Kicking Butt in the Office – No Smoking!

Non-smoking is the new way of being a non-conformist. Kids in college  are now cool because they don't smoke and not the opposite, as it used to be. Grab a cigarette and break it in half in front of everyone and they'll all say "Awwww! What a nice guy!". These are the kids who grow up and become your colleagues and elected representatives to the Government. They then try to make this a conforming standard so they can have more company by making laws which ban smoking.

Many have decided to take this action much farther, however. Devout "non-smokers" harass their smoking co-workers while they are on their breaks with magazine clippings of the various cancers caused by the habit. Some may go even as far as stealing the cigarettes from strangers on the street who they see smoking. Rumour has it that in select extreme cases, some have vowed to hunt down and terminate the plagued portion of society by burning the smokers alive in a vat of tobacco.

The main slogan of the non-smokers appears to be "Death to the death causing smoking community".

To prevent all this potential bloodshed, the Government and our Union Health Minister Dr. Rama-Douse, have brought about a new law which prohibits and deems illegal, the action of smoking in buildings. And corporates, being the model citizens that they are, have enforced the No Smoking rule within their domains as well. Pardon me for drawing parallels between Nazi Germany and the SS for this. Dictatorship anyone?

But before we get to that, let us examine what smoking is.

Smoking

Smoking is the human practice of ingesting enormous quantities of the aerially-dispersed waste products of combustible organic matter, so that they may be sequestered safely within the lungs and out of harm's way.

Why People Smoke

People smoke for a multitude of reasons, some of which are good, some bad and some plainly ugly.

Here are some of the reasons:

• ·   Stress Buster
  
• ·   Helps bond with strangers (ultimate chauvinistic example being “male bonding”)
  
• ·   Covers up the fact that you forgot to brush your teeth today (or was that all week?)
  
• ·   Social Acceptance (it’s like belonging to an exclusive club)
  
• ·   Improves your communication skills and builds confidence (smokers can walk upto complete strangers and ask for a light/match/cigarette/phone number, if the person is cute, etc)
  
• ·   Acts as a better digestive aid than Hajmola.
  
• ·   Keeps you warm on cold nights.
  
• ·   Kills hunger and keeps you from piling on the pounds.
  
• ·   War (see all of the above points)
  
• ·   Festivals like Diwali (safest fireworks of the season, all year round)
  
• ·   Traffic Jams (it builds your resistance towards all that smog on the roads)
  

Smoking at the Olympics

Smoking finally gained the recognition it deserved in 1972, when the International Olympic Committee officially recognized it as an Olympic event. Prior to this, smoking had already been established as a national sport in Bosnia, Croatia, France, Poland and Spain.

Health benefits of smoking

Smoking is the only known cure for Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and some minor forms of dementia, because smoking kills you before you ever get them. Many studies have also found that out of all people with lung cancer smokers have a 70% higher rate or survival. This is due to the incredible properties of the chemical additives in tobacco which kills all the little men who make the cancer on their sewing machines. A local medical university in, Moscow, Russia has been researching on ways to cure cancer through extreme inhalation of tar.

Also all ad-based research has only proven that second hand smoke kills. Nothing happens to consumers of first-hand smoke. Case in point, the Marlboro Man’s horse died of Cancer but he was still alive and smoking. Need I say more?

Reasons why smoking should never be banned

•     Governments get a lot of tax revenue to buy their own tobacco.
  
•     Smoking is good exercise for the lungs, just like a Bullworker is good for the biceps.
  
•     People die younger, so need less pensions.
  
•     Keeps tobacconists and other small shops going. Alternative revenues would otherwise have had to be provided.
  
•     Tobacco farmers would have to be provided with alternative means of revenue. If from developing countries, more aid would have to be provided (on reduced taxes of which more will be spent on pensions).
  
•     Assorted other businesses (transport, tax revenue people etc, the quit smoking industry) will have their work reduced - see preceding point.
  
•     The Ad-industry would vanish or become totally dependent on alcohol.
  
•     Football players would become dependent on dope.
  
•     Smokers are determined to kill someone. Just let them kill themselves, its better than having them kill you when they are going through withdrawal.
  
•     Smoking keeps self-important, anti-smokers, who like nothing more than to push other people around occupied, and allows governments to go to war and screw up the economy without anyone giving a damn.
  
•     Smoking is the easiest way to separate the men from the boys.
  
•     Human stupidity.
  
•     Second hand smoke is a good way to damage people you don't like without taking direct action.
  
•     Smoking is just plain cool.
  

Smoking At The Workplace

The new no smoking in the workplace rule that the government has imposed seems to have quite a few reasons for being imposed. With all the previously rock solid companies going up in smoke, nobody seems to want to risk another disaster. ICICI-cle Bank is going to be the new numerologically correct way of identifying a smoke free bank we once used to know as ICICI.

The environmentalists are concerned that all the smoking leads to Global Warming and that their beach houses will soon be submerged.

The Govt isn’t able to find  suitable industrial land for the TATA Nano plant. Its strategy? Run ITC out of business and get their land for TATA.

But all this ranting and raving, and conspiracy-theory-waving aside, what do you think of the impending ban? Like it, hate it or have your own theories? Please do post a comment and let me know :)