As of today, all public parks, beaches and pedestrian plazas in New York City will be smoke-free, enforced by a $50 fine. If you're having fun while smoking, then you will be fined an additional $25.*
You can read about the ban here at the Daily News. In any event, I know that all of you will abide by this.
[* OK, not really. But jeez.]
27 comments:
That's aimed at visitors. NYers can't afford to smoke cigarettes at $15 a pack.
Unreal...the vibe in this city is becoming more and more totalitarian. Non-Smoker here, by the way.
It's disgusting to inhale toxic lung discharge from inconsiderate smokers, not only in parks, etc., but also in doorways and on the street. These narcissitic yunnies don't give a shit that they blow that nasty smoke in everybody else's faces as they pass, and it's fucking gross. I wish they'd ban smoking everywhere, as a matter of fact. If you want to pollute the air with poison and force others, many with serious lung conditions, to inhale that garbage, do it in your own home.
I'm a non-smoker, but this is stupid.
How about a law that protects us form 2nd hand exhaust fumes?
today's sign of the apocalypse
as an ex-smoker (health reasons) i know how bad smoking can be for you. but second-hand smoke in a park or on a beach? more toxins come from the idling motors of cars, trucks, etc. and there are poisons in our food. shall we outlaw everything that is fun?
and don't forget smoking is still legal! as are cigar and hookah bars? is that tobacco any the less harmful? or is it that elected officials and corporate folks smoke cigars?
certainly there should be places for non-smoking, but also for smokers.
aren't we supposed to have freedom?
and don't forget those high "sin" taxes generated from tobacco.
@anon 9:44 -
Just another thing to blame on the "yunnies." Because no one else smokes. Do you even live in the east village? Or on this planet??
Let's just change the name of the place to No Fun City.
This is great although unlikely to be enforced. I'm all for people doing whatever the hell they want - as long as it doesn't affect me, any smoking does. It's disgusting.
I love it. There's nothing better than eating lunch in the park on a beautiful sunny day. So many times I've had to pick up and move because a smoker comes and sits down right next to me.
Too much monkey business. too much monkey business.
I don't want your botheration, get away, leave me be!
—Chuck Berry
I don't care so much about smokers in the park. But if it stops them from throwing their butts all over the place, good.
I don't give two shits about smoking, hell I enjoy the occasional aroma of tobacco but face it smokers, you are pariahs now. Nobody wants you around their business. Go and gather amongst your pitiful kind. By the way the whining and crying on *both* sides of this issue is way more irritating than any second-hand smoke.
@Anonymous 12:39 PM: Regarding your "butts" statement, does this mean you can't sit down in the park either? This is getting ridiculous!
It's really just like drinking, it's legal to drink but you can't legally stand around the park sucking down a tallboy.
This is good news. I don't need to inhale your cigarette smoke, you stinky smokers. It's bad enough I have to look at your yellow teeth and smell it on your clothes when I sit next to you in a restaurant. This should also cut down on the number of cigarette butts polluting the park.
why can't there be a place for smokers and a place for non smokers?
a person should have the right to eat a sandwich in the park without tasting smoke, and a smoker should have the right to enjoy the park too.
the parks, beaches, public spaces, etc. would be big enough for everybody if only people respected each other.
it's easier to smoke (still illegal) pot than cigarettes (legal).
when did being righteous and pious do anything except mostly bug others.
oh, i forgot, the rapture was saturday wasn't it!
@blue glass: I like the way you think!
The Nazi's were obsessed with prohibiting tobacco too. People have to understand, their owners want clean meat. Yet they still add chinese industrial toxic waste to the drinking water, oh wait, they call it flouride so its all fuzzy teddy bears. I was watching these big dark clouds of smoke billow from a big apt bldg yesterday, guess thats ok, and the dry cleaners and laundromats are still ejecting particles into the artomshere alongside the million or so vehicles entering the city - its all about police state control of public space.
I HATE CIGARETTE SMOKE AND STINK BUT WHEN IT COMES TO SMOKING IN YOUR OWN HOME..YOUR OWN HOME IS YOUR CASTLE..I READ THERE ARE COOPS THAT DON'T ALLOW IT AND FINE PEOPLE..THIS SHIT STINKS. RIGHTS ARE BEING LOST LEFT AND RIGHT(PUNS INTENDED)
Punster - Co-op's have a right to set rules like that. You have a right not to live in a co-op.
Just smoke in the bike lanes instead.
I like the law too but am wary of telling a nearby offending smoker he/she isn't allowed to smoke for fear of being bitch-slapped (or worse).
@ Jeremy--I was President of my coop board for a few years and I would never buy one again. Fucktards. No smoking but child abuse is rampent.
@anon 7:53 - yea, the thought of having to get approval from the whole building if you want to do any work on your place does not seem like a good time.
I like the smoking ban.
Ironic that you can't smoke in the park where it gets dispersed, but you can sit at Horus on the sidewalk next to a park and smoke tobacco from a bong. I cannot remember a time that a smoker annoyed me in the park, but every day I pass Horus and feel a little vomity in the back of my throat from that sickly sweet fruity tobacco smoke.
I sit, waiting in eager anticipation, for the day the Times' Front Page Headline reads "LINK FOUND: PROHIBITION CAUSES MURDER" followed by a bloated article stating that a gaggle of brain-trusts are in agreement that the rise in prohibitive laws—everything from no kite-flying in Central Park to no smoking in Washington Square—are to blame for the tandem rise in violent crime among Gothamites.
It's already happening. Squeeze the population, eventually the population pops. In NYC, Philly, LA... it's happening everywhere. The law refuses to punish the giants of crime (i.e. smog-making factories) so they punish we, the individuals.. What do WE do for the government? Anyone that reads this... what do you do for the government that they should care about your rights? We don't matter, so don't even bother trying to change this. Or anything. We've become such a fragmented, alienated society. No one sees anyone. Now people have to hide inside their homes if they want to smoke... alienate us more. Separate us more. Play with your electronics. Forget how to talk. Forget how to spell. Forget how to fight, how to socialise, how to meet ACTUAL people.
Every generation before this had righteous fight and might for 'let's leave this planet better than the last generation did!' going on. Now it's all just too much work; too much in the way of social skills are needed. A fraction of the newest crop coming up care about anything that can't be read in 3 minutes, on a tiny screen, and won't respond unless emoticons can be used to substitute a sentence.
Forget how to be a person.
Rest in peace, societal human beings. Welcome to Dean Koontz's Midnight.
Forgotten already. How. To be a person. Fragments. Wtvr.
It's just a law though, right?
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