Anti-goth movement?

[Synnthetik]

*screams* Apparently some idiots in our U.S. government think that children start smoking on the more expensive and harder to find cigs. This is preposterous and going to be causing me much dismay. I have been smoking Djarum clove cigarettes for about 14 years now, after switching off from Marlboro that I smoked in my late teens. I am so upset right now... if they were trying to prevent kids from starting to smoke they should at least include menthol smokes like the favored Newport brand. What about flavored liqours? They apparently have no problem with schnapps that tastes like ****ing Kool-Aid, WTF. grr...

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2009-09-22-flavored-clove-cigarettes_N.htm

[Klinical]

This has been in the works for months, unfortunately. Seems they managed to keep it reasonably quiet until the last moment though.

Wikipedia has more info:

In the United States, cigarettes were the subject of legal restrictions and political debate, including a proposed 2004 US Senate bill that would have prohibited cigarettes from having a "characterising flavor" of certain ingredients other than tobacco and menthol.[11] A study by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control found kreteks account for a relatively small percentage of underage smoking, and their use was declining among high school students.[12] Critics of the bill argued that support of the bill by the large U.S. tobacco maker Philip Morris, which makes only conventional and menthol cigarettes, indicated that the bill was an attempt to protect the company from competition.[13]
Some U.S. states, including Utah, New Mexico, and Maryland, passed laws that prohibit the sale of kreteks.[14] On 14 March 2005, Philip Morris International announced the purchase of Indonesian tobacco company PT HM Sampoerna after acquiring a 40% stake in Sampoerna from a number of Sampoerna’s principal shareholders.[15]
In 2009, the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act was introduced in the US Congress and signed into law by President Barack Obama, giving the FDA significantly more regulatory power over tobacco; one of the provisions in the law includes a ban on the use of flavors in tobacco, other than menthol. The ban includes kreteks. As of September 21, 2009 the clove cigarette were no longer legal in the US. However, Kretek International Inc., importer of the Djarum brand continued to offer the clove / tobacco products as small cigars in an effort to avoid the ban.

[Tarryk]

Hm.

http://tarryk.wordpress.com/2009/09/23/ ... -in-twine/

[Tastyvixen]

Every single one of us started by stealing a Winston or Marlboro or Kent III Ultra-Light 100 out of our mother’s purse when we were teenagers.

lol, you were spot on there Tarryk. Thats exactly how I got started. Still wish I never had. I still have cravings and its been 2+ years. I have to agree here, no one who I know ever started smoking with Cloves.

Every time I think the US government can't make themselves look any worse they have to go and prove me wrong.

[Screaminfu]

just another cherry on top of the "we're taking away your freedoms" cake.

i'd assume that the same thing has already happened here in the UK, i've never seen a pack of cloves for sale in any retail situation, no flavoured cigars etc.
<rant>
adults rarely give kids/teens credit for how intelligent they are at that age. the brain figures things out based on your own experiences, it may be a primitive answer, but in a logical way you can see how it arrived at the answer.

you see rough strong men on tv smoking....you see male role models in your life smoking (father, family, peers at school etc). all of these experiences tell your brain what the act of smoking does for you. it says only adults can smoke, the "cool" people smoke (action hero's in movies etc).

this is why it's such a foreign concept to me that "flavoured" cigarettes/tobacco are at risk. the want/need to smoke (in teens) comes from personal need to be accepted into adult society and to not be treated like a child....so what do the government say in response.

"we're treating you ALL like children, you've been bad and now we're taking your toys away".

hey Klinical, am i right in remembering that in the UK at the moment they are trying to remove any kind of branding on cigarette packs so they are basically white boxes with big health warnings on? can't remember if that was dismissed or not.

anywho, if children or teens have a popular role model who smoke, then naturally their brain associates smoking with being grown-up, accepted, cool etc.

as a smoker myself i think there really shouldn't be any middle ground here, you'll NEVER hear gov say "smoking is bad and can kill you, we're banning all tobacco products for the better of society".

either it's legal or it's not, don't faff about with half measures designed with no thought or democratic process. do you think the american poplous was consulted about this tobacco regulation?

people say democracy is freedom. in a democracy it's possible for 51% of the population to dictate how the other 49% lives, how is that freedom?

</rant>

early morning rant

maybe i'll come up with another rant later hehe.

SL

[Klinical]

Clove cigarettes are available in the UK, they're just not very popular so it's almost impossible to find them. "Ethnic" supermarkets are one potential source.

The removal of anything other than plain lettering on cigarette packets is being advocated by the Liberal Democrats, after studies showed that people are dumb enough to think that certain packet colours meant (such as gold) the cigarettes were in someway less harmful than other brands. I don't think it's actively being considered by the government, fortunately.

Anyway all this is nothing new - 18th amendment anyone?

Of course, it's not like this everywhere:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstop ... onomy.html

[Screaminfu]

the chinese may have their political issues, but at least their government doesn't deny that the taxes raised from cigarettes is important to their economy during these tough times. you'd figure that maximising exisiting tax income is easier (eg. adding +1c to a pack of smokes etc) than creating new laws and and regulations (carbon tax anyone?). maybe it's just me; i know my views can be controversial at times, but this forward walk/march into perpetual slavery (we're already there, now we're selling off our younger generations freedoms/futures) is really getting scary. all the general public hear is what the corporate media tell them on tv/radio. these same companies then systematically break down and attack any man or woman who chooses to speak out against the gov, or even if they just want questions answered truthfully; charlie sheen's recent article about a fictional interview with obama has stirred up the gov ganksquads to destroy his character by bringing up his past, instead of trying to debate the issues he's trying to get media coverage for (9/11 truth movement).

i kinda went offtopic....everyone loves a rant though

~sneakily puts on tinfoil hat to keep in all his thoughts~

we're all screwed, how fast we get screwed is up to us.

SL

[Nicodar]

I have to agree here, no one who I know ever started smoking with Cloves.

I know two that started with cloves and never moved to other kinds of cigarettes. *shrugs*

[Ceryn]

I think the real issue here, is not about banning certain types of cigarettes, which is not really such a bad thing (I'm all for choice, but a world without would be better than a world with)

The important thing, which we are missing, is this "Ban Goths" idea.. which seems to have been missed.. and this just cannot be allowed..

*stamps heavy booted foot*

[ivanelme]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstop ... onomy.html

China's plan seems rather short sighted to me. I would hope they have some system in place to cope with the increases in medical costs that they will most assuredly incur from getting a sizable portion of the population to start smoking or increase smoking. Not to mention the lowering of the workforce from premature deaths related to smoking illnesses considering they are still going through rampant industrialization which can do just as much damage to their economy.

[Eleanore69]

I agree that if you are ONLY smoking cloves (and such) cig it's harder to quit. At least for my part. But ban it and make it illegal that's just Nazi shit for me.

Everybody should have the right and the choice about every single thing.

I'm not American and I have no clue about the other laws over there and what is FDA exactly but really that makes me laugh (ok not exactly, and not at all in fact, that just shock me) when I see stuff like that when they decide to ban such things and when you see what other sick stuff there is far more important and dangerous there.

Liberty, freedom, those are dead.