The Province of Ontario has a new law, as of May 31st, requiring variety stores (and most other tobacco retailers , except for designated “smoke shops”) to conceal all tobacco products on the premises. Cigarettes cannot be displayed openly on the familiar racks behind the counter; instead, most stores have adopted a system of shelves with flip up doors, as pictured here. This is the latest legislation in a recent line of laws designed to make it difficult to be a smoker in the Province of Ontario (smoking is banned entirely in public buildings and in bars, clubs and restaurants here in the land of the Trillium; there are also very substantial restrictions on tobacco advertising).
Now, before I get to the meat of my story, I need to make full disclosure: I used to smoke. Filthy habit, I know, especially for me – I have suffered from asthma and significant allergies since I was a child, with the attendant respiratory difficulties from time to time. While I was quitting I started getting terrible anxiety and had to see a behavioral counselor, learn more here. It was stupid, but by way of explanation rather than excuse, suffice to say that a social affectation indulged in over the occasional beer became, thanks to the addictive properties of our little leafy carcinogenic friends, an all too regular practice. Over the space of a couple of years, with mounting stress at work, a social life (at the time) ever more centred around the local pub and the *ahem* occasional beer, that regular practice blossomed into a full-on vice. Not coincidentally, at around about the time Spouse and I started seeing one another socially, I resolved to kick the habit entirely. I feel compelled to set the record straight that my decision, though clearly influenced by her presence in my life, was just that – my decision; she did not “tell me” to quit, though she did encourage me and help me along once the decision had been made. Anyway, a few boxes of nicotine patches, a couple of dozen sweating, screaming rages and eight weeks later, I was restored to my natural state as a non-smoker.
My point is: yes, it’s a significant societal problem, and yes, this is (in my opinion) a proper area of activity in which the government needs to become involved as a regulator. I know whereof I speak, for I was a weak-willed person in the days of yore; the law that sent smokers outside of the bar to indulge was a significant factor in at least getting me started on the road to quitting.
Anyway, Spouse and I walked in to Richi’s – a little variety store just up the road from Juniorvania – to pick up a carton of milk on the way home from work today. While we were completing the transaction, I couldn’t take my eyes off the gleaming, brand-spankin’ new expanse of white shelved enormo-wall behind the cashier, and I got to thinking about the new tobacco law. Spouse and I were debating the merits of this legislation as we got in the car to drive home, and I stated the case in support of the bill: when immature eyes cannot see the evil tobacco products, they cannot be tempted to sample the forbidden fruit, saving them from possible addiction, illness and death.
Spouse doubted the efficacy of this approach, citing the taboo nature of the foul weed as part of the dangerous mystique that is so irresistible to the young, so convinced that they are immortal. Drawn to the risqué behaviour like moths to a flame, Spouse argued, kids will be even more convinced by the drawers of secrecy that smoking must – at all costs – be tried. Since any attempt to hide tobacco from kids entirely is doomed to failure, and since the efforts to conceal it create all the more incentive for kids to find it, Spouse argued, the policy was ill-conceived.
“If you ask me,” Spouse continued, “we would be better off to force all kids to smoke. Make ’em keep smoking ’til they get sick and can’t stand the sight of the things anymore – maybe just before gym class. Then we’d see who wants to take up smoking.”
I regret to advise those of you who may be like-minded that there are – at this time – no concrete plans for Spouse to stand for elected office on this unusual platform of universal and compulsory youth smoking. We are instead reviewing the policies of the various provincial political parties to see which of these organizations might best accomodate such views so that Spouse may cast her vote accordingly; I will let you know what we find, so that you may join her.
Alternatively, you could have kids hawk the cigarettes, which will quickly reveal that people with twenty-year habits sure look older (and less cool) than their age. It worked for me; watching people with the shakes counting out pennies for a pack sure scared that urge out of me.
Congratulations on kicking it; it’s definitely a hard one to break.
Congratulations on quitting when you did. Your wife’s idea of forcding kids to smoke until they got sick, might prevent a few from smoking–the ones that wouldn’t have smoekd anyway but currently most teenagers who are smokers have an underlying mental disorder and would continue to smoke because it relives their symptoms. One study showed that 50% of teenage girls who smoked, suffered from depression. Children with ADHD are more likely to start smoing especially if given stimulants as a your child. For those that become substance abusers, usually the first addictive product they try is tobacco. What we need is a social norm change that makes smoking anti-social, instead of viewing it as a rite of passage. Queen of Quitting, http://www.StopSmokingStayQuit.blogspot.com