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« Smoking mittens | Main | Another good result for the nanny state »
Monday
Jan112010

From the archives ...

Writing in the Observer yesterday Nick Cohen acknowledged what we were saying ten years ago:

Puritanism is as powerful a strain in English culture – and wider British and American culture – as embarrassment. As smokers told you they would, the puritans have now switched their censorious gaze from cigarettes to wine and beer ...

Reading the full article HERE reminded me of another piece by Cohen, published by the New Statesman in January 2000, exactly ten years ago.

"The plot to keep us puffing" began with a reference to a 1999 Forest report entitled Smoking: The New Apartheid that highlighted the growing number of recruitment ads that advertised vacancies for "non-smokers only".

Thereafter the article preoccupied itself with the battle between Big Tobacco and New Labour's "good intentions". See HERE.

Bearing in mind what has happened to smokers in Britain over the past decade, and the dark cloud now gathering over those who enjoy a drink, I wonder if journalists like Nick Cohen will be as censorious about the drinks industry as they were about the tobacco industry?

PS. The Yorkshire Post has a "look back in history" style feature. Last week it focussed on January 1985 and included this item:

Smoking was banned on Yorkshire's buses, following pressure from the anti-smoking lobby. Members of the West Yorkshire Public Transport Committee passed an order making it an offence to smoke on buses, apart from the back row of seats and even then smokers would be asked to refrain in the interests of public health. The move did not go down well with the Freedom Organisation for the Right to Enjoy Smoking Tobacco (Forest), who argued 71 per cent of people were against the ban.

Apart from the back row of seats? Now that's what I call compromise!

Reader Comments (5)

I vaguely remember putting a comment on the publican around Jul 2007 it went something like this.
How are you you going to run a pub after they ban alchohol ?
Or ration it ?
However the Zelots will meet a much stiffer resistance to alchohol simply because most adults enjoy a drink.
Apart from the Puritan weirdo's who dont.
I would imagine they flagellate themselves with sting nettles instead.

January 11, 2010 at 12:44 | Unregistered CommenterSpecky

Its about time one of the many real scientists spoke out against the scaremongering and money making lies about the so called dangers of smoking or SHS, like one Wolfgang Wodarg, head of health at the Council of Europe did in today's media.
When he accused the makers of the swine flu drugs and vaccines of influencing the WHO's decision to declare a pandemic, which led to pharmaceutical firms ensuring enormous gains.
He said that the British govt is desperately trying to off-load up to 1billion of swine flue vaccine.
He also says that pharmaceutical coys have influenced scientists and offical agencies responsible for public health standars in order to promote their drugs, by making them squander tight healthcare resources for inefficient vaccines, that needlessly exposed millions of healthy people to the risk of unknown side-effects of insufficiently tested vaccines.
More, Sir Roy Anderson who advises the British govt on swine flu, also holds a 130K a year post on the board of GlaxoSmith Kline, the biggest beneficiaries of the pandemic!
When you think of what these dangerous self serving money grabbers are getting away with in plain sight it makes you shivver.
When are we going to hear of a similar expose on the lies for corporate gain in regard to the smoking ban that has been left having a free loading easy ride for the past ten years, without any investigation at all?
I'd like to know.

January 11, 2010 at 12:50 | Unregistered Commenterann

P.S. Forgot to mention the punch line heading of above article "Drug firms created a 'false' flu pandemic".

January 11, 2010 at 13:01 | Unregistered Commenterann

As Nick Cohen says, "Puritanism is as powerful a strain in English culture – and wider British and American culture – as embarrassment. As smokers told you they would, the puritans have now switched their censorious gaze from cigarettes to wine and beer"

This whole puritanical movement goes back even further, and covers not just tobacco and alcohol, but would you believe coffee as well?

I am currently working on a project, part of which I have pasted here (below). Judge for yourselves:

As with nearly all-popular pursuits, there always seems to be someone or some group, who are opposed to it, as happened in the USA with Prohibition, and the UK with the smoking ban. In 1674 a group of women formed the 'Women's Petition against Coffee'. These women would burst into coffee shops, causing as much disturbance as possible, and scatter their leaflets about, in which they complained that by indulging in coffee, men were becoming as "unfruitful as the dessert where that unhappy berry is said to be bought". Needless to say, their efforts did not amount to much, as by the 18th century it was estimated that there were over 3000 coffee houses in London.

January 11, 2010 at 16:11 | Unregistered CommenterPeter Thurgood

Ann, there are none so blind as those who can see!

January 11, 2010 at 17:38 | Unregistered CommenterLyn

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