Smoking and drinking in public

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

I realized that if you lived in my apartment building, you can't legally have a cigarette and beer at the same time unless you were visiting someone else's place. Smoking is banned inside the apartments and drinking is illegal outside the rooms and you can't smoke at the bars anymore. Of course that doesn't mean people don't drink outside but that's not the point. Question is this: Why's it legal to stand on a street corner with a cigarette but not have a beer?

Obviously the smoking is much worse to the passers-by. Drinking a beer in public doesn't affect anyone. And the public drunkeness case doesn't apply because there it doesn't matter where you drink it. You'd be just as obnoxious drinking the same amount of alcohol in a bar or your personal residence and then leaving.

So I say ban ALL smoking in public (not just bars and restaurants but anywhere outside of a private residence) and allow drinking alcohol in public areas as long as you don't act like a drunk ass.

[WalterMitty]

smoking should be banned in public buildings.  but why shouldnt it be allowed outside?

as for drinking in public, there is no use for that outside of bars, clubs and restaraunts.

[TeePee4Prez]

Option 1- I do both quite frequently.

[Hatman 🍁]

Option #2.

[AkSaber]

Legal/legal.

[specific_name]

Both should be legal. Businesses should regulate what goes on in their establishments. Obviously laws of disorderly conduct should still apply to extreme public drunkeness, and bars should have proper liquor licences. I don't agree with direct government intervention, in wholly banning either public drunking or smoking.

[patrick1]

BRTD further demonstrates that he is an egocentric hypocrite.

He belongs in the suburbs with his bad case of Nimby-itis.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

BRTD further demonstrates that he is an egocentric hypocrite.

He belongs in the suburbs with his bad case of Nimby-itis.

The point is this though:

Smoking in public exposes others to second hand smoke. You aren't harmed at all by a guy next to you having a beer. So why is one allowed in public and the other isn't?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The problem with second-hand smoke is when it's in enclosed spaces. It's just irritating, else.

[Verily]

Second-hand smoke is not quite as dangerous in the open air, but it's still problematic. I'm fine with smoking being legal in public places, but I wouldn't object if it were made illegal, either. Drinking should certainly be legal in public.

[Undisguised Sockpuppet]

legal/legal and give the MADD types a nice permanent home behind razor wire in the sonoran desert.

[Bdub]

Option 1

[opebo]

#1 obviously

[Bono]

BRTD further demonstrates that he is an egocentric hypocrite.

He belongs in the suburbs with his bad case of Nimby-itis.

The point is this though:

Smoking in public exposes others to second hand smoke. You aren't harmed at all by a guy next to you having a beer. So why is one allowed in public and the other isn't?

You're not objectively and physically harmed anyway.

[angus]

I drink quite a bit in public.   And my guess is that it's illegal on the streets.  But no one here seems to care.  Where I live I regularly get away with all sorts of stuff I wouldn't dare do in most of the other places I have lived.  I agree that in more economically developed parts of the USA they enforce all those laws.  For example, I have been ticketed in Cincinnati for public drinking when all I was doing was sitting on a park bench, killing an hour between buses, and sucking on a 22-ounce bottle of some cheap, domestic swill.  Not sure I was harming anyone.  I have also been ticketed in Fort Worth for walking down the street with sucking on a vodka and tonic with lime in a plastic disposable cup.  Both tickets were around 70 dollars.

Smoking I can smell when I walk by someone, I'll admit.  And I'd understand why some are more freaky about it.  Still, I'm not for outlawing it either.  I think too much Big Brother is more offensive than any particulate or liquid poisons that people might use.  I voted for the first option.

[Ban my account ffs!]

smoking should be banned in public buildings.  but why shouldnt it be allowed outside?

as for drinking in public, there is no use for that outside of bars, clubs and restaraunts.

There's no use for drinking period.  That's a bad argument.

One should be able to drink where one pleases as long as he/she is not causing a problem to others.  You can drink a beer pretty much anywhere (not in a vehicle, obviously) and not disrupt/cause harm to others.

Smoking, on the other hand, does affect others around you.  But I think asking smokers to step outside or having a separate room for smokers is good enough. 

I think at least minimally, we should allow drinking within a certain radius of the entrance to a bar, so that smokers that have to go outside can take their drinks with them.

[TeePee4Prez]

I wouldn't mind a ban on smoking as much if establishments were more accomodating.  McFadden's at the ballpark and Northern Libs are pretty good with letting smokers back in.  Some other places have some surly asshole bouncers that make people wait 10 minutes in the rain to come back in.  That's why I feel we're not ready for a smoking ban.