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Smoking is divine. Eh, sorry, I mean Cigarettes are Sublime https://www.dukeupress.edu/cigarettes-are-sublime https://www.dukeupress.edu/cigarettes-are-sublime

Smoking is divine. Eh, sorry, I mean Cigarettes are Sublime https://www.dukeupress.edu/cigarettes-are-sublime https://www.dukeupress.edu/cigarettes-are-sublime Ashtrays may go along into the dark arts of secret knowledge, along with hooking up a modem, coding your own BBS, repairing your own leather boots, starting a fire to cook dinner over, etc. But something human, something tactile, something that carries with it dangers and pleasures and the competence to determine your own safety, gets lost each time we're proud that the next generation doesn't have to think about these things and can't even conceive of them. I don't really think it's human advancement to throw out the bad things if it means forgetting what they are and why they were bad; then we're doomed to repeat our mistakes. Cigarettes are unquestionably a net negative, but if you haven't understood the pleasure and beauty of them, you can't really understand what makes them tempting. Just like you can't understand what makes religion tempting if you're an atheist, or what makes sex tempting if you're asexual. Yet these things we look down on are all parts of the human experience, and if all you do is look down on things that you never partook of, you really aren't well-qualified to decide whether they had merit.

stonogo 4y ago
It would be a lot easier to agree with you if the tobacco companies hadn't spent decades of time and millions of dollars trying to gaslight the world about the consequences of smoking, aiming advertising at children, and generally making comic-book villains of themselves. Unfortunately they fought so uncompromisingly to avoid having to cede even the slightest of their market that they made complete ostracization the only feasible path forward for public policymakers. Nearly half of adult America smoked in the 1960s; ten years ago that number was at 20%, and today that number is below 13% and dropping -- and unlike the drinking age, smoking wasn't used as a bludgeon by the federal government for forcing its will on the states. It's pure PR and a little urban taxation.
- noduerme 4y ago
  It's fine - this is not in defense of RJR or something. I truly love to smoke. I love to smoke a pipe, to feel the sting of the smoke and the richness and then take a glass of wine next to it, taste the leather and dried fruit interacting with the bittersweet tobacco. I love to roll cigarettes, the act of doing so for others and for myself, delaying the intense pleasure of the flick of the lighter and the sound of the burning leaves. I love a cigar, the method of it, the intensity of its flavor next to a glass of rye whisky, turning both into chocolate and raspberries, the sheer pleasure of each wave of smoke entering your mouth. I'm not defending tobacco companies. I just fuckin love tobacco. Dig? [edit] I did not steal these lines from "Cigarettes are Sublime" - they're my own personal feelings. I can't seem to find my copy of that book.
  - genidoi 4y ago
    I truly love to ride a motorcycle. No ignorance on it’s order-of-magnitude lethality multiplier over cars. But there is a certain cognitive-adrenaline fused pleasure that comes with seamlessly gliding your way through the perfect Bézier-esque curve over a gentle highway turn, whilst being held in the ever-present protective arms of gyroscopic precession, that makes the danger of it all worth it to me. Rollercoasters let you experience a far greater degree of adrenaline and wind rushing through you, but don’t come close to this particular feeling of smiling at death.
Karrot_Kream 4y ago
The nicotine high is a very pleasant headspace. I only smoked occasionally in college and grad school for a few years and off-and-on afterword socially for a few more years but I miss the scintillating conversations and the headspace nicotine put you in. More pronounced than caffeine but not so stimulating as a stronger stimulant. Some of my most interesting conversations happened over a cigarette.
- nine_k 4y ago
  AFAICT nicotine is the lesser evil. It's addictve, and somehow toxic, but not hugely. What makes cigarettes so vile is the actual smoke. The tars, the CO, the nitrous mess that's needed to keep the cigarette from extinguishing. The filter helps, but not a lot. A cigarette without any nicotine would still damage health a lot. Fortunately, the addicts, and those who want the nicotine high, have the option of vaping now, which is close in the sense of the ritual required, but is much less detrimental to health.
  - globular-toast 4y ago
    Nicotine isn't a particularly difficult addiction in the grand scheme of things. It takes most people only a week or two to overcome nicotine addiction. Alcohol and opiates are on a different level. Cigarettes, on the other hand, are extremely addictive. There's something about putting a little stick in your mouth, inhaling, tasting it, then exhaling a cloud of smoke/vapour. I was given a nicotine-free disposable e-cigarette and was quite alarmed at how quickly I became addicted to it.
    - hgomersall 4y ago
      And possibly the fact that cigarette companies freebase the nicotine by soaking the tobacco in ammonia.
      - noduerme 4y ago
        I switched to rolling my own smokes with hemp paper and filters almost 20 years ago. I can't stand the taste or smell of chemicals from packaged cigarettes (even the "organic" ones that still have all kinds of accelerants and flame retardants in the paper). A single Marlboro will give me a headache the next day. It's actually just really sad that smokers have been force-fed that deadly shit, because while the poster above is correct that nicotine itself is not harmful and it's mainly the burn products of the tobacco leaf that are carcinogenic, they don't need to be nearly as deadly as they are in modern packed cigarettes. Some of the additives are mandated by the government (such as the wood glue that's now used in all commercial rolled cigarette papers as a "fire safe" stopper halfway) and those are as bad or worse than the arsenic and other additives the tobacco companies came up with. On the other hand, roll-your-own (RYO) tobacco, especially the type labeled organic, has its own issues. One of them is that "organic" tobacco actually has a higher level of Polonium (which is taken up and concentrated by all tobacco plants, where it's present in the fertilizer - but organic fertilizers have higher levels of Polonium). Of all the thousands of compounds you inhale when you smoke a cigarette, that's probably the one that's most likely to cause lung cancer. And yet smoking is so fucking delicious. The commenter above who talked about conversations in college over a cigarette -- that's my life. Every night. Having to step outside the cafe hasn't killed it, that social ferment, although I think that was the intention when they banned smoking inside. If anything, it's heightened the interaction after an entire generation was forced into these ghettos. If only 11% of Americans smoke (which cannot possibly be true -- that's an absolute lie, as at least 70% of people I can think of in Portland from 30 to 60 smoke cigarettes and Portland is not exactly Mississippi) they're definitely the most interesting 11%, and highly concentrated now.

stonogo 4y ago

It would be a lot easier to agree with you if the tobacco companies hadn't spent decades of time and millions of dollars trying to gaslight the world about the consequences of smoking, aiming advertising at children, and generally making comic-book villains of themselves. Unfortunately they fought so uncompromisingly to avoid having to cede even the slightest of their market that they made complete ostracization the only feasible path forward for public policymakers. Nearly half of adult America smoked in the 1960s; ten years ago that number was at 20%, and today that number is below 13% and dropping -- and unlike the drinking age, smoking wasn't used as a bludgeon by the federal government for forcing its will on the states. It's pure PR and a little urban taxation.

noduerme 4y ago
It's fine - this is not in defense of RJR or something. I truly love to smoke. I love to smoke a pipe, to feel the sting of the smoke and the richness and then take a glass of wine next to it, taste the leather and dried fruit interacting with the bittersweet tobacco. I love to roll cigarettes, the act of doing so for others and for myself, delaying the intense pleasure of the flick of the lighter and the sound of the burning leaves. I love a cigar, the method of it, the intensity of its flavor next to a glass of rye whisky, turning both into chocolate and raspberries, the sheer pleasure of each wave of smoke entering your mouth. I'm not defending tobacco companies. I just fuckin love tobacco. Dig? [edit] I did not steal these lines from "Cigarettes are Sublime" - they're my own personal feelings. I can't seem to find my copy of that book.
- genidoi 4y ago
  I truly love to ride a motorcycle. No ignorance on it’s order-of-magnitude lethality multiplier over cars. But there is a certain cognitive-adrenaline fused pleasure that comes with seamlessly gliding your way through the perfect Bézier-esque curve over a gentle highway turn, whilst being held in the ever-present protective arms of gyroscopic precession, that makes the danger of it all worth it to me. Rollercoasters let you experience a far greater degree of adrenaline and wind rushing through you, but don’t come close to this particular feeling of smiling at death.

Karrot_Kream 4y ago

The nicotine high is a very pleasant headspace. I only smoked occasionally in college and grad school for a few years and off-and-on afterword socially for a few more years but I miss the scintillating conversations and the headspace nicotine put you in. More pronounced than caffeine but not so stimulating as a stronger stimulant. Some of my most interesting conversations happened over a cigarette.

nine_k 4y ago
AFAICT nicotine is the lesser evil. It's addictve, and somehow toxic, but not hugely. What makes cigarettes so vile is the actual smoke. The tars, the CO, the nitrous mess that's needed to keep the cigarette from extinguishing. The filter helps, but not a lot. A cigarette without any nicotine would still damage health a lot. Fortunately, the addicts, and those who want the nicotine high, have the option of vaping now, which is close in the sense of the ritual required, but is much less detrimental to health.
- globular-toast 4y ago
  Nicotine isn't a particularly difficult addiction in the grand scheme of things. It takes most people only a week or two to overcome nicotine addiction. Alcohol and opiates are on a different level. Cigarettes, on the other hand, are extremely addictive. There's something about putting a little stick in your mouth, inhaling, tasting it, then exhaling a cloud of smoke/vapour. I was given a nicotine-free disposable e-cigarette and was quite alarmed at how quickly I became addicted to it.
  - hgomersall 4y ago
    And possibly the fact that cigarette companies freebase the nicotine by soaking the tobacco in ammonia.
    - noduerme 4y ago
      I switched to rolling my own smokes with hemp paper and filters almost 20 years ago. I can't stand the taste or smell of chemicals from packaged cigarettes (even the "organic" ones that still have all kinds of accelerants and flame retardants in the paper). A single Marlboro will give me a headache the next day. It's actually just really sad that smokers have been force-fed that deadly shit, because while the poster above is correct that nicotine itself is not harmful and it's mainly the burn products of the tobacco leaf that are carcinogenic, they don't need to be nearly as deadly as they are in modern packed cigarettes. Some of the additives are mandated by the government (such as the wood glue that's now used in all commercial rolled cigarette papers as a "fire safe" stopper halfway) and those are as bad or worse than the arsenic and other additives the tobacco companies came up with. On the other hand, roll-your-own (RYO) tobacco, especially the type labeled organic, has its own issues. One of them is that "organic" tobacco actually has a higher level of Polonium (which is taken up and concentrated by all tobacco plants, where it's present in the fertilizer - but organic fertilizers have higher levels of Polonium). Of all the thousands of compounds you inhale when you smoke a cigarette, that's probably the one that's most likely to cause lung cancer. And yet smoking is so fucking delicious. The commenter above who talked about conversations in college over a cigarette -- that's my life. Every night. Having to step outside the cafe hasn't killed it, that social ferment, although I think that was the intention when they banned smoking inside. If anything, it's heightened the interaction after an entire generation was forced into these ghettos. If only 11% of Americans smoke (which cannot possibly be true -- that's an absolute lie, as at least 70% of people I can think of in Portland from 30 to 60 smoke cigarettes and Portland is not exactly Mississippi) they're definitely the most interesting 11%, and highly concentrated now.