AS I SEE IT...

A Scene out of Escape from New York

At the Atlanta airport there was a "smoking lounge" on the concourse. Air travelers that smoke know that a smoker's lounge is a real luxury, not necessarialy luxurious, but a luxury just the same.

The Smoking Lounge was horrid. The ceiling was a wade of exposed wires, cables, ducts, and pipes. The obviously old light fixtures hung precariously at odd angles. Dust on the varied ceiling fixtures was at least a half inch thick. There was an over abundance of huge ugly, ash trays the size of trash cans that appeared to not have been emptied for quite some time. The paint on the walls appeared a putrid shade of green. The vinyl covering the mismatched chairs was split and cracked with age. The combined appearance of the paint, and furniture in the smoking lounge definitely made an impression - an impression that someone had been sent to trash pick to find furniture just for the smoker's lounge. The lounge appeared to be a set, or stage for the movie Escape From New York.

It was obvious that this Smoker's Lounge was designed as some kind of cruel joke by non-smokers.

The ratty, unclean space craved out of the cleaner, better maintained space afforded non-smokers was a concession we accepted gladly. The non-smokers' did not deter any of us, even the most well-heeled, and well-dressed walked in, glanced around, and if need be requested a light from a fellow smoker.

The contrast between inside the Smokers' Lounger and outside the Smokers' Lounge is as dramatic a contrast as I have witnessed. People should not treat other people like this, nor expect people to tolerate this type of treatment silently, or for very long, either.

Smokers' have now joined the ranks of the most mistreated, and persecuted of our generation. We realize that prejudice is not only about the color of someones' skin, or their nationality. Yes, smokers' realize exactly what it is like to be segregated, and admonished. Non-smokers' profit from the taxes we pay on cigarettes and other forms of tobacco products, states and lawyers are making millions of dollars in profits from taxes and lawsuits, and all the while, We, the lowly smokers', are treated like second class citizens.

Smokers' are not breaking any laws. Smoking is legal. Smoking is taxed. Smoking is a choice, freely made by a free person living in what is suppose to be a Democratic nation.

I did quit smoking once... the world stinks, and the world is not being stunk up just by smokers' either. I decided to start smoking again so I didn't have to smell all the chemical plants discharge, and other stuff. Capitalist Non-smokers, who want to impose your ways on everybody, are allowing too many others to really pollute our world, but you're blinded by your single sighted goal to rid the world of smokers'. News flash - we all got bigger problems.

Sure you, campaigning Non-smokers' may cause a few smokers' to quit smoking, you will earn the points for winning that battle, but while ya'll were out figuratively beating up on individual smoker's, you will have lost the war. HA HA

"What war?, non-smokers' ask. That is the problem isn't it, ya'll non-smokers' really think smokers' are the problem.

"Idiots'!" and I just call'em like I see 'em.