Not in Front of the Kids

If smokers in movies set a bad example for the kids, what about smokers in real life? Stephanie Anderson Stroup, former "tobacco prevention coordinator" with the Deschutes County, Oregon, Health Department, defends a proposed ban on smoking in parks on educational grounds. "Our issue here is about modeling safe behavior and making Bend a safe place for kids," she says. "We have to start setting healthy norms in our community."

Stroup is not the first advocate of outdoor smoking bans to use this argument. Given the current agitation about obesity, it may be only a matter of time before fat people, too, are forbidden to show themselves in public.

[Thanks to Linda Stewart for the link.]