In high school, I had a friend sneer and tell me that I reeked of cigarette smoke. I don’t smoke. However, my dad does. On January 1, 2010, NC finally banned smoking in restaurants and bars (except for country clubs—elitism much?, cigar bars, and non-profit members only clubs)*. I read through some comments online and found a lot of whining from smokers as they threaten to go to SC to smoke while they eat out or refuse to patronize eateries anymore. On the other side, the non-smokers are gleeful and dancing all over the raining parade that has finally set down atop the smokers.
Since I grew up in a smoking household, the smell of cigarettes does not faze me. However, as illustrated above, my friends who are from non-smoking homes would be occasionally vicious to me. I could not help what my dad did. I eventually developed the habit of running my freshly laundered clothes to my bedroom and putting them away and keeping the door shut to try and keep the smell out. Then when it was time to leave the house, I’d wait to the last moment to get dressed. However, my efforts would be foiled if dad decided to smoke in the car.
Buying my own cars was the only solution. Since my name was on the title and I paid for maintenance and gas, I could ban my dad from smoking in my car. The only price I paid is that on long car trips, he’d have to pull over once an hour to smoke. This is from the man who could go days without smoking, but if heaven forbid he had a pack burning in his pocket, he did his damnedest to smoke them ASAP.
I think banning smoking in restaurants and bars is a good thing. When I was a hostess, I had read that restaurant workers are more likely to get ill from cigarette exposure than workers in non-smoking businesses. More statistics can be found here:
Bar and restaurant workers who are nonsmokers and exposed to workplace secondhand smoke were 6 times more likely to have a detectable level of a tobacco-specific lung carcinogen and higher total levels of the carcinogen than those working in smoke-free environments (20).
Bar and restaurant workers who are nonsmokers and exposed to workplace secondhand smoke were 109 times more likely to have nicotine in their bodies than those working in smoke-free environments (20).
Smokers will survive not being able to puff and eat in public eateries. For more information on the law, visit NC Prevention Partners.
*information from the Asheville Citizen-Times
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