Stupid Guest Tricks

susislicker wrote:...( she said, with tongue firmly in her cheek) :toncheek: her OWN tongue, ya'll, get your mind outa the gutter so mine can float by! :hysteria: just trying to catch you before someone says it...

Yep, you're becoming quite at home here. I'm telling ya', it's Disney World's back porch... just not over by the fertilizer factory, please :p:

susislicker wrote:I am sorry if I riled anyone up, I believe in everyone's right to do whatever they want in regards to smoking. I guess I was trying to present a scientific answer to the point of the original post. I love you all and this is my favorite site. We ARE all here for the same reason , to poke the SGs, not each other and if I poked my fellow posters, I truly am sorry. I also have a tendency to say what is on my mind, I don't worry too much anymore about what people think of me, like I did when I was in my teens and twenties. I try to be polite about it and if I sometimes am not, I claim the Menopause defense! :pitchfork That's my story, and I am stickin' to it! :p:

...

Susi, I agree that you were just trying to show the science behind allergens and irritants. Either one can trigger the same type of reaction in an individual.
I do think the posters on this board have a right to their views, but in doing so, we all assume the risk of being disagreed with, and some of us will use personal experience and/or our knowledge of science to disagree. That being said, in a hundred years, our descendants will probably think that we were all a bunch of primitive idiots! :D:

I'll say it first, my kids already think I'm a primitive idiot! :p:

PrinceOfSka wrote:and to further state that I was one of the jerks that said nasty stuff to say to people smoking out of place- however I did say that I AM in fact a jerk, and it doesn't bother me that people think that. while not working, I wouldn't come up to someone who was five feet out of the section and say those things. However, if someone is in line for spaceship earth and have a lit cig in their hand - on certain days I would probably make fun of them to their face, or at least where they can overhear it. On others I would ask them to put it out. I take it as they have already set the "rude" tone for our conversation, since they are violating the rules and could possibly be endangering others (lets forget second hand smoke and consider lit flame in a non designated area... or as someone already said, little suzie is at eye level to a lit cig casually in one's hand).

Two things here: (a) have you ever heard the saying "you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar"? Even if you think they're an asshole, that doesn't justify you being an asshole back. And the other approach (pleasantly directing someone to a smoking area) is just so much more likely to get a pleasant and hoped for response (wayward smoker going to said designated area). (b) What if the person is foreign, confused, lost, injured, or under extreme mental stress? You don't know what a person's circumstances are. They may think they're in the right place or not know there are right places or just not be thinking clearly. What if you're yelling at somebody who just lost a kid in the park and they're trying to calm themselves while security looks for the kid? In a situation like that, a person may not be thinking clearly enough to go to a smoking area even if they normally know to do that. Or you might be yelling at someone who just minutes before had a slip-and-fall injury and hit their head and is confused. I know when I injure myself, I like a cigarette to help me regain composure. There are all sorts of circumstances where yelling at or belittling a smoker is morally wrong or at least unhelpful. And then there's the danger factor. Same reason you should use the middle finger very sparingly in DC: `cause you might get shot. It seems to me that, in light of these thoughts, belittling a smoker at random (not a smoker you know) for this minor trespass against you is just not worthwhile compared to the potential gains of a more constructive response.

PrinceOfSka wrote:I don't have a problem with smokers, my mom is a lifer - however, I do think that there is a natural animosity on the part of non smokers towards smokers. This is probably because at most places of work smokers get extra breaks!!! :p:

That is sad but true. That's actually the major reason I started smoking! However the more assertive non smokers in most places I've worked have no problem taking as many breaks as the smokers do...

PrinceOfSka wrote:as for that smog example, even though I do agree that that is probably the reason more kids are developing asthma these days, I don't think the methodology can be sound. I could claim that more solar panels (which are also on the rise) are causing asthma... just because something is going up doesn't mean it is to blame... though unless one can link asthma to say, smoking parents - I don't see how anyone can say smoking is rasing Asthma rates... As i said earlier, its all about who pays the scientists to research... :( (read State of Fear by Micheal Crichton for good fictional examples)

Well, that's half right. I'm pretty sure you're thinking of the fallacy "post hoc ergo propter hoc" (lit. after this therefore because of this). I ate Cheerios this morning and then aced my math test this afternoon, therefore I must have aced my math test because I ate Cheerios. As an argument, this is fallacious. With other information added, though, it might not be. If I tell you that for every math test, I study exactly the same amount of time, eat exactly the same breakfast, talk to the teacher the same amount (basically that all other things are equal) and I always get C's but this time I switched from frosted flakes to cheerios, and I got an A, then that could be turned into a cogent argument.

Such is the case with your solar panels thing. However the point of the asthma/smoking vs. asthma/smog thing is that there are good studies linking both things to asthma but not comparing which one's truly worse in causing asthma. I was simply trying to suggest that most people now know about the evils of smoking. Most people do not do it around their children at all, or at least not nearly as much as previous generations of parents did (this is the speculative part, but I'm claiming it's logical as people are clearly better educated about health than people were as few as 20-something years ago and therefore tend to act in certain ways to protect loved ones even if they don't necessarily protect themselves). Basically, I'm asking you to see that since we're putting smog into the air in record amounts, and since less people are smoking now than in the past (according to statistics, about 50% of the population of the US smoked, the current figures from the american cancer society show that it's down to 20.9%) and juvenile asthma rates are skyrocketing, clearly asthma is tied much more to smog than smoke. Otherwise, logically, there would have been more asthmatics in the 50's [when there were decidedly fewer cars and less energy consumption but more than double the rate of smoking] than there are now. I think that's actually pretty cogent (although I only did the 101 version of philosophy, so any philosophy majors out there can probably correct my work...) but maybe I didn't flesh out the whole argument adequately on the first run through.

PrinceOfSka wrote:anyway... the point is lets not jump down anyones throat about this whole topic, we are all here because we know there are OTHER people who do stupid things in the parks more often than we do :P:

Hmm...not jumping down anyones throat... That does sound like a pretty good idea. But what happens when you see my face instead of my pretty avatar and you jump down my throat if I'm mistakenly smoking in the wrong place? That's at least a double standard (we can jump down other people's throats) and, maybe a little hypocritical (don't jump down my throat over that I like to jump down people's throats!)

Food for thought...

Random side note because of your screenname (and this is meant for a laugh, not at all a slam, truly!): How many ska kids does it take to change a lightbulb? Four. One to drop it and three to pick it up, pick it up, pick it up! :D:

Kwahati wrote:... have you ever heard the saying "you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar"? ...

Anyone remember the Newsradio ep where Bill & Dave are stuck in the St. Louis airport because of weather? Irate New Yorker Bill is complaining loudly to anyone and everyone, while laid-back Midwesterner Dave tries to settle Bill down with this line. Bill's response was something like (code for "this is from memory since the exact quote is not on imdb.com"): "Have you ever heard the expression that only a hillbilly sits around figuring out the best way to catch flies?" :D:

ETA: Nothing personal meant by this, Kwahati. The previous post just reminded me of this scene, and I (heart) Newsradio!

BRWombat wrote:"Have you ever heard the expression that only a hillbilly sits around figuring out the best way to catch flies?" :D:

ETA: Nothing personal meant by this, Kwahati. The previous post just reminded me of this scene, and I (heart) Newsradio!

I was actually thinking, when I wrote that, "why the hell do people wanna catch flies anyway?!?" (And, from what I've seen, the best way is with a flower called Dracunculus Vulgaris [found through the dutch nursery I get my bulbs from, but you can find it online if you really want one]. It's pretty, but it stinks! It smells like a rotting corpse so bad it will attract lots of flies!)

Edited to add: Oh, hey! Wombat! You're a lawyer! How's my logic and knowledge of fallacies?

DisneyMom wrote:I'll say it first, my kids already think I'm a primitive idiot! :p:

Same here DM,even the 'kids' I work with think I'm full of shit.(me,not you)

Kwahati wrote:... Dracunculus Vulgaris ...

Edited to add: Oh, hey! Wombat! You're a lawyer! How's my logic and knowledge of fallacies?

I'm impressed. But I'm even happier that you gave me this plant name. I'll try to use it in court or with another lawyer to make them think I know a Latin phrase that they don't! :twisted: :D:

DisneyMom wrote:I'll say it first, my kids already think I'm a primitive idiot! :p:

I'll go you one better. Sometimes I think I am a primitive idiot. :D:

Randy

I haven't even gotten past page 5 of catching up on this thread..but let's post some of the studies that I have looked at regarding smoking and allergies shall we? Then some people can get off their high horses of false facts and attempt to present actual studies to back up their claims as well:

From Respiratory Research, 2006, March 7;29

Cigarette smoke exposure facilitates allergic sensitization in mice.Moerloose KB, Robays LJ, Maes T, Brusselle GG, Tournoy KG, Joos GF.
Department of Respiratory Diseases, Ghent University Hospital, Ghent, Belgium. [email protected]

Abstract:
BACKGROUND: Active and passive smoking are considered as risk factors for asthma development. The mechanisms involved are currently unexplained. OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to determine if cigarette smoke exposure could facilitate primary allergic sensitization. METHODS: BALB/c mice were exposed to aerosolized ovalbumin (OVA) combined with air or tobacco smoke (4 exposures/day) daily for three weeks. Serology, lung cytopathology, cytokine profiles in bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF) and on mediastinal lymph node cultures as well as lung function tests were performed after the last exposure. The natural history and the immune memory of allergic sensitization were studied with in vivo recall experiments. RESULTS: Exposure to OVA induced a small increase in OVA-specific serum IgE as compared with exposure to PBS (P < 0.05), while no inflammatory reaction was observed in the airways. Exposure to cigarette smoke did not induce IgE, but was characterized by a small but significant neutrophilic inflammatory reaction. Combining OVA with cigarette smoke not only induced a significant increase in OVA-specific IgE but also a distinct eosinophil and goblet cell enriched airway inflammation albeit that airway hyperresponsiveness was not evidenced. FACS analysis showed in these mice increases in dendritic cells (DC) and CD4+ T-lymphocytes along with a marked increase in IL-5 measured in the supernatant of lymph node cell cultures. Immune memory experiments evidenced the transient nature of these phenomena. CONCLUSION: In this study we show that mainstream cigarette smoke temporary disrupts the normal lung homeostatic tolerance to innocuous inhaled allergens, thereby inducing primary allergic sensitization. This is characterized not only by the development of persistent IgE, but also by the emergence of an eosinophil rich pulmonary inflammatory reaction.

Mainstream = the persona actually smoking, not second hand. No proof for secondhand (feel free to look up the entire article, you have all of the info for it)

Would you like me to give you a long drawn out discussion on the relationship between IgE's and allergies? With the VAST knowledge of this that some on here have, I would hope they wouldn't need me to explain

But wait, there's more...many more, let's post another shall we:

Annals of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology, 1999 Feb;82(2):194-7

Abstract:
Tobacco allergy: demonstration of cross-reactivity with other members of Solanaceae family and mugwort pollen.Ortega N, Quiralte J, Blanco C, Castillo R, Alvarez MJ, Carrillo T.
Department of Allergy, Hospital Universitario NTRA SRA del Pino, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Canary Islands, Spain.

BACKGROUND: Tobacco is a plant belonging to the Solanaceae family. This plant is usually used as a contact insecticide for several infestations in some areas, such as the Canary Islands. Allergy induced by inhalation of this plant is unusual. Identification of the potential allergen in growing areas is essential. OBJECTIVE: We report a patient with occupational sensitivity to an aqueous solution of cut tobacco whose clinical manifestations were rhinoconjunctivitis and urticaria. Past medical history was significant for seasonal allergic rhinoconjunctivitis to mugwort pollen and oral allergy syndrome with avocado. METHODS: Green tobacco and cured tobacco leaf extracts were prepared, skin prick tests were performed with green tobacco, cured tobacco leaf extracts, and certain aeroallergens. Conjunctival challenge test was carried out with green tobacco and cured tobacco leaf extract. Serum-specific IgE against tobacco leaf was performed by commercial CAP. CAP inhibition experiments were carried out with tobacco and Artemisia vulgaris. RESULTS: Skin prick tests and conjunctival challenge tests with green tobacco and cured tobacco leaf extracts were positive, as well as serum-specific IgE by CAP, indicating an IgE-mediated sensitization. CAP inhibition experiments were carried out and it was found that tobacco, mugwort pollen, and tomato extracts inhibited the binding of the patient's serum to solid-phase tobacco leaf. No inhibition was observed when Alternaria, D. pteronyssinus, and potato were used as control inhibitors. Inhibition of immunoCAP to mugwort was obtained with mugwort and tobacco extracts and no cross-reactivity to D. pteronyssinus was shown. CONCLUSION: The results suggest that tobacco can induce IgE-mediated reactions that are mediated by the existence of common antigenic epitopes between tobacco and mugwort pollen. This allergy can be a hazard of employment in the agricultural areas.

That's just two I found on PubMed in about a minute. There are no, and I repeat NO studies that I have ever seen that directly relate second hand smoke and allergies. I agree it's a nasty habit, and it does cause asthma, but that does not change the fact that actual medical studies do not back up the media hype and what people want to be true.

So before anyone says I have nothing to back up my claim and acts like they are the all knowing one, please present me with any journal articles you have that show a relationship between second hand smoke and allergies (unless you happen to work in the Canary Islands as in the agriculture department, then I'll believe you have an allergy). I would be interested to read the methodology in their study.

Thanks