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Antheil
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« Reply #5235 on: 00:18:50, 24-03-2008 » |
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Phew!!
That was an Exhalation, Devoutly to be Wished
Amen
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Reality, sa molesworth 2, is so sordid it makes me shudder
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perfect wagnerite
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« Reply #5236 on: 08:15:10, 24-03-2008 » |
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They are more than happy to rake in tax from the sale of cigarettes and whack the price up every time a Budget comes along,
... while continuing to promote mad ideas like this that will make it more likely that people will bring their ciggies in from abroad, without paying any tax. I do despair when I see things like this. I'm a non-smoker, I don't like the smell of smoke and will defend vigorously my right not to have to breathe other people's smoke, and I support the ban on smoking in the workplace. But the Government's position seems to have descended into imbecile tokenism - where is the evidence that taking cigarettes off display will actually make any difference - especially when aimed at an age-group who should not be able to buy cigarettes in the first place? It's the epic stupidity of Governments who want to be seen to be doing something that infuriates me ....  |
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At every one of these [classical] concerts in England you will find rows of weary people who are there, not because they really like classical music, but because they think they ought to like it. (Shaw, Don Juan in Hell)
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Bryn
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« Reply #5237 on: 08:27:36, 24-03-2008 » |
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I've been a fairly happy bunny today until I just heard the latest bright idea from our Government on the News. They are now investigating the possibility of making it illegal to display cigarettes in shops, thereby raising the alternative of selling them under the counter. What utter hypocrisy! They are more than happy to rake in tax from the sale of cigarettes and whack the price up every time a Budget comes along, while at the same time chastising smokers for being modern day lepers and then banishing us outside. What next? What next? A tax on paper, of course, in order to cover those who buy certain products manufactured from that planet-destroying material for the purpose of rolling up illegal cigarettes. After that, since you mention not being a happy bunny on Easter Sunday, then doubtless a tax on rabbits and chocolate (not to mention the kind of packaging that usually accompanies the latter). And perhaps an extension of the lifetime gift part of inheritance tax so that each trackable instance of a composer giving one of his/her scores to anyone is deemed by HMRC to be a PET (Potentially Exempt Transfer) chargeable to tax at 40% unless the donor survives for a minimum of seven full fiscal years following the gift - and so on and so off. What a subject for Easter! Grrr!!! Long overdue for tobacco to be made Class C, if not Class B. It is quite outrageous that its smokers were permitted to exhale their chosen poison for others to inhale at considerable risk to their health for so long. Yes, remove this evil drug from public display by all means, especially given the research findings regarding the problems associated with early smoking. |
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Milly Jones
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« Reply #5238 on: 08:41:06, 24-03-2008 » |
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On the news this morning they were talking about banning cigarette machines which makes a lot of sense.
Apologies to all you smokers out there and indeed my very best mate is a chain-smoker - but I think Walter Raleigh has a lot to answer for with this one. (I'll forgive him the spuds of course). It would have been so much better for this craze never to have started.
My smoking friends are quite aggressive about their right to choose and they may be right but logic dictates that they would be so much better off both health-wise and financially if they didn't smoke.
I remember when my husband was being treated at the Christie hospital in Manchester, seeing literally crowds of patients, in wheelchairs, dressing gowns, on drips.....all outside at the front of the building, still smoking! Total madness. Before the hue and cry develops, I do of course know that you can get cancer without smoking - but science has shown us that your risk is dramatically increased if you do.
All this is easy for me to say because I've never smoked, so I can take the moral high ground. I'm so glad I didn't persevere when I initially tried it, because it's an addictive drug like any other. Very fortunately, it made me feel ill so I didn't continue when peer pressure and society at the time mooted that you weren't adult or sophisticated unless you participated. I believe I was lucky.
Alcohol is as bad though. Why can society promote all-day drinking and then say cigarettes should be banned? That's hypocrisy too.
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We pass this way but once. This is not a rehearsal!
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ahinton
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« Reply #5239 on: 08:56:57, 24-03-2008 » |
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They are more than happy to rake in tax from the sale of cigarettes and whack the price up every time a Budget comes along,
... while continuing to promote mad ideas like this that will make it more likely that people will bring their ciggies in from abroad, without paying any tax. I do despair when I see things like this. I'm a non-smoker, I don't like the smell of smoke and will defend vigorously my right not to have to breathe other people's smoke, and I support the ban on smoking in the workplace. But the Government's position seems to have descended into imbecile tokenism - where is the evidence that taking cigarettes off display will actually make any difference - especially when aimed at an age-group who should not be able to buy cigarettes in the first place? It's the epic stupidity of Governments who want to be seen to be doing something that infuriates me .... I'm in the same position as you via-à-vis both smoking and governments. People will either go buy their weed legitimately ourside UK, thereby denying the UK government the tax revenue it would otherwise have received, or they'll buy them illegally anywhere, thereby denying the government of the country of purchase the tax revenue it would otherwise have received, or they might even give up smoking, which will deny the UK government the tax revenue it would otherwise have received; that seems pretty unequivocally like a lose-lose situation to me. It's the same for alcohol; people - especially those living in the south-east of England - will buy it abroad in bulk (I think that the UK import limit per person is currently around 90 litres, which is the equivalent of about 128½ bottles and the amount to be saved on 257 bottles by a couple popping over to Calais in their gas-guzzling SUV could quite easily exceed £1,000), thereby paying much lower rates of tax to the French government instead of punitively high ones to the UK government. The same kind of thing happens to French people living near the border with Spain and who pop across to buy their petrol/diesel at 20-40 cents less than the cost in France, thereby denying tax revenue to the French government and paying smaller amounts of tax to the Spanish one. So the present UK governmet position seems like not only "imbecile tokenism" but also woefully bad commercial sense. |
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Mary Chambers
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« Reply #5240 on: 09:06:36, 24-03-2008 » |
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I've never tried smoking, even as an adolescent. It simply didn't tempt me at all, and I never cared about peer pressure - several of my friends did smoke, but they've all stopped now. I do have awful memories of being in hospital in the late 1950s with a chest infection, in a ward full of older people (I was a teenager) mostly at death's door with various smoking-related diseases. The chain-smoking woman in the bed next to me died one night - not cancer, some form of severe bronchial asthma, I think - she was 37. The astonishing thing is that they were allowed to smoke, in the ward, all the time! Thank goodness that's changed.
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Milly Jones
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« Reply #5241 on: 09:27:31, 24-03-2008 » |
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"Thank goodness that's changed"
I've just inadvertently pressed the report to moderator button! Totally unintentional! I blame these new acrylic nails they're too long to type with.
Anyway regarding "that's changed" - it might have changed on the ward Mary but all that's happened now is that they all troop outside the building, some dragging along all sorts of complicated machinery to which they are variously attached.
It isn't a good advert for the hospital to see everyone outside the front door puffing away.
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We pass this way but once. This is not a rehearsal!
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George Garnett
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« Reply #5242 on: 09:45:41, 24-03-2008 » |
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Children in their early teens will be less tempted by something which is kept under the counter with a glamorous aura of the forbidden?! That's not what I remember about being thirteen. Shome mishtake surely  |
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« Last Edit: 11:26:44, 24-03-2008 by George Garnett »
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Morticia
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« Reply #5243 on: 09:50:46, 24-03-2008 » |
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Our Hospice Manager introduced a smoking ban two years ago, despite the fact that, along with prisons and mental health units, hospices are exempt from the ban. Result? Patients puffing away outside while attached to drips and drains, come rain or shine. Outside a hospice!!? It looked appalling. People must have wondered what on earth the level of care was like inside if we were happy to boot patients out onto the street Finally after consistent complaints from the neighbours the patients are now allowed to smoke in the garden. They can have an umbrella if it's raining  |
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Jonathan
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« Reply #5244 on: 11:15:14, 24-03-2008 » |
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The other week I saw on a big sign in a public garden: "Cigarette ends do not grow into cigarette plants if you plant them in the soil, no matter how much water and sunshine you give them" Well, i thought it was funny anyway.  I tried a cigarette when i was about 12 and was immediately sick. I did try them again in my late teens and found them horrible, I've probably smoked about a dozen in my life - enough to decide they do nothing for me! |
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Best regards,
Jonathan
*********************************************
"as the housefly of destiny collides with the windscreen of fate..."
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Antheil
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« Reply #5245 on: 12:21:56, 24-03-2008 » |
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What is going on over at the BBC R3 MBs? I rarely go over there but I have looked and found that a thread about The National Youth Orchestra's forthcoming concerts has seemingly been trashed by the Mods who have removed every reference to them Surely we used to be able to flag up forthcoming events? Or is there a malicious hand in this as The Rite of Spring is involved? |
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Reality, sa molesworth 2, is so sordid it makes me shudder
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perfect wagnerite
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« Reply #5247 on: 12:39:28, 24-03-2008 » |
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I had a look a that thread yesterday, Ants. Very depressing it was too. I saw that ff pointed out that it is perfectly in order to post concert details as long as prices aren't quoted. Unless the Mods have 'disappeared' that post as well. It's really most unpleasant over there now  And not least because one member took it upon himself to describe the young players as "philistines" for playing a programme containing Ravel, Strauss, Stravinsky and a new piece and neglecting "real" music. One of the things I like about this place is that at least we usually celebrate our musical enthusiasms, rather than enjoying dumping on the enthusiasms of others. TOP looks increasingly like a prep school playground. |
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At every one of these [classical] concerts in England you will find rows of weary people who are there, not because they really like classical music, but because they think they ought to like it. (Shaw, Don Juan in Hell)
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Antheil
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« Reply #5248 on: 12:41:28, 24-03-2008 » |
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Mort, the Mods haven't 'disappeared' ff's post but on reading some other threads there seem to be some posters from old who seem to have turned into Grumpy Old Fogies when they still haven't hit middle age I know Stravinsky isn't everyones cup of Typhoo but from some comments you would think he was The Devil Incarnate!! |
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Reality, sa molesworth 2, is so sordid it makes me shudder
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Mary Chambers
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« Reply #5249 on: 13:18:52, 24-03-2008 » |
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Smoking outside a hospital may look bad, but it's a lot better than smoking inside it! At least poor innocent non-smokers like the teenage me aren't being subjected to it.
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