriptionsadvertisements
If the Bus Is A-Smokin', Don't Come A-Pokin'
Edmonton bar owner Tony Burke has found a creative way around the city's new smoking ban: a remodeled bus where customers can go to light up out of the cold. Since the bus has wheels instead of a foundation, it's not covered by the smoking ordinance. (Just to be on the safe side, Burke registered it in his own name, rather than the business's.) "Despite the loophole," reports the Globe and Mail, "Edmonton Mayor Stephen Mandel has told reporters that bars should comply with the spirit of the law."
As Scott McCormick notes over at Northern Exposure, the spirit of the law is the spirit of intolerance:
The standard "public health" argument seems dubious in this case...People entering the butt bus are clearly making the decision to go in knowing it is specifically designed for smoking, and the bus serves no other explicit purpose except as a venue for smoking (you can't bring a drink on it). Of course, if your real goal is to stop people from deciding how they use their own bodies, you're failing--which is why this case nicely exposes the fact that the public health argument isn't the true motivation for many of the anti-smoking nannies.
To be more precise, it exposes the fact that the activists and officials who support smoking bans do not distinguish between public health and private health. Their main goal has always been to discourage smoking, which they believe directly threatens "the public health" by exposing smokers themselves to the risk of disease. According to this view--which, unfortunately, has become "the standard 'public health' argument"--everything you do that might lead to disease or injury, from driving unbuckled to eating too much, is the government's business.
|12.16.05 @ 1:53PM|#
According to this view--which, unfortunately, has become
"the standard 'public health' argument"--everything you do that
might lead to disease or injury, from driving unbuckled to eating
too much, is the government's business.
Well duh. Since you and everything you do is interstate commerce,
the government's had that base covered since Wickard v.
Filburn.
|12.16.05 @ 1:54PM|#
According to this view--which, unfortunately, has become
"the standard 'public health' argument"--everything you do that
might lead to disease or injury, from driving unbuckled to eating
too much, is the government's business.
It is because they pay for our health care and they have a right to
save us money on taxes by making us live healthy.
|12.16.05 @ 2:03PM|#
Yes, Juan, the "government" pays for our healthcare. They harvest the fresh dollar bills each spring.
|12.16.05 @ 2:04PM|#
It is because they pay for our health care and they have a
right to save us money on taxes by making us live
healthy.
Who are "they"? I pay the taxes that they
use to fund health care. They don't pay for anything. All
they do is run the (crappy) system.
|12.16.05 @ 2:08PM|#
Thanks Juan for pointing out a major negative of public healthcare. It gives politicians the perceived right to control just about everything you do.
|12.16.05 @ 2:10PM|#
jaydee-
I'm pretty sure Juan is a caricature. There's no need to argue with
him.
Ed|12.16.05 @ 2:15PM|#
I love the story's punchline:
"I'm not one to care about civil liberties and all that, but this
is getting out of hand."
|12.16.05 @ 2:16PM|#
A private solution to a government imposed problem. I'm sure the mayor will find a way to get Tony off his butt and on his toes again. Give 'im hell Tony!
Dave W.|12.16.05 @ 2:37PM|#
I think it was good when the federal government made cigarette companies use prominent warning labels. They should have done that sooner. After that, people should be free to choose. Risks are great, so long as they are disclosed. They oughtta leave the butt bus alone.
|12.16.05 @ 2:39PM|#
So, are we gonna have a H&R "Smoke-In" down in DC soon,
considering the council's latest great idea? Holla, holla.
I'll bring the matches.
|12.16.05 @ 2:44PM|#
I, for one, look forward to a future where I will be able to board a bus in order to partake of foodstuffs that have corn syrup in them.
|12.16.05 @ 2:49PM|#
mediageek-
Maybe I'll run into you on the Corn Syrup Express.
I'd just better be sure to leave my firearm at home. It might go
off when I bump into you.
|12.16.05 @ 2:49PM|#
Unfortunately most of America looks at smoking the same way Canada does (at least it seems like to me). Smokers are looked at as second class citizens, and I don�t think that will ever change. All we can do is make sure the government does not go too far with nanny laws that tell people how to live their lives.
keith|12.16.05 @ 2:58PM|#
I support this smoking bus idea so long as the people who run it allow me to bring my children on board and don't expect me to keep them quiet while they are on there. I mean, I HAVE to bring them. It would be irresponsible to leave my 5-year-old sitting at the bar byhimelf for so long.
Timothy|12.16.05 @ 2:59PM|#
I'd just better be sure to leave my firearm at home. It
might go off when I bump into you.
Wouldn't you be able to use the twinkie defense in this case?
|12.16.05 @ 2:59PM|#
If I wanted to enter the bus and enjoy the company of friends, I have a right to a smoke-free atmosphere, and others have no right to endanger my health.
|12.16.05 @ 3:03PM|#
"All we can do is make sure the government does not go too far
with nanny laws that tell people how to live their lives."
Hey Zeiner, how are things up there on Mars?
|12.16.05 @ 3:20PM|#
"If the Bus Is A-Smokin', Don't Come A-Pokin'"
Pokemon is a Rastafarian proctologist.
|12.16.05 @ 3:21PM|#
If I wanted to enter the bus and enjoy the company of
friends, I have a right to a smoke-free atmosphere, and others have
no right to endanger my health.
When I was teaching I had a colleague explain this to me in all
sincerity: the reason she supported state no-smoking laws was
because her non-smoking self should be allowed to go into ANY bar
she pleased, without having to smell cigarette smoke. (Hell, by
that token, maybe *I* should have the right to go into any bar I
wish without having to listen to country music.)
Not that this has anything to do with anything else, but at the
time she was a 35-year-old ex-lawyer who had yet to move out of her
parent's house. (And I suspect she may have been a virgin, though I
cannot prove this.)
|12.16.05 @ 3:27PM|#
thoreau,
Will that be after you tell us the long and boring tale of what you
did at work today?
|12.16.05 @ 3:30PM|#
"I also have the right to never be exposed to karaoke."
Correct-a-mundo. I retain the right to not be exposed to women who
won't put out after five drinks.
|12.16.05 @ 3:32PM|#
I retain the right to not be exposed to women who won't put
out after five drinks.
Unfortunately, Jamie, this conflicts with my right to not
be exposed to men who think five lousy drinks are worth sex with
me. Whatever shall we do?
|12.16.05 @ 3:35PM|#
"Unfortunately, Jamie, this conflicts with my right to not be
exposed to men who think five lousy drinks are worth sex with me.
Whatever shall we do?"
Get a bottle of Jack, come up to my condo and stick in some porno.
"King Schlong" do for ya?
|12.16.05 @ 3:36PM|#
I love the butt-bus idea for a temporary solution but I was thinking someone should invent something like a plastic bubble connected to a vacuum system, kind of like the Cone of Silence, for smoking in bars. It would need to connect to your neighbor's so you could invite someone to join you. Actually, having a limited number of multi-person cones might even be a great way to get people socializing - hey mind if I join you in your cone of cancer? For tables perhaps a large "umbrella of silence" type device would work (scroll down at the above link for a prototype :) kinda looks like that is what it's being used for in the picture, actually...).
|12.16.05 @ 3:38PM|#
When I lived in DC, there was a "Smoke-In" every July 4th. Don't tell me they've done away with that Vincente. Of course, it wasn't really for cigarettes, but that's neither here nor there.
|12.16.05 @ 3:40PM|#
Brian, it is funny that you should mention that.
Bowery Ballroom in Manhattan had installed a $300,000 ventilation
system designed to pull smoke up and out of the club so that people
could see the stage unobstructed by smoke and also so that
secondhand smoke wouldn't be much of an issue. Despite their
petition, they were not exempted from the NYC smoking ban.
|12.16.05 @ 3:41PM|#
This reminds me of the recent nude dancing bus incident in
Tampa. The city passed an ordinance requiring nude dancers to be
six feet or more from patrons. However, the ordinance was based on
the city's zoning authority. Buses aren't real property, so there's
some gray area for the defense counsel to play with. I wonder if
they were smoking inside the bus, too?
Maybe Libertarians should scrap the Free-State Project and just
start living in RVs.
|12.16.05 @ 3:42PM|#
Correct-a-mundo. I retain the right to not be exposed to
women who won't put out after five drinks.
Absolutely. That's where a warning label is truly needed.
|12.16.05 @ 3:47PM|#
Women have the right to not be exposed to men so icky that even five drinks won't render them attractive.
|12.16.05 @ 3:50PM|#
Women have the right to not be exposed to men so icky that
even five drinks won't render them attractive.
Heh heh. True enough Jennifer, but at least you don't need warning
labels to let know know who those guys are. :)
|12.16.05 @ 3:54PM|#
At Hillsdale College, even our "boo government" stances are
swaying when it comes to smoking. Smoking was still allowed in
classrooms up until about 1999-2000 (when ashtrays were still in
the rooms), but no one lights up in class anymore.
Though we still allow smoking in the student union, a new student
union is being built (smoke-free), and they're tearing down the old
one.
It's a travesty. My once-libertarian college is now unabashedly
right-wing-Christian and takes in loco parentis far too
seriously.
|12.16.05 @ 3:54PM|#
What H&R needs is more references to cupcakes and corn syrup. I'm serious. It cracks me up every time I see them. I'm not kidding.
|12.16.05 @ 4:05PM|#
Did anybody besides yours truly think James Thurber's War
Between the Sexes series was funny?
(Judging by the immediately foregoing, smoking leads to sex, or, at
least, thoughts thereof.)
|12.16.05 @ 4:18PM|#
"But I'm hot. Smokin' hot. Even after only two
drinks."
I'm sorry, there's no smokin' allowed in here.
|12.16.05 @ 4:19PM|#
"When I was teaching I had a colleague explain this to me in all
sincerity: the reason she supported state no-smoking laws was
because her non-smoking self should be allowed to go into ANY bar
she pleased, without having to smell cigarette smoke."
I should be able to go into anyone's HOUSE I please, etc. etc
...
Jennifer, this story about your colleague made me want to whack her
straight in the forehead with a nine-inch stiletto heel, but it
sounds like her life is already pathetic enough. That thought alone
will just have to comfort me.
|12.16.05 @ 4:19PM|#
I retain the right to not be exposed to women who won't put
out after five drinks.
Heh. I think most women will put out after 5 drinks...given the
right man.
|12.16.05 @ 4:31PM|#
Bowery Ballroom in Manhattan had installed a $300,000
ventilation system designed to pull smoke up and out of the club so
that people could see the stage unobstructed by smoke and also so
that secondhand smoke wouldn't be much of an issue. Despite their
petition, they were not exempted from the NYC smoking
ban.
Obviously, this piddling effort had nothing to do with
protecting the health of innocent bar-goers, which was the purpose
of the smoking ban.
(Why, yes, I'm being sarcastic and have a burr up my
ass...)
|12.16.05 @ 4:33PM|#
Jennifer, this story about your colleague made me want to
whack her straight in the forehead with a nine-inch stiletto heel,
but it sounds like her life is already pathetic enough. That
thought alone will just have to comfort me.
True story, Pirate Jo: after she said this, and after I explained
to her my libertarian reasoning for letting business owners decide
for themselves whether or not to allow smoking. . . . she accused
me of being selfish.
|12.16.05 @ 4:38PM|#
"Maybe I'll run into you on the Corn Syrup
Express.
I'd just better be sure to leave my firearm at home. It might
go off when I bump into you."
Corn Syrup Express to Accidental Discharge Town!
/that was a lot funnier in my head.
|12.16.05 @ 4:50PM|#
she accused me of being selfish.
So, your point is that you beat Pirate Jo to the stiletto
heel-punch? ;)
|12.16.05 @ 4:51PM|#
mediageek,
Did you mean to say, "Corn Syrup Express to Premature Discharge
Town!"
yuk yuk
|12.16.05 @ 5:05PM|#
So, your point is that you beat Pirate Jo to the stiletto
heel-punch? ;)
I would have, if I hadn't been suddenly paralyzed by a crippling
attack of cognitive dissonance.
Plus I was dressed in a very teacherly way: sensible shoes, not
stilettos.
|12.16.05 @ 5:20PM|#
Plus I was dressed in a very teacherly way
Ahhhh! Stop teasing us. :)~ Ok, so I know it wasn't your intention
- but it just reminds me of my crush on my 7th grade health teacher
who was, well, "smokin' hot" yet always dressed very teacherly.
|12.16.05 @ 5:25PM|#
They tried the bus trick in Ireland when the smoking ban came in but the authorities were having none of it.
|12.16.05 @ 5:32PM|#
(And I suspect she may have been a virgin, though I cannot
prove this.)
Jennifer, she's no longer a virgin. She's here with me... smoking a
cigarette.
|12.16.05 @ 5:35PM|#
Ruthless,
James Thurber was a genius!
Mrs. Glitt doesn't like him at all but she married me so how
discerning can she be?
Thomas Paine's Goiter|12.16.05 @ 5:47PM|#
I also have the right to never be exposed to
karaoke
West Virginiaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
Moutain mamaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
Take me hooooooooooooooooooooooome
Country rooooooooooooads
|12.16.05 @ 5:48PM|#
Brian Courts:
I love the butt-bus idea for a temporary solution but I was
thinking someone should invent something like a plastic bubble
connected to a vacuum system, kind of like the Cone of Silence, for
smoking in bars.
I like this idea but I think the bubbles should be for the
non-smokers.
|12.16.05 @ 5:56PM|#
For those who voted or would vote for banning smoking in
privately owned establishments I have just one question.
Say there was a ballot in your city requiring all privately owned
establishments to allow smoking with no restrictions.
If it passed and all bars and restaurants were thus forced to allow
people to smoke where they wanted, would you rethink the whole idea
of voting on what other people can and can't allow on their
property?
|12.16.05 @ 6:09PM|#
Bobster,
C'mon, man! Don't make them be intellectually consistent. That's
just plain mean.
|12.16.05 @ 6:12PM|#
Bobster,
I like this idea but I think the bubbles should be for the
non-smokers.
Perhaps, but I might have to take up smoking if that happens. :)
Actually I've had a few cigarettes (average less than 2 per year,
hence my non-smoker status notwithstanding) in bars over the years
because, well, it can actually enhance a good drink. Though for
long-term health and fitness reasons I severely restrict my
indulgences to very rare occasions.
But back to the cones, maybe we can call them Cones-of-Safety and
they can be sound, smoke, and fire-proof, opaque and padded. That
way nobody has to hear karaoke or country music or cheesy pick-up
lines; nobody has to look at ugly people in ill-fitting attire;
nobody has so smell (or smell like) cigarettes; and nobody will get
hurt if they fall down or are involved in a car accident on the way
to the bar. They can leave home and have a perfectly sterile, safe
and boring evening without requiring that everyone else do so as
well. ;)
|12.16.05 @ 6:14PM|#
Better get another name for the butt-buss. In Frisco they might get the wrong idea.
|12.16.05 @ 6:36PM|#
Andy:
People have actually called me �mean� when I ask them questions
like this. I always tell them that I am indeed about average.
Brian:
Sounds like a great idea. The problem may be that
we don't have the technology to make this work. Don't worry I have
a back up plan.
Everyone who wants to exist forever, never being offended, or hurt
or having any fun what-so-ever can opt for the "Padded room under
guard" option. They can simply sit in the padded room being fed by
tubes full of healthy food with no taste. The guards will make sure
nobody comes near the room to disturb or upset the occupant. Man,
that would be sweeet!
|12.16.05 @ 7:37PM|#
NoStar: LOL
Not a problem. My Cone-Of-Safety will protect me from their wrong
idea!
Wintermute|12.16.05 @ 10:05PM|#
Smokers didn't use to be considered second-class citizens, but
then we used to have Jimi Hendrix, and now we got 50-Cent.
Studies were done a long time ago that showed smokers cost
government less than non-smokers, because non-smokers live longer
on average and collect more Social Security, which is greater than
what smokers cost in increased medicals. The problem has been that
the states have to share Medicaid costs, but do not reap the
savings from SS. Which is why the big lawsuit was
state-instigated.
|12.16.05 @ 10:25PM|#
As long as there's publicly funded healthcare, there will be the
question of what to spend the money on, since there are more
possible medical procedures than there are neccesary/desirable
ones. So you've got 3 choices:
1) Fund everything, allow everything, nonsmokers get soaked by
smokers
2) Don't fund lung cancer treatment for smokers (and insert other
procedures brought on by sinfulness), get voted out of office
3) Fund everything, ban sinful activity
Clearly, (2) isn't an option for an elected official. So they're
trying (3).
|12.17.05 @ 8:20AM|#
TPG, you just crossed a line. I just sent the moderator an email about your violation of my rights.
|12.17.05 @ 9:54AM|#
bigbigslacker,
If you had purchased a Cone-of-Safety you would not have noticed
your rights being violated. It seems to me that any rights
violations that occurred are your own fault for paying attention.
Turn yourself in to the authorities immediately! :-)
|12.17.05 @ 10:15AM|#
C'mon, man! Don't make them be intellectually consistent.
That's just plain mean.
Yeah, they hate that.
|12.17.05 @ 11:41AM|#
Always gotta have a nigger. Black people had civil rights and King, so now it's smokers and gays.
|12.17.05 @ 1:34PM|#
"Always gotta have a n-----. Black people had civil rights and
King, so now it's smokers and gays."
If smokers are treated like gays, when will the Supreme Court issue
a decision upholding a right for consenting adults to smoke? When
will government officials start presiding at commitment ceremonies
between smokers and tobacco companies?
|12.17.05 @ 2:54PM|#
For some reason I'm freaked out by all the sex talk from people on this blog. I'm used to thinking of all of you as faceless talking heads. Now I'm picturing numerous people going up to random women in bars and saying "Hey baby, I'd like to privatize *your* social security," or many other pseudo-libertarian pickup lines.
|12.17.05 @ 3:17PM|#
". . . or many other pseudo-libertarian pickup lines."
How about "You must be with the Federal Reserve, because you've
raised my interest."
|12.17.05 @ 5:03PM|#
"Their main goal has always been to discourage smoking, which
they believe directly threatens "the public health" by exposing
smokers themselves to the risk of disease"
Discouraging smoking may have been their original intent, but now
that they have cushy public-sector jobs and no marketable skills,
their main goal will be to keep their silly, busy-body jobs.
|12.17.05 @ 5:15PM|#
money quote:
�This city is becoming so . . . communist. You'd think we lived in
freaking Toronto or something.�
|12.17.05 @ 6:06PM|#
Brings a new meaning to bumming a smoke on the butt bus.
Surely the cancer-getting fans abord the bus should be drinking
too!
I mean, let's speed up the suiciding effort in there, eh?
Rick Giombetti|12.19.05 @ 2:47PM|#
Back in Novemer a comprehensive smoking ban was passed here in
Washington state. It's really stupid. Obviously, a downtown Seattle
Starbucks has a different product and customer base than a Pioneer
Square area bar in Seattle. This law is not going to change who
patronizes the bar I frequent after professional sporting events in
the Pioneer Square area. So people who used to smoke in the bar,
with no other customers complaining about it, are now forced to go
outside and smoke because of the Health Uber Alles Partisans.
People don't go to bars to get healthy and this is something the
Health Nazis don't get.
A few days ago a neighbor of mine was having her customary smoke in
the doorway of my apartment building in the Belltown area of
Seattle. I then realized that she was violating the smoking ban's
requirement that smokers be at least 25 feet from the doorways of
public buildings to have their smokes. I then jokingly started
reminding her to get at least 25 feet away from the buildings main
doorway, or that I would call in the Health Police to cite her for
her violation.
I think a good joke initiative to put on the ballot would be to
call for the construction of concentration camps for smokers, since
it is the only way non-smokers can be guaranteed that they won't be
exposed by even the sight of a smoker. Actually, that might not be
such a good idea. The Health Nazis would all vote for that one and
see to it that is zealously enforced also.
|12.21.05 @ 11:47AM|#
Butt Bus is Leaving:
In the newspaper this morning, the City told him to get rid of it
because "It hasn't been Approved". By-law officers delived a letter
to him citing "a number of concerns."
Got him by the short 'n curlies. I swear, this country is going
Communist. :-(
The sad part is, I'm not suprised...
Site comments/questions:
Media Inquiries and Reprint Permissions:
(310) 367-6109
Editorial & Production Offices:
3415 S. Sepulveda Blvd.
Suite 400
Los Angeles, CA 90034
(310) 391-2245