Good for you! Keep fighting the addiction.

Why are we still tolerating smokers around the squares???

For the same reason we tolerate gays, transgenders, sun god worshipers, communists, etc. This is America and we recognize the rights of minorities, that's why we "tolerate" them.

I find it pretty easy to tolerate most groups, big or small, mainstream or fringe. I have even fought for those groups right to speak freely (something a lot of people with green or purple hair can't claim). Where I have difficulty is when I'm expected to advocate for a group I don't believe in. If I fall to fully advocate for theses outliers I'm a biggot.

I again call bs.

😄😆😂 Hahaha! No! No! No! Not the same at all, silly rabbit. Not unless all the above named happen to be the smokers spreading their noxious fumes around the squares.

What if they are spreading their toxic ideology to my grandchildren?

Different subject! Don't deflect with "what if", or "what about".

Heh. This place is Geezer Central. I doubt that there has ever been any discrete group of people since the time of Sargon The Great MORE inclined to grouse about whatever, than geezers are.

No, it's exactly the same. Because this is America, we tolerate minorities whether they are poisoning their lungs with smoke (outside away from the crowd so all you get is the smell and will never inhale enough to damage your lungs) or poisoning our minds with ideology. No difference, you can't have it both ways.

I don't know if it is a point to be taken lightly. People can demonstrably shorten their life expectancy by needless worry.

"Research shows that overreacting, constantly worrying, and living in a state of perpetual anxiety can reduce life expectancy." (Verywellmind, Oct. 17, 2023)

Both are undesirable, but they are not the same thing. Like being electrocuted vs being bitten by a shark. Both are undesirable, but they are not the same and need to be handled in different ways, regardless of what country or ocean you are in.

True. Anxiety can be deadly, and should never be taken lightly.

I like to think of it as FossilTown.

You can't get "cancer of the gay." You can't get "gay of the cancer." If you are exposed to a black person who prays to Allah, you can't catch his blackness.

You need to stop being afraid of things that can't hurt you. Or not. If someone's rainbow flag causes you anger and anxiety, well - it must just really suck to be you I guess.

But if someone was burning that flag, and the smoke drifted over to my yard, I might have a thought or two about the smoke. I don't care about the flag, because there is nothing about it that can hurt me.

And exposure to cigar/cigarette/pipe smoke 30+ feet outdoors for a few minutes each time someone happens to light up at the town square when you are in attendance can't hurt you either. And I couldn't care less about a rainbow flag. I do care if transgenders or sun worshipers or satanists want to try to indoctrinate my grandchildren through parades, the classroom, and infiltration of TV, the movies and social media. Again, you can't have it both ways. You can't state that a smoker is evil and should be denied any rights while transgenderism is wholesome and natural, we should embrace them and change American culture for them.

Full disclosure---I am not a smoker.

I'm scared, we agree on something.

Doc...youre making it harder to be your friend. But I'm hangin' in there! ;)

Can't wait til November when the smoke from the newly legal, freshly rolled 'fattys' clear out all these curmudgeons in the squares!

*This from a non smoker

Except its absence.

Of course.

I don't think "they" think that way. Not even on Memorial Day or Veterans Day. Remember "their" basic premise---America is evil and racist and needs to be "fundamentally transformed". Even typing it leaves a bad taste in my mouth:1rotfl::1rotfl::1rotfl: