Challenge 17: Smoking

180. If you could ban anything in the world, what would it be and why?

Smoking. If anything was to be banned in this world it would be smoking. This huge profit-making industry that help relax people leads to many health problems. I personally do not like the smell of smoke as it gives me headaches, but that isn’t the point, smoking is unhealthy, a waste of money, and effects not only the smokers but those around them as well. Being brought up with people smoking around me, I hated how inconsiderate they were as to smoking in a room with other non-smokers present. Non-smokers suffer as much as smokers do, in terms of illness, as they breathe in the polluted air. No, these passive smokers are more affected by inhaling the smoke than smokers are by smoking.

If smoking were banned, the people closest to me would have no choice but to stop. I have asked those people to stop more than a hundred times, yet, it doesn’t seem to work. Sometimes I feel like giving up, because they just don’t understand that I say it because I love them and smoking just increases the chances of them getting diseases of all kinds. But each time they feel a pain in the chest or have a coughing fit, I go back to my nagging on how they should quit! Is a puff of smoke that satisfying that they risk their life for it? I don’t think they realize how much it would mean to so many people if they just stopped! If smoking were banned, I would feel the relief in knowing that each cough these people coughed wouldn’t be because of smoking; the huskiness in their voice wouldn’t be because of smoking; the pain they feel wouldn’t be because of smoking.