When will Japan join the modern world? When pigs fly.
The cruel reality of Japan is that alongside the very high smoking rate, the Japanese live longer than anyone else. So smoking doesn't kill the Japanese, it just makes it very smoky in Japan. :(
LONDON, Feb. 14 — After a tortured debate, Parliament voted overwhelmingly on Tuesday for a total ban on smoking in indoor public places in England — a move that seemed certain to end the time-hallowed traditions of the smoky British pub, where a pint of ale and a cigarette once defined the downtime of generations.
The decision, by an unexpectedly high margin of 384 to 184, brought England into line with Ireland, which barred smoking in public places in March 2004, and with Scotland and Northern Ireland, where bans are to come into force over the next 13 months. The local parliament in Wales has also said it will seek a full ban. The English ban is expected to come into effect next year.
Japan men only have very high smoking rates (although Japan Tobacco are trying their hardest to redress the balance) at over 50% - women are at around 10%-15% or so depending on which statistics you look at.
Smoking is probably the one thing in Japan that gets me most annoyed, from the rather casual portrayal on health shows on programs to non-segregated, or ineffictively segregated smoking areas in restaurants, via being crushed up against someone smelling of stale fags in the morning rush hour.
While I prefer non-smoking establishments, this is CLEARLY a violation of property rights. It's an outrage to consider that a privately owned establishment can somehow be forced to regulate - against its will - the legal behaviors of its guests. I believe that the market should decide. Some people like to smoke, and they should be able to congregate in facilities where smoking is permitted by the proprietor of the establishment.
Once again, I don't smoke, I don't like smoking, and I prefer a clean atmosphere - but I also recognize that a free society is founded on three core principals, and this violates the pillar of private ownership of property (the other two are, of course, freedom of expression and an armed populace).
cdg
In the Irish case anyway, the ban is not on smoking in privately owned establishments. It is on smoking in any place of work. The idea is that allowing smoking in people's workplaces is a violation of labour rights.
Christian, I for one am I happy that such things as public health are NOT decided by "the market" (as brainwashed as it is by those out to make money off it) and rather by ostensibly democratically elected governments which reflect (theoretcially) the will of the people.
I have been a smoker for ten years. The city where I live is enacting a smoking ban in public places in 2 months from now and I can hardly wait.
The weirdest thing in Tokyo, insofar as smokign is concerned is you have bits of th ecity where it is illegal to smoke outside in the street, but you can slip into a restaurant, sit down next to a family and light up. And people do. Ridiculous.