Menthol Cigarettes - Should be banned or nah? (1 Viewer)

Should Menthol cigs be banned?

  • Yes, we need to protect people from themselves

    Votes: 2 4.8%
  • Yes, they are more dangerous than other kinds

    Votes: 1 2.4%
  • No, menthol cig ban is racist

    Votes: 12 28.6%
  • No; my body, my choice

    Votes: 27 64.3%

  • Total voters
    42
I had a friend that smoked lucky strike filterless and had a homeless guy complain when he had asked for a smoke and my friend offered him one.
I had an Aunt and Uncle who smoked Lucky Strikes. When I was a kid our next door neighbor smoked Picayunes. Those were brutal. They has twice the tar and nicotine of a Marlboro red. You could smell them the second he stepped out of the house. How he made it to 90,I'll never know. Don't let the extra mild fool you. Trust me, they were far from it.
 

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I had an Aunt and Uncle who smoked Lucky Strikes. When I was a kid our next door neighbor smoked Picayunes. Those were brutal. They has twice the tar and nicotine of a Marlboro red. You could smell them the second he stepped out of the house. How he made it to 90,I'll never know. Don't let the extra mild fool you. Trust me, they were far from it.
Same friend occasionally had those too! I remember us joking about the "extra mild" on the package.
 
Most of this thread discusses the menthol cigarette side of this issue but didn't this directive also ban all "flavored" cigars too ? I have never smoked but I see entire racks of those in the tobacco section of convenience stores.
 
Most of this thread discusses the menthol cigarette side of this issue but didn't this directive also ban all "flavored" cigars too ? I have never smoked but I see entire racks of those in the tobacco section of convenience stores.
Never started smoking and I think anyone my age or younger who did is crazy. I grew up with 2 parents who were chain smokers/nicotine addicts. Their behavior was no different from any other addict. They were wonderful parents with a problem they could not manage. Cigarettes were everywhere in our house and cars.

Mom and dad were dead before they got to 60, dad from cancer and mom from a burst aorta cased by high blood pressure which was exacerbated by nicotine addiction. Dad's oncologist said cigarettes killed him as sure as a gunshot to the head. My sisters and I were orphaned in our 20's.

Yeah, I ******* hate tobacco and nicotine in all forms.
 
There's more to the story and it needs to be taken in context from what happened 12 years ago.

The FDA banned all flavored cigarettes except menthol. However flavored cigars were still allowed. So clove cigarettes for example (my old personal favorite) just started to use tobacco rolling paper instead of, well, paper, which makes it a cigar. So not only did the ban make an exception for the most popular flavored cigarette, it left a loophole open for the others - just use a different rolling paper and its legal.

The new ban will wipe out both of those. No more menthols, and no more flavored cigars. No more black & milds!

All that said, I'm against it, because I don't believe in banning things from others based on personal preference.
 
Not sure if that stuff is on the chopping block too, but seeing it is flavored tobacco product, it is likely it is, or will be targeted soon also.
Yeah, I was in Oakland a couple of years ago and none of the stores carried it. I was told they couldn’t sell flavored tobacco and I would have to go to a smoke shop.
 
I used to smoke in my late teens/early 20's. I remember being at work in my 20's and a couple of us were outside smoking. One of the people outside was an 18yo intern. My friend asked him when did he start smoking and why did he start. The kid said he had smoked for about a year and that he's addicted. So we told him he didn't start because he was addicted because you can't be addicted to something you have not started yet. So he then tells us he started smoking because he was stressed. So we mentioned that starting smoking does not help you with stress and if anything that first cigarette would likely have caused more stress. So I then told him he started smoking to try to look cool, which he denied. We went on to say that we all had started smoking to try to look cool or fit in. It was stupid, but that was the reason.

This story to illustrate that people don't start smoking because it tastes good. They start for social reasons. I think society has come a long way and smoking is way less acceptable than it was when I started in the 90's. You don't need to ban things to make the shift. Education on the risks is what has made the shift.
 
I've been smoking for 25 years.

In college, I was laying across the bed watching one of my friends smoke a cigarette.

The face he made when inhaling and the slow, deliberate way he exhaled - I asked to try it. I guess I wanted to see if I'd receive that same level of (apparent) satisfaction.

I liked the way it felt spreading through my chest. And the light-headedness. It was exactly how I wanted to feel.

I told myself that I'd smoke for 10 years then quit cold turkey.

"Ten years is long enough to do anything."

January 2006 is when I was supposed to stop. But Katrina had rolled through a few months prior and I was in no condition to be giving up vices.

I didn't set anymore timelines and I've never had an actual desire to quit. I'm not real big on surviving/living. I just want to be able to glean small instances of peace while I'm here, however long that might be.

Being able to stop whatever it is I'm doing and smoke... It's my pause button. It's the tiniest bit of peace I can find. I can't imagine going through this life with no pause button.
 
I've been smoking for 25 years.

In college, I was laying across the bed watching one of my friends smoke a cigarette.

The face he made when inhaling and the slow, deliberate way he exhaled - I asked to try it. I guess I wanted to see if I'd receive that same level of (apparent) satisfaction.

I liked the way it felt spreading through my chest. And the light-headedness. It was exactly how I wanted to feel.

I told myself that I'd smoke for 10 years then quit cold turkey.

"Ten years is long enough to do anything."

January 2006 is when I was supposed to stop. But Katrina had rolled through a few months prior and I was in no condition to be giving up vices.

I didn't set anymore timelines and I've never had an actual desire to quit. I'm not real big on surviving/living. I just want to be able to glean small instances of peace while I'm here, however long that might be.

Being able to stop whatever it is I'm doing and smoke... It's my pause button. It's the tiniest bit of peace I can find. I can't imagine going through this life with no pause button.

I loved smoking. The ritual of it. The peace of the alone time.

However, I did not enjoy waking up and coughing up a lung. And, while you may care more about enjoying life than how long it lasts, I can tell you that lung cancer is a really terrible way to die.
 
I've been smoking for 25 years.

In college, I was laying across the bed watching one of my friends smoke a cigarette.

The face he made when inhaling and the slow, deliberate way he exhaled - I asked to try it. I guess I wanted to see if I'd receive that same level of (apparent) satisfaction.

I liked the way it felt spreading through my chest. And the light-headedness. It was exactly how I wanted to feel.

I told myself that I'd smoke for 10 years then quit cold turkey.

"Ten years is long enough to do anything."

January 2006 is when I was supposed to stop. But Katrina had rolled through a few months prior and I was in no condition to be giving up vices.

I didn't set anymore timelines and I've never had an actual desire to quit. I'm not real big on surviving/living. I just want to be able to glean small instances of peace while I'm here, however long that might be.

Being able to stop whatever it is I'm doing and smoke... It's my pause button. It's the tiniest bit of peace I can find. I can't imagine going through this life with no pause button.
It's no lie that smoking is very satisfying on an emotional level. It's the whole reason that it was made so popular in the movies & not just tobacco companies trying to peddle their wares. When it makes you feel good plus the added bonus of the chemical buzz you get from it, it makes it all that much more difficult to stop. I think I've told this before, but my mom would often tell me that smoking was by far the most difficult vice to give up including alcohol and illegal drugs.
 
I loved smoking. The ritual of it. The peace of the alone time.

However, I did not enjoy waking up and coughing up a lung. And, while you may care more about enjoying life than how long it lasts, I can tell you that lung cancer is a really terrible way to die.

Yeah, that was my grandmother. Not fun seeing her like that before she died.
 
It's no lie that smoking is very satisfying on an emotional level. It's the whole reason that it was made so popular in the movies & not just tobacco companies trying to peddle their wares. When it makes you feel good plus the added bonus of the chemical buzz you get from it, it makes it all that much more difficult to stop. I think I've told this before, but my mom would often tell me that smoking was by far the most difficult vice to give up including alcohol and illegal drugs.

Indeed, my parents damn near killed each other when they quit smoking. Quit drugs, hard but they managed, quit drinking, not too bad, quit smoking...they separated for a while. Thankfully they're still married today going on 51 years.
 

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