Deborah, Deborah, what will become of you?
Who’d a thought it eh?
The Dutch government are to abandon the likes of the dreadful Deborah Arnott’s Dutch colleagues to public subscription!
No more public money for the anti-smoking lobby. No more free handouts of smoking cessation kits. What is to become of them all? Redundancies loom. A multi million pound industry killed off just like that!
Not that the pharmaceutical anti-smoking industry is being killed off, you understand, their products will still be available for those who want them.
No, what is being killed off is the lobbying industry, the publically funded centre of anti-smoking propaganda.
Deborah and her colleagues are beside themselves, rending their garments and caterwauling hysterically in the Lancet today.
‘Smokers are being abandoned to their fate’ they wail.
No my little love – not abandoned to their fate, released to the freedom of choice. Anathema to you, I do understand.
“Every death that ensued would not just be the responsibility of the tobacco industry, which continues to promote its lethal product, but also of every politician in the Dutch Government who chose to look the other way and allow it to happen.”
Should it prove that next year there are less Dutch smokers than at present, it will sound the death knell for Deborah and her colleagues, a dreadful fate, as you will surely agree.
Despite the ferocious claims in the Lancet article strangely only two of the fifteen authors have declared any conflict of interest in denouncing the Dutch Government for this move.
Deborah wasn’t one of them. It’s not as though ASH is a publically funded outfit that has anything to fear from a broke British Government following suit is there? All those fervent anti-smokers are bound to send her money to continue her work of their own free will, aren’t they?
No? Oh dear.
‘Anti-Smoking campaigners are being abandoned to their fate, every redundancy that ensues……’
December 10, 2011 at 17:43
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Statistically the most dangerous thing is a bed – most people die in
it.
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December 10, 2011 at 13:46
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I am a smoker. I smoke in my own home but try not to when I have
non-smoking guests; I think that’s only common courtesy. I used to enjoy the
conviviality of my ‘local’ but it’s been driven out of business by the
anti-mob. If I have to, I can tolerate all that.
What I cannot tolerate is
the insertion by the manufacturers, (under threat, no doubt), of ‘firewalls in
the product ensuring that the cigarette self-extinguishes half-way through…I
am relighting one at this moment.
That is not what I paid for & I
consider it adulteration of the product & a deliberate attempt to curb my
freedom to enjoy what I purchase. It is WRONG & probably illegal.
And
when will it be mandatory that all cars & m/cycles display pictures of
gruesome accidents on their bodywork? Duh!
- December 10, 2011 at 13:23
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Did they give you a scroll for being the 10th. new entrant to Pubs since
the smoking ban? Or were you already visiting pubs prior to the ban, in which
case, it didn’t really bother you, did it?
- December 10,
2011 at 08:11
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As I non-smoker, I now appreciate not having to share a smokey office. I am
generally appreciative of the ban on smoking in public buildings.
Smoke all you like, just don’t make me do it.
Thanks.
- December
10, 2011 at 08:20
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“I am generally appreciative of the ban on smoking in public
buildings.”
Which ban is responsible for the little cluster of employees all smoking
outside on the pavement, near the entrance, rather than in designated
smoking rooms with proper air filtration.
So you are now guaranteed a lungful of the stuff as you enter.
Can’t quite see what you are so thankful for…
- December
10, 2011 at 15:47
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A lungful as I enter is an awful lot better than a lungful every
breath, every working day, all day long. I am thankful for this.
I would also be supportive of designated smoking rooms such as you
describe.
To be honest, I haven’t noticed getting a lungful as I enter public
buildings.
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December 10, 2011 at 17:10
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La la. The usual anti-smoker comment; the usual hyperbole. Where are
these offices where everyone smokes, all day long? I’ve never worked in
an office where anyone smokes, ever.
And what ‘public’ buildings are you thinking of anyway? Museums?
Council offices? Pretty much everywhere else is a private building. Like
people smoked anywhere BUT IN PUBS pre the 2007 ban, anyway.
As for the pious “Smoke all you like, just don’t make me do it,” go
fuck yourself.
- December 11, 2011 at 09:03
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Thank you for your polite and reasoned response, Mr snowman.
The offices in which I worked in a smoke-filled environment all day
long were in Maidenhead, Feltham, and Hounslow.
I am thinking of all public buildings.
Your last comment does not merit a reply
- December 10, 2011 at 01:26
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Some years ago I managed a shop that sold ‘the evil trio’ – Sweets
(obesity) newspapers (lies) and cigarettes. IIRC, the latter contributed about
30% to turnover, and 5% to profit.
Following one of the regular ‘shock-horror- everyone -will-die’ stories
about tobacco, it was rumoured that all the UK companies in the business were
going to call a press conference to set out their ‘Policy’. I obtained an
advance copy of the proposed statement from the Chair of the Manufacturers’
Association.
\\
Ladies and Gentlemen. We cannot any longer resist the
claims of the Anti-smoking Campaigners. We are closing down all of our
facilities in the UK. As I speak, all of our staff are being handed their
dismissal notices, and told to leave the premises forthwith. Our Lawyers are
taking the necessary steps to wind up the Companies.
No more tobacco products will be sold in this Country, and there will be no
further ‘Tobacco Duty’ to send to the Government.
Thank you – have a nice day.
- December 10, 2011 at 07:09
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If only, the look of panic on the PM’s face would be a picture.
Unfortunately the Ashites would just move on to another lucrative
target.
- December 10, 2011 at
00:39
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That bit about there being no financial interests made me laugh too, Anna.
Not only that, but even where it was admitted, Robert West’s of CRUK merely
said “receives research funding and undertakes consultancy for companies
that manufacture smoking cessation medications”.
They must have forgotten to mention that he “also has a share in a patent for a novel nicotine delivery
device”.
And these guys, with a straight face, accuse tobacco companies of acting
purely in lucre-pursuit and self-interest? Good grief.
- December 10, 2011 at 00:18
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Europe can fall, the economy can crash around me. I could lose my house and
car and end up sleeping in a pile of toxic waste.
But if I then heard that ALL funding had been cut to ASH (and their
hundreds of little helper like De-Myst, Smokefree Kids, Smokefree Northwest
and on and on and on…), I would laugh and laugh and laugh. I’d be the happiest
man in the world.
In fact, just the thought of it gives me a rosy glow.
- December 9, 2011 at 22:14
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A government says “No more joking.
Propaganda loses tax-money
stoking.”
The scoungers at ASH
who loved having ‘free’ cash
were left
fuming (foreign lingo for smoking).
- December
10, 2011 at 08:16
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/applause
- December 9, 2011 at 22:12
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Châtelaine you Dutch speak so many languages that it puts the rest of us to
shame so if you make the odd spelling mistake there is no need to apologise by
making an admission of the fact.
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December 9, 2011 at 22:33
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Thank you, Antisthenes
In
fact, not to boost myself, I speak 5 languages, can make myself understood
[with some pantomime] in 2 more, get around with basics with another 2 and
can read in 12+, including 13th century French.
Oh dear, now I did it … I boosted myself …
Spaß beiseite: it’s great to have knowledge of more than one’s maternal
tongue. It allows e.g. nowadays on the Internet to read about the same
article and see either the cunning similarities OR the interesting
differences when the truth is somewhere in the middle.
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December 10, 2011 at 11:01
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I Live in France and my linguistic skill is so bad that French people
frequently remind me that “Je parle français comme une vache espagnole”. I
am not up to much in my mother tongue either.
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December 10, 2011 at 13:19
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That’s “vachement” rude! And the French can be very rude. I had an
encounter the other day with one, which sent me up to the ceiling [and
ceilings are high here
]
- December 9, 2011 at 22:04
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English being my 3rd language: gens = genes?
- December 9, 2011 at 22:00
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Anna
Me
being Dutch, you put a big smile on my face. From time to time, even if [or
especially?] now living abroad for quite a while, I’m proud of my people and
my heritance.
Free will. It’s in our gens, M’am …
- December 9, 2011 at 21:02
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Every cloud has a silver lining. The new slogan for this war against debt
“Non jobs and fake charities your country dos not need you” .
- December 9, 2011 at 19:09
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Surely this is the bright side of economic hardship, governments may yet
realise that costly advocacy campaigns are unnaffordable. Next up -climate
change? What a wonderful Christmas present that would be.
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December 9, 2011 at 19:06
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The anti-smoking charities will have to begin standing outside pubs and
restaurants banging on tambourines and having a big collection pot in which
all the true believers can toss in their money to keep the high-minded
anti-smoking charites running. Since they are a charity and doing goodness
then I am certain everyone will donate in abundance to their cause, which
supercedes that of The Christ in the amount of importance they have in the
world bringing smokers to salvation for all of eternity, whether they want
saved, or not. Choice will not be tolerated, nor should it, in their minds,
since they are sugar and spice, goodness and everything nice; and up until
now, politicians, businesses, unions and media all agreed/conspired.
- December 9,
2011 at 18:07
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It’s a sneaky plot.
Beware Anna, they are trying to do away with satirists by appearing to be
reasonable.
Ha.
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