Austin Smoking Ban Hits the News

[Updates below.]

I've long since laid out my opposition to Austin smoking bans, so I'll just note what the Health Fascists are saying and the necessary consequences of imposing their ideology.

An AP report via Yahoo!'s front page: Voters in Austin Asked to Ban Smoking (backup link from the Washington Post here)

But the smoking ban has some heavyweight support, including the American Lung Association, the American Cancer Society and the Lance Armstrong Foundation. Supporters say the ban would protect the public - including musicians and bar workers - from second-hand smoke.

It is sometimes hard to look at these organizations and not seethe at them for what they want done. Fighting cancer is a good thing. Informing people of the risks of cancer; what can be done to prevent it; how to recover once it is detected within you; these are movements that provide useful services. But they've stepped over the line from benign advocacy of cancer-free lifestyles and have become Just Another Lobbying Collective, demanding individual freedom be sacrificed for the good of society. That is why I call them Health Fascists.

"Everybody deserves the right to breathe clean air," said Rodney Ahart of the American Cancer Society. "This is about protecting public health."

What Mr. Ahart and those who agree with him about a "right to breathe clean air" are the implications of using that framework to justify the ban. If someone has a right to breathe clean air, then those who dirty the air that person breaths has therefore violated that person's rights. That person may then act in legitimate self-defense to protect himself and to secure just restitution from the polluter.

As I described in previous posts regarding a so-called right to food and an alleged right to life, respectively:

There is no "right to food." By asserting there is, you imply that it is permissible for anyone who owns no food to use force in order to possess food. That is what the concept of a "right" demands: universality and enforceability. Without either, the purpose of rights - the nature that makes it different from other concepts - falls apart. But this means that every human's wealth that crests over the level of bare subsistence would be at the mercy of anyone who is starving and does not own the means to procure nutrition for him- or herself.

It would be a permanent global hall pass for larceny...

[...]

By asserting Terri Schiavo has a right to live - that she cannot justly be denied access to this right - they then move on to find ways of restoring or securing her access to that right. Which, of course, is the forced provision of her means to life: food, water, and shelter.

Similarly with a "right to breathe clean air." It is something ban supporters use because they understand the power of using rights terminology. Why, I have a RIGHT being fucked with here! I had no idea the problem was so serious! Going this route yields dividends because most Americans spend nary a minute seriously thinking about what rights are and how they are conceptualized.

According to the cancer society, second-hand smoke causes 35,000 to 40,000 deaths per year from heart disease in adults who are not current smokers and about 3,000 lung cancer deaths in nonsmoking adults. It also leads to other respiratory and health problems.

...so what?...

This cannot be repeated enough. I say ignore all the bullshit sideshow debate over statistics and "harm" and other nonsense that distracts from the central issue: Do you own yourself and your possessions? If "yes," then the entire case presented by the pro-ban people immediately falls apart on moral grounds. If I do own myself, no one has the right to tell me how to live as long as I don't violate the self-ownership of others.

If "no," then we've entered the realm of slavery and of collective "ownership" over the individual. There are enough historical examples just in the last 100 years to dissuade anyone rational from taking that route.

Singer-songwriter Sara Hickman is one of a handful of musicians taking a stand on the issue. She supports the ban after spending 28 years playing music under a cloud of smoke.

"There are some musicians who smoke, and I can see how it would be awkward for them," said Hickman, 42. "I would guess most musicians would agree with me that going home after a gig and smelling like smoke is disgusting. You might as well spray me with asbestos."

Copyright © 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

Then change your fucking job. Your desire to breathe clean air does not grant you or anyone else the authority to use force against bar and club owners who want to allow smoking on their property.

UPDATED 5/9/2005 9:02am
The Additional Tyranny - The New Austin Smoking Ban Passes

UPDATED 8/30/2005 1:46pm
Deadline for the Austin Smoking Ordinance

Posted by Drizzten at May 04, 2005 01:18 PM