Smoking bans continue to proliferate but so too does anger over the loss of liberty. One passionate response to a statewide smoking ban comes from a university student in Tennessee. Some have labeled this piece overwrought and perhaps even a satire. You be the judge, but the points he makes over the loss of individual liberty, the assault on a culture, and the attack on working class people that characterize anti-tobacco policy, are on target. The writer is ignorant about the fraud embraced by anti-smoking "researchers." If he gets his information from mass-media sources that is no surprise.
The writer, whether spoofing or not, is on point in his criticism of the Tennessee governing class that has, like all other governments that legislate on smoking, imposed an elitist law on people who did not send representatives to the statehouse to pass laws that hurt businesses, ignite divisiveness, or legislate what the governing class calls morality.
The angry student may not be familiar with the underlying purpose of smoking bans as a mercantile ploy to hustle up business for the pharmaceutical industry but he does know the state has no business intruding onto private property to enforce petty rules upon people who depend on their own judgment to make an honest living.
If the author is attempting satire he fails, because what could be construed as exaggerations are no such thing, as readers of this site are aware. If sincere, his fury and rage, which are shared by millions, should give overreaching political hacks pause. Anger, although it may smolder for years, always does erupt sooner or later.
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