Smoking Ban in Burbank, CA
A Pox on Political Correctness!
I hasten to tell you that I am a non-smoker. As a matter of fact, I'm allergic to cigarettes and to secondhand smoke from all burning objects, including incense and grass fires. I'm allergic to perfume and the smell of those nasty dryer sheets that waft into my apartment from the one below mine. At one time my allergy to cigarettes was so bad that I took up smoking to desensitize my body and enable me to breathe in an area with smokers. Twenty years ago when smoking on airplanes was still allowed, I was an active member of ASH (Action on Smoking and Health) and thus was a part of banning smoking on planes. I felt very strongly about the issue.
Now, however, I see things a bit differently.
The Taste of Burbank takes place in the downtown area where by law nobody is allowed to smoke. Downtown encompasses a large geographic chunk of real estate, and according to the new ordinance, smoking is prohibited in the following areas:
All City parks and facilities and all areas within 20 feet
Within 20 feet of all entrances, exits, and open windows of buildings open to the public
All sidewalks and pedestrian areas in Downtown Burbank and all areas within 5 feet
Chandler Bikeway and all public areas within 20 feet
Outdoor dining areas and all areas within 5 feet
Outdoor waiting lines and service areas and all areas within 20 feet
Outdoor gathering places and event areas and all areas within 20 feet
City transit vehicles and station platforms and all areas within 20 feet of station platforms
Pedestrian areas at outdoor shopping areas and centers and all areas within 20 feet
All elevators
Any area designated as non-smoking by the property owner or business
Indoor common areas of multifamily residential projects and outdoor common areas within 5 feet of entrances, exits, walkways
And the list goes on.
Recently when I was looking for a new apartment, I came across my first which informed all potential renters that the entire complex from gate to gate was off limits to smokers. What are we thinking? Do we not want smokers' money? Yes, we want our health and the health of our children to be protected, but at what cost? If you have a loved one who is a smoker, is that member of your family banned from public venues? Does that not effectively ban you as well?
American society seems bent on taking political correctness to outrageous lengths. Soon there will be no segment of society except rich white male nonsmokers allowed in public places. There will always be some reason identified to ban another group.
Women are already being forced to nurse their children out of public view because this natural and necessary event is repugnant to some. Women are being pulled off of airplanes because somebody considered their dress inappropiate. Recent articles speculate that being fat is contagious. Will we next say that no fat people are allowed within 5 ft of outdoor gathering places and event areas? Maybe bulimia is also contagious. Will thin people be next on the banned list? "No! That's ridiculous," you say.
That's precisely what smokers were saying twenty years ago, and that is why I now see things differently. Now, I realize that the loss of one person's rights ultimately means the loss of rights for us all.
Published by Glenda Glayzer
Writer, Artist, Singer, Actress, Website Designer, Green Marketer, Senior Advocate View profile
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7 Comments
Post a CommentI have the right to poison any idiot that doesnt look where they are going. why do i have less rights than the car industries? they can poison us all they want yet no one is going to ban that in downtown burbank.
Sorry Alyce Rocco. You don't have the right to poison others against their will.
I don't see why my infant and I have to suffer from second hand smoke. If it harms the health of others, you should find some place else to do it and not light up in front of me. And by the way, women are legally allowed to nurse in public. I do and proud of it. If society views breasts as sexual objects and not what mother nature intended for them to do, then that is society.
All I have to say is that liberalism is a mental disorder...
I agree with the above. I would even go further by saying this will ad more money to the pharmaceutical pockets. As the pressure on the smokers increase, more will want to quit. A few years ago as I was trying to quit smoking I looked into the internet for quitting aid. I looked into a new product that was quite highly praised. I have forgotten the name of it. It sounded like zopan or zoltan. I can't remember. Anyway as the name reminded me of psychotropic drugs. I looked at the composition of some, such as prozac and other similar stuffs and compared it with the praised quitting aid. I have found that there were a lot of similar ingredients between the two. it sounds like by trying to deintoxicate you with one drug you become intoxicated by another that could be mind altering and addictive.
Glenda Glayzer is right....one person's rights ultimately means the loss of rights for us all. People have to be such right fighters that they don't realize that the only thing they are going to gain is less freedom! I am ashamed to be a California native!!
I wonder why the government does not just round up all the smokers and march them into gas chambers at GWB's new detention centers being built from unused military barraks to detain border trespassers. Who knows, now that the gov can pick up citizens with no charge, no calls, and held indefinitly, perhaps the detention centers are full without citizen knowledge. To think I moved to CA because I thought it was a progressive People's state that not let the government take away citizen's rights. Sad.