...neither does cocaine !

Whoa, maybe that's why it's illegal.

...but I've seen you defending your personal usage ?

I'll state this right now...I'm arguing from a utilitarian perspective.

The amount of utility gained from smoking a cigarette in a public place is arguably negative...insomuch as it creates more harm than good.

They damage your health, they damage other people's health, they create a mess, they may deter people from using public places.

The only benefit (and a small one I may add) is the amount of pleasure it gives the smoker...which is fairly minimal. Even if the pleasure gained was something a long the lines of an orgasm, the bad effects would still outweigh the good.

To use cars as an analogy (going over the others is just time consuming) is pretty weak. Why?

Cars serve a much higher level of utility...they get people around faster, in greater comfort, they save time, they allow access to places, etc

Disutilities include pollution and a danger to oneself an others.

This may seem like a poor argument because cigarettes have the same disutilities...but at a much higher rate.

You smoke a cigarette...you will damage your health. You get in a car, you may or may not damage yourself. I've been driving for 7 years now and I have not once suffered an injury from driving a car. Yet, if I had been smoking an average amount for the past 7 years, I would have undoubtedly caused irreversible damage to my body.

Furthermore, the car serves a very high level of positive utility, much greater than smoking a cigarette does.

I suppose if we're going the utilitarian route, we should find lower class citizens to harvest for lungs so we can keep the elite smokers functioning, since they produce a lot for society.

Santara where do you draw the line if at all? Would a straight up ban on smoking be acceptable? If not what are your stances on other bans like nudity? Is the legality the only issue with nudity? What about other recreational drugs that are currently illegal? Should they be legal? If they should be then should a person be able to use them in public as they please?

I've never advocated legalizing it, nor do I think it should be legal, but ultimately people make their own decisions on what risks to take. People can take the risk and smoke wherever they want, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't have laws prohibiting this. Similarly, people can take the risk and do cocaine, but that doesn't mean we as a society should legalize it.

I was actually hoping you had quit

Smoking is an otherwise wholly legal activity, and unless you can provide evidence that outdoor smoking is detrimental to the public health any more than standard pollution, mind your ow business.



Don't think smoking is useful? Try banning it and see how violent the public becomes.

I have serious problems with that ideology.

5 people are dying in the hospital. One needs a liver, one needs a heart, one needs a kidney, one needs a pancreas, and one needs a lung. A healthy man walks into the clinic and takes a nap. By utilitarian logic, you should kill the man and save the five.

I don't feel like basing arguments around utilitarianism is ultimately useful.