When Good Intentions go Bad or...

They can pave the Road to Hell but They can’t fix the Damn Highway!

For the last century or so tobacco use was considered a given, the type of thing that people did regardless of where they were at. Restaurants, moving picture houses, courtrooms, wherever. Pipe, cigar, cigarettes, even chewing tobacco and snuff were simply the norm. Of course, those who found it offensive would occasionally ask (or tell) someone not to use their tobacco product around them but then they might hear something like "It’s a free country" or, "If you don’t like it, you can leave!" Or they may have even gotten a smack to the head! (One can fantasize, can't one?)

So there you go; way back when tobacco users were already sowing the seeds of discontent among those who did not choose to partake. Interesting how what goes around…

When the tobacco industry finally got the spotlight shown on it, it was about damn time. Not only had Big T gotten arrogant about its acceptance in society, it had fostered ever more toxic advertising practices as well as chemically altering the product to ensure a healthy and ever expanding profit margin.

Well, okay, so those last two things are what ‘all the other kids do’ as well but that’s not the point. My beef is why the hell did Big T have to do all the chemical crap to it? And when is enough profit enough? Apparently, the respective answers are “because we can” and “never”.

You know, like all the other industries (kids) do.

Then what makes Big T so much more evil in the eyes of the non-tobacco using world? Probably because of the simplest reason – it reminds us how sloppy, imperfect and perfectly mortal we are. Tobacco is looked down upon as a habit, an addiction, an unnecessary luxury and/or indulgence. Of course, so is alcohol, ice cream, chocolate, SUV’s, coffee, sugar, music, art, and everything else that has either been declared bad for you, could be bad for you, make someone else look bad or "make" someone feel bad.

Censorship and other tyrannies concerning people's behaviours are nothing new. They have always existed and force fed to anyone within spitting range of a religious or a political pulpit, as well as from ever-evolving social mores.

Yet, it also seems that when some ‘bad’ thing becomes outlawed long enough it comes back as a rebellion, then a cause, then once again as an accepted norm until it’s time for it to be ‘bad’ again.

I think that’s because we don’t cope well with the concept that as imaginative, creative, clever, productive, ingenious, whatever as we can be, we are still destined to wind up as worm bait. Who truly wants to see their faults and vulnerabilities? I mean, I don’t have any to face myself but if I did, I’m sure I wouldn’t want to deal with it.

So, if we cannot escape or accept our own sloppy selves what can we do? We do what we can to reform everyone else, that’s what. Once all the evils that those 'Others' engage in have been vanquished, THEN we'll be able to live happily, well and forever!

Personally, I think that sounds a little exhausting. I’d rather continue to learn how to put up with people who inhabit this planet with me and hope they choose to learn to do the same.

OH, how I hope they choose to learn to do the same. Otherwise, we could wind up on the same seesaw together and I’m not sure I could resist jumping off my end while they’re up in the air on theirs.

Hmmm. Then again, that could be fun!