Public health busybodies really can’t help themselves. Even when they’re winning, they’re not happy unless someone else is unhappy.

As H.L. Mencken quipped, some people suffer from:

…the haunting fear that someone, somewhere is having a good time.

Indeed. And our anti-smoking public health lobbyists are determined to prove him correct!

Before you jump to conclusions, I’m not a smoker, although occasional cigars are a part of my social repertoire. And no, I’ve never ‘vaped’, nor do I plan to.

My distaste for the nanny state’s desire to ban smoking stems from my beliefs in individual choice and responsibility, not from self interest or a personal nicotine addiction. But whilst I strongly disagree with the anti-smoking lobby’s desire to ban it, I can at least understand where they’re coming from. Smoking is bad for you. No argument here! So I ‘get’ where they’re coming from, even if I think they have no right to regulate other peoples lifestyle choices.

But what makes absolutely no sense is how the anti-smoking lobby have jumped with reckless abandon onto the anti-vaping bandwagon! Vaping should be a ‘quit’ advocates best friend! Finally there’s an alternative to smoking which has a fraction of the health downsides, but most if not all of the smokers perceived upsides! It’s an excuse to take a break regularly, it’s a social activity, occupies the hands, and now it actually tastes good! (unlike cigarettes!)

So finally ‘quit’ advocates have a weapon far more effective than just patches or gum, they have a relatively harmless replacement for the whole habit, the social, physical, and mental behaviors which are ingrained into smokers. They should be celebrating! But of course they aren’t.

You see, they were never really motivated by the health arguments, the health impacts of smoking were a convenient second-tier issue that they could place front-and-centre to cover their real motivation: They can’t allow others to like something that they don’t.

These are the new puritans. Not content to live their own lives of self-denial and discipline, but instead they are determined to shape everyone else’s lives to match their ‘pure’ way of living! “If I can’t have fun, why should they?” To which I answer “Well… you can have fun, you just choose not to.”

And for many years these public health puritans weren’t found out, because the public health argument had enough truth in it, and was morally superior enough, to disallow arguments to the contrary. But finally they’ve overplayed their hand. They’ve taken up a crusade against a nearly harmless passtime… because it looks like smoking… it reminds them of smoking, and so it’s bad and must be stopped, actual health arguments be damned!

Well now we can see them for the meddlers and busybodies they are, and their cries and shrieks and howls against vaping expose their true nature. It’s almost enough to make me want to start vaping, just for the satisfaction of hearing their cries of protest all over again…

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