While following this thread over the past few days, I have had a number of thoughts:

Several years ago, while I was still a smoker, I created a video program for Simon & Schuster and the American Cancer Society called "Freshstart: 21 Days to Stop Smoking." In the middle of writing the script, I came down with bronchiitis and very naturally stopped smoking for about a week while my lungs recovered. When I started feeling better, I had the thought, "Why don't I stop smoking now? I have already got a one week head start on it?" THis healthy thought was met by a string of rationalizations from another part of my personality, all aimed at telling me that it really was all right for me to return to smoking. Here are some examples of their rather questionable quality: "Now that I have moved from the East Coast to California, I am no longer breathng the exhalations of a continent of home, automobile and industrial air pollution. THe air I am breathing is coming clean off the Pacific. Surely this is the equivalent of having given up smoking in Washington D.C."

"I am smoking low tar and nocotine cigarettes so I'll be fine."

"My grandfathers smoked cigars all their lives and had no problems. I am not genetically predisposed towards these cancers."

I knew better than these arguments because I had dealt with them in a section I had written about the rationalizations people have for smoking. I had been so intent that this video be accurate and powerful that I had really examined my own rationalizations unmercifully even though I had no real intention of giving up smoking. Now that I was going to my own rationalizations for support of the decision I wanted to make, that it is fine for me to continue smoking, I was forced to confront the flimsiness of my rationales. Suddenly, I discovered that to continue smoking, after having admittted to myself what I had, would mean giving up a great deal of self-respect. I was a bit angry at this turn of events but reluctantly I did give up smoking.

Some good things started happenening pretty quickly. The first was that I no longer had to knock the ashes off the tyopescript when I put it into an envelope to send to the Cancer Society for their approval. The second thing was that I dodn't have to sneak out of ACS meetings to hide in their bathrooms for a smoke.

However, the biggest advantage was the removal of what I had learned in college was something called "cognitive dissonance". I no longer had to spend energy defending myself not just those who criticized my smoking but from my own criticism. I think my self-respect had become a little frayed by my having continued to smoke after the Surgeon General's Reports made it clear that it was bad for me. I never was comfortable saying, "It's my life to do with what I want" or "I could give up cigarettes but I really enjoy smoking".

Becasue more and more people were giving up smoking I had also noticed that I had begun doing something I noticed that my friends who had a drinking problem were prone to do, using as a criterion for companionship whether or not a person smoked rather than their interests, personality, etc.

As far as smoking making you stupid goes, I doubt it but I have seen the surveys that show that among mature smokers, (this does not include the new crop of high school and college age smokers), there is an increasing correlation between education level, income level, and smoking. This has been noticed by the cigarette companies who are targeting these people with advertising to take advantage of the predisposition.

And one more topic: There is an argument that goes that society has the right to stop people from smoking because it is society, not the individual, who must pay for the ravages of smoking. I think this is a very dangerous argument. Using it, one could outlaw of at least place some sort of health tax on anyone who skateboards, rock climbs, motorcycles, flies small planes, etc. A "safe" life is one in which the individual does nothing that puts him in harm's way. Not only is that a boring life, I think it is terrible for society. What kind of civilization would that create? I expect that the standards would soon change after the "big" risks were handled. The new big risks might be driving a car, getting on a commercial airliner.

Sourdough