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Tobacco Is The Devil
- Thread starter Julian
- Start date
psychoslice
Veteran Member
My dad died only 47 from smoking tobacco, but I don't think its evil, there's a lot of other bad stuff that maybe worse than tobacco.
oldbadger
Skanky Old Mongrel!
Nah........ !
If you want to put some really very evil 'things' into the serpent-devil bracket, try secret societies. Our whole UK system is completely riddled with masonry.
Do you think evilness is a quality possessed by things?
FTNZ
Agnostic Atheist Ex-Christian
Nah tobacco is not of the devil. It is simply an unnecessary substance that causes ill health and early death. And that ill health can start as early as the 20s, and lead to all kinds of gruesome and painful complications every decade until the smoker finally dies, 50% of the time directly from smoking. The real question is why do people do it?
For the immediate gratification that comes with feeding a habit.
The real question is not why established smokers smoke, but why anyone aware of the risks would pick it up.
A Vestigial Mote
Well-Known Member
Think of all the people who self-admit to being addicted to food. Those that develop health issues - like diabetes, or their weight making their heart work too hard, etc. - can, basically, die from this addiction eventually. Is food evil?
There are plenty of things one can become addicted to besides tobacco. Alcohol, heroin, cocaine, prescription pain medications, etc. I don't know which is worse or what causes more death and damage to society, but I don't think prohibition really works either. I see it as a medical/public health issue.
I don't know if there's any such thing as "the devil," but if I was to interpret that as meaning "the worst thing in the world," I'm not even sure that tobacco would be in the top ten.
Julian
New Member
Tobacco was chosen because it kills the most people in the developed world. Its also chemically addictive, which other poor lifestyle choices like mcdonalds arent. It is worth considering that most americans die from preventable disease. If we look at heart disease, cancer, stroke, lung disease, those are the most common deaths and smoking leads to all of them. heroin is addictive, but in terms of numbers and damage done to developed society, tobacco is definitely in my top 10
I understand, and I agree that there are healthier lifestyles and choices one can make. I've noticed a lot of people switching over from regular cigarettes to these e-cigarettes which are also harmful to the user, but don't have any second-hand smoke.
A case might be made that alcohol is worse than tobacco, especially when considering the death and damage from drunk driving and alcohol-induced violence. A person who is falling down drunk, loud, impaired, and potentially a clear and present danger to themselves or others, they may be more of a public nuisance and a burden to society than someone off to the side quietly smoking a cigarette.
amorphous_constellation
Well-Known Member
I don't really feel any kind of addictive tug toward religion, I don't know if that makes me unique or not. I got over the delusion that religion offers all kinds of great things a long time ago and I couldn't really enter that once more. Addictive substances are bad in that they often kill us. I wonder if science could someday take the deadliness out of things like tobacco or alcohol, by doing some modification on the substance or something that renders it harmless to the body.
Are we talking about junk food or fresh greens from a garden here?
A Vestigial Mote
Well-Known Member
In the end even fruit (dried being worse), if too much is consumed, contains more sugar than you need to be taking in. And "too much" isn't even really all that much, honestly. Vegetables and vegetation are, of course, different - there being plenty of other substance to offset the sugar content therein.
But who here, honestly, sustains themselves on fresh greens and produce only? I mean honestly? Show of hands? No one? Hmm...
Point being - in today's societies, almost NONE of us are "doing right" by our bodies and biology with respect to food - cutting our life-spans shorter in the vast majority of cases. So let's all hunker down with a plate of evil and call it a day.
amorphous_constellation
Well-Known Member
Well, apparently there are substances in some foods that are hard on our bodies. It's not really the food's problem, but the problem is kind of with the body's inability to deal with this stuff. So instead of saying that food is evil, we might instead say that the body is a piece of junk.
My brother died at the age of 44 due to alcohol abuse. I can tell you that addiction did appear to be evil to me for awhile. But, in reality, inanimate objects aren't evil; it's what we do with them. A glass a wine can be beneficial, etc. That said, I see no value whatsoever in tobacco.
Poisonshady313
Well-Known Member
No. It's not about gratifying a habit. It's about constantly battling nicotine withdrawal. Smokers don't just go through withdrawal when they attempt to quit. They go through it every moment that exists between one cigarette and the next. The thought "I need another cigarette" is caused by the first cigarette, and the next, and the next, etc...
I'm not sure that many smokers are aware when they first start. They usually start pretty young. But for those that are aware usually figure "it won't happen to me".
This thread is stupid. I'm a smoker and I don't care what health Nazis think about it.
Smoking is pleasurable no?
The thing I have found with many smokers is that in their attempts to quit they often last months, my friend lasted years, long after the effects of nicotine dependence have dissipated. Smoking is as much of a psychological habit as it is a chemical addiction. Getting over the chemical withdrawal is actually the easy part as many smokers (I have a lot in my extended family) who have actually quit have told me. It's the psychological attachment that's harder to break in the long run.
amorphous_constellation
Well-Known Member
Don't quote me on this but isn't nicotine sort of one of those natural pesticides some plants have? Anyway, I know I've read caffeine for example is. Besides this, if it is a pesticide, but also addictive for things that get used to it, that seems like a darwinian royal flush for survival. If you addict to the plant, the plant ensures it gets to keep going, despite what the organism may do to you.
Poisonshady313
Well-Known Member
No. It's an illusion of pleasure. Have you ever heard of a smoker tell you that the first cigarette was wonderful? Isn't usually a scene of hacking and coughing? Seems like the opposite of pleasure. The only sense of relief given by smoking is of the stress caused by the desire to have another cigarette... which was only caused by the previous cigarette. The relief of this craving is confused for genuine pleasure.
You're right. It is as much, if not mainly, psychological. I don't believe it's physical attachment that makes it hard. I believe it's the feeling of being deprived of the "pleasure" of nicotine. The feeling like getting through certain moments in life just won't be as good, and the regular stresses of life will be much less bearable without nicotine... these are the feelings that usually make it tough to quit.