Smokers have the right to be heard

 Simon Clark is asking for our ideas HERE.

I am not a smoker, I'm a vaper. I'm a smoker at heart. But if ever we are disempowered as smokers have been, we will need the same rights,

This was my (edited) answer to "Do Smokers have Rights?"

I think smokers have as much right to smoke as Bell ringers have a right to ring bells, as Sportspeople have the right to play sport and, Bell ringers and Sportspeople are treated without judgement by the medical profession which they have paid for with their taxes, when they have been (self) injured. I broke a finger Bell ringing. The hospital classified it as a "sports injury" and gave me a surprising statistic of how many people they treat regularly for rope burns and broken digits, JUST from Bell ringing!  All sports are expensive to our NHS yet personally inflicted. What society views as a "good" lifestyle costs in hip replacements, knee replacements, and foot trouble in later life. Dancers and musicians suffer equally. Many end up with serious health problems from a self inflicted lifestyle. A good number die. Yet they have rights.

Quote (ASH) - "Prior to the implementation of the smokefree law, it was estimated that exposure to secondhand smoke in the workplace caused around 617 premature deaths in the UK each year.

How they worked out this figure must have been magical rather than scientific! For 617 (guesstimate?) deaths from SHS - itself debatable, a quarter of the entire British population have been excommunicated from society, even in places where their SHS can do no harm.

Smokers use a legal product to perform a legal lifestyle.

They do have rights.

They have the right to protest their excommunication from society that has been orchestrated by self righteous people who have used every means  possible and millions of pounds to do it.

They have the right to explain that SHS was an excuse to turn society away from their habit.

They have the right to explain that they are NOT a dying breed (pun intended) but that cancer rates, asthma, allergies and other "smoking related" illnesses are increasing, not falling, despite their excommunication.

They have the right to explain that their habit and self harming has been over exaggerated by the self righteous and that medical porn displayed on their product packs are criminal nocebos performed against them.

The biggest right they have, is the right to free speech. Smokers have a right to be heard. They are never represented fairly in the media They are yelled down on TV, and like the inquisition, they are only allowed to speak when they recant.

Smokers have a right to be heard.