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"SMOKING COOL!"

Do you smoke? Well the chances are either you have done or you know someone that does smoke and you haven't given it too much thought as to why they smoke. I know a lot of people who smoke, and despite their personality, however 'sensible' they are, I will always feel that they are in some way letting themself down, and they lose a certain amount of respect in my view. It's a disgusting habit and all cigarette advertising should be banned, the government should outlaw it or at least raise the prices even higher - to something like £10 a packet, to help deter people from buying them.

If you smoke then quit. I know it may be hard to even contemplating giving up smoking, but I really hate the stench, the fowl disgusting aura of people who prefer to kill themselves now. Just phone those quit smoking hotlines, the people can help you! I know that a hell of a lot of people develop cancer as a result of smoking and I also know that the people who do smoke should quit. 'Why should I stop smoking?' Stupid question. Get an education you fool.

I detest everything associated with it. The smell, the scent of death not too far away, and the ethical issues with the cigarette companies - they make an incredible amount of money, and the tobacco growers get paid in potatoes most probably. How much is a packet of fags? Who cares, the price you actually pay isn't in sterling. You're paying your life - so don't go looking for sympathy when you discover you have cancer or something as a result of smoking - have the will power, do the right thing and start trying to quit. Don't give up giving up as they say. And that's the main thing - cut down, treat yourself to something really nice if you manage to leave of the fags for a week, and for your own sake, and your family - don't be so god damn ignorant that you won't even listen to other people's advice.

I'm sure you know someone who smokes, and suffers from health problems as a result. They may have the smokers cough, or similar, and in us women especially - our voices turn deep - like a bloke's. Disgusting. Wrinkles and aging take place faster and smoking people just reek! It's NOT cool, it certainly isn't trendy - it just shows that you don't have the guts to try and give up.

Cigarette smoking makes your clothes smell, make asthma sufferers lives hell, and just seem to be the most anti-social activity there is. 'I only smoke to fit in!' Yeah, but I bet you all do. So, why don't you all quit together and then you'll all fit in again? 'It helps my social life!' B****x. It helps destroy your REAL LIFE.

Forget the swearing, believe you can do it and you will. Don't give up you know it's true.

I have lost some very close family members to what I thought was cancer derived from smoking, it’s not the cigarettes that cause cancer - it’s your lack of will power.

“But I smoke because I enjoy it!” That has to be the most ridiculous thing a person can say – “I kill people because I enjoy it!” same thing – your killing yourself, if you enjoy the coughing, the bad throats, painful headaches, premature aging and that oh so horrid aroma, then well, you’re beyond a joke. Smoking is not cool. It’s an antisocial activity – I’m dead certain many of you probably smoke, just remember it’s never too late to quit – if you’re young and have been bullied into smoking, as many are from peer pressure, then my advice? Seek advice – get help, talk about it to a close friend, a relative, aunt, uncle – don’t let it take your money away.

I don’t want to offend anyone – and I know some really lovely people that smoke, but who am I to tell them how to live their lives? I can’t dictate the way they live but I can help them from dying – so I’m not afraid to have a ‘heated discussion’ about it, and even help them through it.


Here’s some pretty startling factual info – take it in…

• Tobacco use kills around 120,000 people in the UK every year, about 330 every day - as if a jumbo jet crashed every day and killed all its passengers, around 20% of all deaths.

• About half of all regular cigarette smokers will eventually be killed by their habit.

• Smoking causes at least 80% of all deaths from lung cancer, around 80% of all deaths from bronchitis and emphysema and around 17% of all deaths from heart disease.

• Thirty per cent of all cancer deaths can be attributed to smoking.

• Fewer than 10% of lung cancer patients survive five years after diagnosis.

• Men in the 15-64 age group in social class 5 are three times as likely to die of lung cancer as men in social class 1. Women in social class 5 are almost twice as likely to die of lung cancer as women in social class 1.

• Smokers who smoke between 1 and 14 cigarettes a day have eight times the risk of dying from lung cancer compared to non-smokers. Smokers who smoke more than 25 cigarettes a day have 25 times this risk compared to non-smokers.

• Cigarette smoking increases the risk of having a heart attack by two or three times, compared with the risk to non-smokers.

• About 90% of cases of peripheral vascular disease which lead to amputation of one or both legs are caused by smoking - about 2000 amputations a year in the UK.

• Women who smoke and take the contraceptive pill have 10 times the risk of a heart attack, stroke or other cardiovascular disease compared with those who take the pill but are non-smokers. Smoking has also been linked with an increased likelihood of menstrual problems (although not with PMT).

• Smoking leads to an earlier menopause: on average women smokers go through the menopause up to 2 years earlier than non-smokers and are at a greater risk of developing osteoporosis.

• Smoking has been associated with increased sperm abnormalities and with impotence in men.

§ Smoking during pregnancy leads to an increased risk of:

- spontaneous abortion (miscarriage);
- bleeding during pregnancy;
- premature birth;
- low weight of babies at birth (which is associated with greater risks of ill-health and failure to thrive);
- Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (cot death).

• The risks of smoking pipes and cigars compared to cigarettes are difficult to assess - it depends on whether the smoker inhales the smoke or not. Smokers who inhale pipe and cigar smoke are just as much at risk of developing lung cancer as cigarette smokers. All cigar and pipe smokers have a higher risk than anyone else of developing cancers of the lip, mouth and throat. This risk is even greater if the smoker is also a heavy drinker.

• People who smoke and drink alcohol regularly are at greater risk of mouth and throat cancers. One study found that among consumers of both products the risk of these cancers was increased more than 35-fold among those who smoked forty or more cigarettes a day and took more than four alcoholic drinks a day.

• There are some little-publicised health problems associated with smoking. It can affect both your sense of taste and smell. Smokers are more likely to develop facial wrinkles at a younger age and have dental hygiene problems. Stomach ulcers are made worse by smoking, and wounds, including surgical incisions, in smokers take longer to heal.

• Teenage smokers experience more asthma and respiratory symptoms than non-smokers, suffer poorer health, have more school absences and are less fit.

• Giving up smoking can reduce the risk of developing many of these problems. Within 10-15 years of giving up smoking, an ex-smoker's risk of developing lung cancer is only slightly greater than that of a non-smoker. A young smoker suffering from bronchitis or emphysema who gives up may see some improvement in lung function as a result: damage to lungs caused by years of smoking is permanent but quitting smoking prevents it worsening.

• It is estimated that several hundred cases of lung cancer and several thousand cases of heart disease in non-smokers in the UK every year are caused by passive smoking.

• Exposure to other people's tobacco smoke has also been linked with the following health problems in adults:

- increased sensitivity and reduced lung function in asthmatics;
- irritation of the eye, nose and throat;
- reduced lung function in adults with no chronic chest problems.

• Passive smoking also harms babies and children, with an increased risk of lower respiratory tract infection, increased severity of asthma symptoms, more frequent occurrence of chronic coughs, phlegm and wheezing, and increased risk of cot death and chronic middle ear effusion (glue ear).

• More than 17,000 children under the age of five are admitted to hospital every year because of the effects of passive smoking.

Don’t die from this, please.

Banning smoking is completely out of the question.

I'm not saying this because I'm a smoker - I'm not - but banning anything people enjoy doing doesn't work.

The main example of this is prohibition-when the government banned alcohol in America. This let in the criminals who supplied alcohol illegally. To this day they still haven't got the mafia out.

The same is true of illegal drugs over here. They can't be bought legally so they are bought from criminals, who cut them with all kinds of rubbish like washing powder.

Banning cigarettes would simply invite criminals to take over the country and make smoking even more dangerous than it already is.

Thing is, you are listening, you just don't choose to hear what's being said, hence the incredible response from Sally's topic - why hasn't she claimed her film yet for ages ago?

No one has won a prize from the discussions here, suggesting that it's a stale topic, but it isn't, or is it?

We all live together, smoking doesn't make people aggressive, insane (with exception to Goatboy), antisocial drugs are a far worse aspect of life - these do more harm than smoking.

I hate the fact that alcohol and nicotine are described as social drugs anyway, but they aren't nearly as much a problem as illegal drugs.

I agree with my old PE teacher - he nearly played for Leeds, got rejected and instead became one of the best teachers I know, he despises smoking - the smell, the whole situation, I totally agree, but you cannot hate a smoker, just because he or she or it, decides to smoke - nobody's perfect are they.

Let's throw eggs at old people anyway.

But we all

How many smokers think of non-smokers?

The same amount of people that drink and think of non-drinkers, drivers that think of non-drivers and mobile phone users that think of non-mobile phone users.

I treat all of these people with the respect they deserve.

It's not illegal, it's an addiction and, more importantly, it doesn't matter one little bit.

I'll tell you how warped people's perception of what matters and what doesn't has become.

This thread is huge, yet I posted one about the UK Government dealing Arms, with facts, figures and a website operated by the MOD, and 1 reply.

THAT is wrong, not me smoking a fag in my own time, where I want, when I want.

Go preach somewhere else, cos I ain't listening.

Yeah I agree with you that its there choice and if they enjoy it then its up to them. Also without it we would need to raise the money the government gets from it from somewhere else. But one thing is smoking dosn't just harm those doing it, passive smoking is also a serious problem, so how many of you smokers actually think of others before you light up?

Cheers Dan.

"My life, I do what I want with it".

Anyway, my packs of ciggies say "May cause birth defects", so I'm ok with these ones.

The game of 'chicken' is a stupidly named 'game', because it is stupid. People, mostly the uninformed children - they don't really think about the risks or consequences - jump out in front of trains, trying not to get hit.

Why do they do it? Because they get a thrill? It could harm people, it might not necessarily, but do they feel better for doing it?

Playing this game could kill them, maybe if they thought about who it was affecting, what the potential knock on affects could be - maybe they'd stop and realise how stupid it is.

Is smoking like playing 'chicken'? Do most smokers REALLY know how much harm they're doing to themselves AND the environment in which they pollute? Playing 'chicken' 'could' kill people, but smoking 'will' kill you.

So why do it? "Because we enjoy it".

I don't want to take it out on Goatboy, no one can persuade him to change his ways, and lets face it - without smokers, there'd be no non smokers - the government would have no money from taxing, and the health service would shoot up for your £££, but then, how much would we need to use it?

Anyway, do as you choose, eat obscene amounts of lard out of a bucket with cockroaches if you 'enjoy' doing it, maybe even throw eggs at police officers, if you 'enjoy' doing it, your choice, your life, you do as you please.

There is one thing I don't get, any smokers out there may be able to help me on this one. The packet says "Smoking seriously damages your health" so why do you do it? If someone gave you a knife and said stab yourself, it seriously damages your health you wouldn't do it so why smoke??

I can't quit smokin. Watchin the replay on Crazy Taxi 2 when I've just got a high score would be ruined without a thick, curling Benson & Hedges!

Just don't start smoking in the first place! MAke up some excuse if you are forced.

Tony gave up smoking, I think everyone can give up smoking, it aint big it aint hard, its a killer!