Supervisors propose regulations on electronic cigarettes :
The city of San Francisco is getting ready to introduce legislation that would ban the sale of e-cigs and vaporizers except where regular tobacco products are allowed. The same will go for public vaping as well. Can’t smoke there? Can’t vape there as well. Honestly, I really don’t have a problem with that. Even though vaping doesn’t even remotely produce the same kind of toxic cloud that smoking does the norms will still freak out when a puff drifts their way. Not to mention, for me anyway, that vaping has allowed me to increase the time I can go without nicotine. If I’m out to dinner these days I don’t feel the need to rush outside every 10 minutes. Plus as former smokers we should all be used to being relegated outdoors by now. Here’s the thing though. San Francisco will be enacting these regulations using the same old tired argument we’ve heard over and over again. It’s for the kids.
Supervisor Eric Mar, who has a 13-year-old daughter, said the number of students he hears about smoking in and outside the classroom has grown “exponentially.”
“E-cigarette companies use flavors like cotton candy I think as a hook for a new generation of users, but especially targeting teens and younger people,” said Mar, adding that the legislation is also meant to crack down on illegally selling e-cigarettes to minors.
“Tobacco companies know it’s a wild west out there, so common-sense regulations like ours that treat e-cigarettes like regular cigarettes are important,” he said.
The presence of e-cigarettes in media is “normalizing the smoking after several decades of anti-tobacco work to keep cigarettes out of television ads and magazines,” Mar added.
Again, with the flavors. Look, I’m in my mid 40s and here’s the flavors I have currently, Vanilla, Chocolate, Cherry Cola and Banana. Adults actually enjoy these flavors. I was just at my vape store yesterday where some guy got blueberry cheesecake flavor. Besides, how many kids nowadays walk down the street chowing on a big carnival sized serving of cotton candy?
Secondly not every e-cig company is owned by a tobacco company. As far as I know the majority of them are not and most places that sell them have signs in their stores indicating that they can not be sold to anyone under 18. I’m not saying that teens are not getting them but I think the horror stories of teen vaping are being horribly overblown.
I’m not going to turn a blind eye to the fact that e-cig companies are trying to get us hooked on their product. That’s what any manufacturer wants to do whether it be fast food or mobile phone apps or what have you. It’s up to us as individuals to decide whether or not we want to engage in these practices. Also what the good supervisors of San Francisco fail to realize is that vaping offers you an out.
As I’ve said I smoked for 30 years. In the 8 months since I’ve been vaping I haven’t even slipped once. I started off vaping at 20mg of nicotine. I eventually went down to 16 then to 11 and now I’m at 6. My next step will be to go to 0mg and then phase it out altogether. In three decades smoking never gave me that opportunity.
So if you’re going to regulate vaping be honest about it. Say you’re doing it for the potential of future taxes because honestly that’s what this is really about. Stop trying to say you’re protecting the kids.
The Trench Reynolds Report 