islander wrote: 

we're pretty tolerant here, I wouldnt worry too much

How many years do I lose for using the new post editor?

 jadewahoo wrote: 
 Great now I have to worry about that too?

 pdhski wrote:  Again, no doubt. Anything we do increases our risk of some health disorder, form the food we eat to the amount of sex we, as men, hve in oour early 20's (more sex = higher incidence of prostate cancer in later life. This includes masturbation). So, shall we all agree that it is healthier to not fuck, eat, drink or smoke? I thought so. Ok, so we choose our experience of life. and each one has its consequences. Like I said before, I choose to avoid the cities whenever possible. The major benefit that brings to the health of my lungs is one factor that allows me the greater freedom of choicer as to puffing a tobacco. I personally have no need to defend my choice. I have only sought to bring forth a consideration that what so many hold as to be 'sensible' is in fact intolerance.

 Johray63 wrote: 
Oh I agree! I couldn't make it in "their" world and "they" couldn't make it in mine. But if I was born into it... yanno.

A very good friend from my childhood, an old-school hippy who taught me a great deal about life, smoked nothing but her own hand-rolled Drum tobacco. She is a vibrant, loving, good-humored person who gave a lot of herself to her students, her kids, and her grandkids.

She is currently dying of lung cancer.

Anecdotes don't make for good science but they sure bring it home.

 MayBaby wrote: 
That sounds a bit like "men never added anything really necessary to what was already there, since humans exist".  I sometimes think about modern life like that, but at the same time realize I wouldn't stand a chance in the jungle, so go for another supermarket visit, instead of hunting (etc.) ;-)

 aflanigan wrote: 
No doubt. I am not here to say tobacco smoking is the cleanest  and purest past time one might indulge in. Rather, I was seeking to provide some insight that would promote a greater tolerance amongst the rabid anti-tobacco people. As a conscientious smoker, I amvery aware of those around me when I smoke. Even at home I smoke out on my deck, not in the house, except for during the Shamanic healing sesions I offer, where the use of tobacco as a sacrament is an integral part of the event.

jadewahoo wrote:

"Most people who smoke cigars, do so on an occasional rather than a regular or daily basis, and tend not to inhale the smoke deep into the lungs. The alkaline pH of cigar smoke means that the nicotine it contains is readily absorbed through the oral mucosa. Cigar smokers therefore receive a high smoke exposure to the mouth and tongue, and constituents of smoke in their saliva are swallowed, resulting in higher risks of oral and esophageal cancers. In regular cigar smokers, this risk is similar to that of cigarette smokers.

In cigar smokers who do not inhale the smoke deeply, the risk of laryngeal cancer is less than that of cigarette smokers, as are the risks of lung cancer, other lung disease and heart disease. However, the risk of developing disease increases with extent of exposure to cigar smoke. Daily smoking (with moderate inhalation) of five cigars provides a disease risk profile similar to that of a typical pack-a-day cigarette smoker."

National Cancer Institute. Cigars: health effects and trends. Smoking and Tobacco Control Monographs, Monograph 9. Rockville, MD: National Cancer Institute, US National Institutes of Health; 1998. Available from: http://cancercontrol.cancer.gov/tcrb/monographs/9/index.html

"Manufactured loose tobacco, hand-rolled into cigarette paper and smoked with or without a filter, causes the same range of diseases as smoking manufactured cigarettes. Variations in quantity of tobacco used per cigarette and filtration make measurements of individual exposure more difficult to assess, but the directly comparable exposure to harmful constituents and method of consumption means that smokers of these products have at least an equivalent risk of developing disease as smokers of conventional cigarettes. Several decades of research on the health effects of tobacco use have enabled comparisons between products with and without filters, and with high and low nicotine and tar yields. Overall, incidence of lung cancer has not varied with tobacco product used, and nor have other health benefits become apparent."
US Department of Health and Human Services. The health consequences of smoking. A report of the Surgeon General. Rockville, MD: US Department of Health and Human Services, Public Health Service, Office of the Surgeon General; 2004. Available from: http://www.surgeongeneral.gov/library/smokingconsequences/
Jade, this is meant in no way to diminish your connection to, or choice in the way you believe and worship.  However, many studies have been conducted since the 70's that show further connections to even limited smoke exposure. 

Peace.

 jadewahoo wrote: 

When I was a smoker I smoked tailormades (hand rolled) using Virginia tobacco (it was sold in bulk by a local tobacconist; Export A was the best tasting comercially available stuff around, although the Drum brand Stu mentioned wasn't bad).  I doubt I could have managed to resist inhaling because frankly Virginia tobacco without all the chemical processing tastes pretty damned good.  My hat's off to you if you can puff on a tailormade without inhaling!

Without checking the numerous studies that have been done, however, I suspect that while smoking untainted tobacco, or even puffing without inhaling, could plausibly reduce the risk of cancer, one would probably still be at greater risk of lung cancer or (for puffers) oral cancer than a nonsmoker.  After all, tobacco use including snuff, chew, and smoking in various forms has been suspected as damaging to health for quite some time by doctors and others; was not the correlation between illness and early death and smoking established before it became commonplace to add all sorts of chemicals like saltpeter and flavorings to cigarettes?  Doesn't burning even untreated tobacco produce nasty stuff that, if inhaled repeatedly into the lungs, damage them?

 jadewahoo wrote: 
No sorries... 

I believe that greed is at the root of all of the destruction. If people would just "do the right thing" yanno. It's not gonna happen. I will continue to live a simple peaceful life despite all the bullshit. Sometimes I wish I were born into a "third world" tribe. Think about it. It would be so much simpler... I don't care for the running from the lions part tho ; )

 MayBaby wrote:If anyone was ranting it was me. Sorry. It is an area of sensitivity that i have... not tobacco, per se, but the onslaught against any culture which is not the PC Ideal. So much beauty has been lost, is continuing to be snuffed out due to the encroachment of, not just American, but, contemporary industrialized societies. Sigh...

I am not innocent of opting for ease when it comes to doing all the right things. We do the best we can with the degree of awareness that we have. I trust that with each and every one of us, including the most vehement negators of anything other than the PC party line to be found espoused in these forums.

 jadewahoo wrote: 

(1) I KNOW it is harmful and I'm an addict, maybe because of the chemicals, I don't know. But I'm not telling anyone how to live.

(2) Mine wasn't a rant, just an observation. But as you said "this culture", so I don't take that personally.

I may be a part of the destruction of the planet. Yep. I was born into it but that isn't an excuse. I do what little I can in this society to "live green" but I know I can improve... I am not very environmentally correct. Nope. I am trying, though. Not so much for me but for the kids and their kids.

(3) Yea, "my culture" but not me. Thank you for not attacking me in a direct way.

Everyone is born into and dare I say trapped in their society. I have to drive a car... no, I drive a truck! I drive the truck because I needed it in my business. Now that I'm not in business, I don't need the truck as much as I used to but I still need it to make the rare few dollars that I do working odd jobs. I can't carry my tools or products on a moped. Eventually, technology will (if big business doesn't snuff it out in it's infancy) prevail and we will clean up our messes.

Anyway I do what I can. I recycle, do full loads of laundry, drive the car when the truck isn't needed, keep the thermostat at levels that force me to wear a sweater or two in the house... whatever I can. I know I could do more. We could all do more. I won't preach because I pretty much know nothing except what I have experienced. I will say what I know if it benefits someone else but I can't preach.

(end of rant)  ; )

 MayBaby wrote: 
Simply put... NO. I remember reading the research parers from the University of Berkely, Ca (circa 1972) upon which the original denouncement of cigarettes was made by the Surgeon General. It stated that 92% of the carcinogens in a cigarette are in the gum of the paper that binds the cigarettes in a tube. Having said that, I do not recommend that any one start smoking cigarettes (reasons given in the previous post). As Stu has mentioned, the abuse of tobacco is a corruption of yet another sacred of the Earth People. Addictive smoking is not the intended purpose of the sacred Grandfather Tobacco.

If you feel that strongly about your belief that tobacco is harmful, I would suggest that you a) don't smoke and b) avoid places where one is apt to be exposed to tobacco smoke. I have to make a similar choice regarding not exposing myself to the toxic environs that your cities are immersed in. I choose not to breathe your polluted air, so I stay out of your cities, best I can.

The hypocrisy of this culture against tobacco is that while you rant against the harms of tobacco, you will do so while walking down a street of your city, inhaling a toxic mish-mash of poisons being expelled from your exhaust pipes. Thinking that you (again, the big you, not you personally) are being so enviromentally correct, you want to increase the number of electric vehicles in your cities. That electricity is being produced by the coal fired power plants of the Four Corners area and our people are suffering from black lung and quality of life denigration so that you can drive your 'green' cars. Your culture would deny us our sacrament and means of commune with the Spirits of our relationship while you destroy the very places where those Spirits are best found: in meditation in the quiet and undisturbed places of nature.

On Sale Now!
 

 jadewahoo wrote: 
I smoked from the age of 15 until I was 30.  When I quit I was a 2 to 2 1/2 pack a day smoker.  It was hard, probably harder than anything else I've ever done.

About ten years ago, I started smoking hand-rolled "Drum" brand (later to change to American Spirit) cigarettes and smoking them without inhaling.  I smoked about 8-10 cigarettes a week (yes, a week) and always in a contemplative way.  I never inhaled.  I only puffed and did what Jade has described, used the smoke as a meditative medium.

I'm not Native American but I have a great respect for the fact that tobacco has been mis-used by the Europeans.

About four years ago when my heart rhythm troubles showed up, I quit entirely (except for about one or two cigars a year) and there was no withdrawl.

I am glad Jade's going to send us some good thoughts... we seem to need them.

 jadewahoo wrote: 
But isn't tobacco (additives or not) a carcinogen? I respectfully disagree with your thoughts on tobacco. Cigarettes are probably the worst for a body but people get cancer from cigar and pipe tobacco, even if it isn't inhaled and then there are the smokeless ones - snuff, or chewing tobacco. I guess the only good thing about the smokeless variety is that it isn't polluting other people's environment and the risk of cancer is confined to the user. Correct my ignorance if I'm wrong.

Please, I'm not trying to start anything here. I just think that tobacco, in any form, isn't good for us. This from, unfortunately, a lifelong cigarette smoker.

 Isabeau wrote:Tobacco is, for me and those of my culture, a sacrament. A  tobacco of pure leaf, no additives, is handrolled so as to give time and consideration to the purpose of that smoke. Each puff carries a heart felt thought and feeling of goodness (a prayer, if you will). Tobacco is not meant to be inhaled, anymore than I would sit around a campfire and huff the smoke of that. A tobacco is puffed, not inhaled. Smoking in this way insures that:
1) the chemical processes that would otherwise take place within the lungs, creating the toxic components of exhaled secondhand smoke (carbon monoxide/dioxide, etc) are not created nor released.
2) the amount of nicotine brought into the system is minimal, not enough to create addiction. It is the massive infusion of nicotine into the blood brought about by inhalers of cigarettes, laden as they are with a cocktail of other added chemical drugs designed to hook one on that particular brand, that triggers the addiction.

Me, I would never smoke a cigarette. Cigarettes are not the same thing as a pure leaf tobacco, anymore than cocaine is the same thing as chewing on a coca leaf.

Unless one is informed, and open minded, it is easy to be intolerant even while thinking one is standing up for what is 'right'. Understanding that you (the grand 'you', not necessarily the Isabeau 'you') are probably unaware of anything regarding tobacco other than what your culture teaches you, I don't hold it against you for being so... intolerant. I send a puff of good thoughts your way anyway, cuz love is a stronger force than prejudice.

 jadewahoo wrote: 
We don't much tolerate that kinda talk around these parts, Pilgrim.

 jadewahoo wrote: 
tolerance and where it should be exercised seems to be a subjective thing.

. . . I'm sure if we asked long enough, we could find some things you are not "tolerant" of either.  Personally, as an ex-smoker, I believe displaying a personal philosophy to die and including others around you while you make that choice, is not a matter of tolerance.
It is a fundamental right for anyone to reject what they personally feel is not good for them. If we make smoking unglamorous and save a few hundred mis-guided urban cowboys' lives, then so be it.

I am not villifying you sir, simply making a personal choice as you are