can we please just ban smoking in public already

[kaberett]

Smoke exposure on my way into work again. It hurts to breathe again. It has been the case, two days running, that the people I've asked to kindly consider not smoking at the top of the ramp into the building, within 5m of the building entrance, have looked baffled and disgusted at me and not even bothered to make a verbal response, so that was a load of exposing myself further for precisely 0 gain.

Which means I am getting around to typing up this rant.

If you smoke in public, you are the reason I can't leave the house safely, where by "safely" I mean "without ending up coughing and wincing with every single breath for a week".

Here is a partial list of things that prompt me to alter my breathing patterns in public, just in case, because I can't really afford to be incautious:

• people standing at bus stops
  
• people standing outside tube stations
  
• people standing near building entrances
  
• people sitting at tables outside cafes
  
• people waiting at pedestrian crossings
  
• wind (because it means I need to be further away from any smokers to be safe)
  
• absence of wind (because it means that smoke doesn't disperse as rapidly)
  
• people getting their phones out of their pocket
  
• people getting anything out of their pocket
  
• people using their phones while walking
  
• people gesturing while talking to friends
  
• people walking abreast across a pavement
  
• et fucking cetera

If you smoke near building entrances, you're the reason I can't safely walk down the street or get into work. If you smoke near bus stops or stations, you're the reason I can't safely use public transport. If you smoke in public parks or while walking between destinations, you are the reason I can't safely use or occupy those spaces. If you smoke in public but only when you're not around me you are still the goddamn problem, and I shouldn't have to spell out why for you. If you smoke in public, you are the fucking reason I can't leave the house or even open windows safely, and I hope you feel fucking awful about it.

Comments

[barakta]

Oh so very this! Work at a university, walking into work in the morning is often in a crowd (a whole challenge to stay upright in itself) and if some git is smoking in that crowd and I can't see them I can't breathe and am clogging up but CAN'T escape... I have long term ENT issues which Do Not Need Triggering kthx. I'd happily make all of campus bar some smoking huts non smoking! I wish the whole world was "smoking only in the designated smoker pits"...

And grr yes to the non enforcement of smoking near buildings, drives me potty that no one cares...

I would be less harmed by someone slapping me in the face...