Smoking: Any Rationale?

An article I wrote as a 2^nd year student at the University of Nairobi. Thank you Nicholas Kariuki @Africarising121 for safely keeping this article for about 17 years!! Dedicated to my ENG 112 students – be yourself, be vulnerable and write your thoughts down!

Photo Courtesy of http://www.tabac-stop-center.com/igallery/images/encigarette_composition.gif

 

 Smoking is a pain that a person experiences to come to more pain. It is an act that is consciously practiced with no justifiable reason to back it up. On average, people have two reasons why they do things: the logical reason and the factual reason. Is your reason for smoking logical or defended by factual statistics? What is it that is in a cigarette that makes smoking a pain that people endure to come to more pain?

The label on the packet honestly informs us that cigarette smoking is harmful to our health. This leaves one wondering whether smokers doubt the truthfulness of the statement or they are just ignorant. Indeed about 90% of smokers never read past the brand of the cigarette they smoke. As a result, the warning has become banal and people view it as additional decoration on the pack! I suspect that if you told a smoker that smoking is risky they would think that you said smoking is healthy.

Despite the capital letters of the warning, smokers smoke on. They empty as many packs as they can in spite of the fact that the price of cigarettes like that of other commodities in our country is forbidding. If you have never stopped to ponder whether cigarette smoking is harmful to your health, I would like you to stop for a minute before you strike that lighting up for the millionth time and think of the consequences.

Cigarette smoking increases your chances of developing lung cancer and other smoking related complications. If you happen to have a high cholesterol level in the blood your chances of developing high blood pressure can be heightened.

According to Mutuku, a third year BA student, cigarette smoking is ‘fake’. “It gives you foul breath and you become the most unlistened to person in conversations.” He calls smoking an ‘untidy game’ that is addictive and one that draws you ostensibly into other harder drugs.

I read somewhere that smoking is also linked to miscarriages in pregnant women. It can also give them breast cancer and we all know the devastating effects of cancer in our society. I mean, the statistics of cancer are alarmingly increasing by the day and the toll on our loved ones is becoming unbearable.

Paul Nyagah, another BA student, smokes. He confesses that it is a habit that is financially draining. Asked whether he would quit smoking, he undoubtedly admits yes but sadly states that “to quit is every smoker’s anthem.” But is this really so?

I believe every dark cloud has a silver lining. Mutiso another student says that he cannot face a new day without puffing away the first thing in the morning. As if in solidarity, Charles an engineering student declares that there is nothing as refreshing as cigarette smoking after a meal. Other students who smoke staunchly defend it by insisting that it is a remedy for stress. Accordingly, they say that you can always numb your frustrations by smoking.

On the other hand, other students who indulge in the pastime of smoking consider it as a form of social interaction. Their take is that smoking gives you a sense of belonging, class and sophistication. But is killing oneself class? Do smokers really understand the magnitude of the dangers of smoking?

Your never knew nor believed you could start smoking until you tried; also, you will never know nor believe that you can quit smoking until you try. You hardly realise it until what begun as a joke, a puff for pleasure and leisure, lures you into a state of frenzy and addiction. Eventually you end up being stuck in a world of I can’t stay without smoking.

Smoking is not about oxygen but rather inhalation of toxins that are harmful to our health. The worst thing we can do is nothing, the best thing we can do is something – ban smoking. I wish we could all live according to the philosophy of Muthondu, my next door neighbour in Hall five at the University of Nairobi: “life is sweet and short and we need to live healthy and longer.”

Quit smoking! That is the only word I have for you now, that is the only word I can ever have for you – quit smoking!