Advocacy Group Lauds Brookhaven Town Beach Smoking Ban

Michael J. McFadden July 22, 2012 at 03:03 am

"protects the health of community members"? I'd like to openly challenge this "Tobacco Action Coalition" Coordinator (How much does he get paid btw, and is it by the taxpayers?) to produce even a single study showing any harm to health from the levels and durations of exposure to outdoor smoke that would commonly be experienced at a beach or in a park. NOTE: I'm asking for a STUDY: Not a generalized "report" or "website" or "advocacy fact sheet" or "authoritative statement" or "article." An actual scientific study showing harm.
I make that challenge because I know that no such study exists. Applying the EPA Report research on secondhand smoke to situations at beaches and parks, even if we assume that you go to such places EVERY SINGLE DAY and happen to have the bad fortune (and judgment) of walking through a "cloud of smokers" every one of those days, the EPA's figures predict it would take you, on the average, roughly 250 MILLION years to get lung cancer. How many times do you think you'd get mugged in 250 million years while the beach and park cops were chasing after smokers? Michael J. McFadden Author of "Dissecting Antismokers' Brains"

Donna D July 22, 2012 at 02:18 pm

I am not worried about the second hand smoke..but the butts all over the place really make the place look nasty.

Michael J. McFadden July 22, 2012 at 02:39 pm

Donna, on that I would totally agree! I think a crackdown on littering with steep fines would go a long way toward solving that problem on the beaches. You should be aware that that in at least one area where the question came up in California the santitation people examined the problem and concluded that many (most?) of the butts on the beaches were being washed up from storm water runoff.
The smoking bans in the bars etc were sending a lot of smokers out on the sidewalks and a lot of them were littering out there and the butts were getting washed down the sewers and then up on the beaches. The cheapest and quickest and surest way to clean the beaches up would have been by amending the smoking ban so that bars or restaurants that wanted to allow smoking could do so: voila! Most of those smokers would be back inside and the beaches would be cleaner. Strangely enough, the Representative who'd made the loudest noises about the beach litter refused to even respond to the suggestion: he wasn't so much worried about the litter... he simply had a history of voting for every antismoking bill in site and the litter issue was a convenient excuse to turn the screw on the smokers again! - MJM

AJ July 29, 2012 at 08:29 pm

I wish they can ban smoking at my kids bus stop, the parents keep the cigarets behind there back like that will stop us from smelling it....yuk!

Michael J. McFadden August 3, 2012 at 10:36 am

Well, a little over a week ago I went to the website of the antismoking group challenged here and left a note on their contact form:
=== Tobacco Action Coalition of Long Island I would not want it to look like you deliberately avoided responding to a public question, so in case you hadn't checked on it, I thought I should recommend you read my posting at: {HERE} === As you'll note: not even an ATTEMPT at offering a study to back up their claims: as noted, they simply do NOT exist. - MJM

Mema September 3, 2012 at 09:45 pm

I'm a smoker and I take my garbage to the garbage can with buts in it. I don't throw buts around my property and do not throw them around publicly. I'm sure there are plenty of smokers like me. Maybe they should stop shooting rockets in the sky, take away all smoke stacks, planes are cars go too. I'm sure there are mainly more pollutants than someone in public smoking.

Michael J. McFadden September 4, 2012 at 01:14 am

Mema, there are lots of different chemicals in plane exhaust and smoke, but one of the more irritating/dangerous in both of them is Nitrogen Oxide. On an average day a reasonably large airport emits the same amount of Nitrogen Oxide as EIGHT AND A HALF BILLION cigarettes. Yet they don't want you smoking at the airport because it'll "pollute the air," eh?
Craziness, but too few people realize it.

Dan Elton September 23, 2012 at 10:48 pm

It may be there is no evidence that there are harmful effects from outdoor second hand smoke, and I appreciate your skepticism, but you seem to have missed the entire point of the article. The idea is to discourage smoking because it is a detrimental habit. The beach is a public park, operated by the local government, thus it is in their jurisdiction to make such a decision. I wholeheartedly support it. Nowhere in the US are there more smokers than Long Island, and nowhere are more people suffering because of it.

Michael J. McFadden September 24, 2012 at 02:57 am

Dan, if they do it honestly, I have a lot less of a problem with it. But when they say they are doing it "for the health of community members" they are invoking the secondhand smoke nonsense: and that's a lie. It certainly IS in their jurisdiction to make such a rule, just as they could rule that all beach goers had to wear full body bathing suits for modesty. They have that right. But don't base the rule on lies.
- MJM

Mema September 27, 2012 at 11:59 pm

I most definitely agree. Also I did not misunderstand the article. If it is for everyones health then, let them close down the Tobacco Industry, period end of story. But please do not tell me about pollution compared to airports that in itself is a joke. Also I am not responsible for all the children of the world to set an example. That is for their parents to do. So in conclusion, the government should set a big example and stop taking money from corporations and close them down o all of our health. How about that. It seems to me when they can not come up with an honest solution they implement a law. Again close down the harmful company for all our health. Any takers out there?

Michael J. McFadden September 28, 2012 at 01:40 am

Mema, you understand perfectly! And they won't close down the companies because they make too much money from them. North (South?) Dakota proposed a law banning all smoking and eliminating the taxes that paid the antismoking groups and those groups all came and testified AGAINST a total ban.
- MJM

Mema September 28, 2012 at 02:25 pm

I'm sorry Michael, Some of the reply was also to I think Dan, who said I didn't understand, i'm missing the point, I need to set an example for other's children and I didn't want to type twice. lol Sorry. But as I grew up I can see when government has no solution or maybe better put no profitable solution they make a law for our own good. Lucky Us that costs us money. Lucky Us Again. Everyone needs to be responsible for their own children and set their own guide lines and traditions. And I don't believe government should own all the beaches, I thought we payed taxes to clean them up and that the beaches belonged to the citizens. So I guess they want more more money and still do less work. TAXES and FINES. This whole government has me sick to my stomach from the bottom all the way to the white house. Everyone want to clean house, dismantle this corrupt government from the bottom up. Follow our constitution. Get rid of the Federal Reserve and the Central Banker. And put them all in jail. Sorry for the rant.
Mema