In fairness, I haven’t been personally affronted by a smoker for almost 24 hours, and before that I managed to go several days without anyone really pissing me off with their idiotic selfishness. And I should also acknowledge that I know several smokers who are considerate, decent human beings who don’t deserve to be given a hard time over their addiction. They manage their problem without being more of a pain in the arse for the people around them than anyone else. After all, nobody’s perfect and people who don’t smoke are still capable of being Republicans, petrolheads, limbo dancers, Scotsmen or other forms of life that undermine my faith in natural selection.
So I make this post more in the spirit of scientific inquiry than as a rant. Here are a few examples, and I’d be interested to know whether others think that I’m only noticing the things that confirm my opinion or whether there is a real trend in place here. Observations from enraged smokers about my sensitivity to tobacco smoke are off-topic. A simple “I don’t do that” would suffice, as I’m trying to form an accurate impression of what happens rather than re-ignite the war on smoke.
So, I sit down outside a 7-11 yesterday. One of the ones that provides tables and chairs, and ashtrays. Someone is smoking at the next table. So far so acceptable. But when he leaves, the smoke continues. Why? Because he’s made a complete balls-up of stubbing the bloody thing out and it is now smouldering in the ashtray, pleasuring no-one and subjecting me to a completely unnecessary assault on my senses. This happens a lot, and I have to ask “if you’re not smoking it then why are you forcing me to deal with it?” Are smokers making a statement when they do this, or are they just being careless? Don’t they see that it matters?
At the traffic lights a few days ago I see a guy pulling the plastic packaging off a straw, which is attached to a drink in a box. He drops the packaging, slurps the drink, and drops the box in the road. He also has a cigarette in his mouth. I see this a lot. Smokers dropping shit in the streets like they don’t care. I have a friend who I once observed pushing his empty beercans into the bushes near my house, with a cigarette in his mouth. The area outside his house is littered with cigarette ends, and he doesn’t appear to care.
Now I have to ask, am I only noticing this because I already have a negative attitude towards smokers? Or do I take notice of people dropping shit because I also don’t like litter, and then also notice that they often have something else in common?
I’m coming to the conclusion that a disproportionately high percentage of smokers are also careless, in fact contemptuous, of the environment and people around them. Possibly this attitude contributes to them being smokers? Who knows? What’s going on?
If 100 smokers and 100 non-smokers were tracked through a normal day, how many instances of unnecessary pollution (let’s say that actually smoking a cigarette is not pollution) would be observed in each group? What other behavioural characteristics would be observed? Would smokers drop more shit, drive more polluting vehicles, leave more lights on, run more red lights, argue more with their spouses, or what?
My feeling is that, despite the shining examples of humanity who swell their ranks, there are more selfish arseholes walking around with cigarettes in their mouths than not. Comments?
Lord Lucan, in advance, thanks for your input but I wasn’t talking about you specifically or advocating that you be denied your 200 daily fixes in order to make you into a better human. Carry on.
and what precisely is the problem with dropping cigarette butts in a street that will be cleaned later in the day? Concrete doesn’t catch fire you know?
