To Smoke Or Not To Smoke - This Vegan's Dilemma!

I'm a smoker. Sometimes I enjoy it, mostly though I hate it.
I have tried many times to give it up, everytime just using willpower because I really don't want to use the chemical substances.

On the weekend I did my usual shopping trip to the local health food store. I was particularly ecstatic on this occasion as they had just stocked a new array of vegan foods.
Imagine my joy when I found their new stock of herbal cigs and tobacco! I promptly put a pack of each into my basket.

Now here is my dilemma... honey has been used to make these quitters 'little helpers'.
So, do I forgo my vegan beliefs and use them to help me kick the evil weed for once and for all, or, do I stay stubbon and continue on my path to lung destruction?

The floor, dear readers, is yours...

DEBATE, DEBATE, DEBATE!!!!

 

Well....personally, honey isn't a deal to me. I dont know if that sounds hypocritical or not but it just isn't. I'm vegan, all except for the honey thing. I don't gorge myself in honey, I rarely eat anything that contains honey.... so it's not a problem anyway, but if there is a bread I like or something and the only non-vegan ingredient is honey, I go for it. So I guess it depends on how important that is to you.

I have respect for all life except bees ^_^ And good reason to. They try to kill me 5 times a year. Bitches....

So, I say go for it.

I'm sure there will be plenty who disagree with me though.

 

Well first off, kick the habit! Hell yeah. Smoking is not good for you.

Other than that, you simply cannot be vegan if you smoke prefabricated cigarettes. They are animal tested. If you roll your own cigarettes with organic tobacco, that's generally okay. Same with pipe tobacco. But any kind of cigarette that comes in a pack or a carton, is pretty much the bane of all vegan existance whatsoever -- it's just as bad, if not worse, than the meat industry (at least in the meat industry, animals are killed off earlier).

Tobacco companies animal-test for cancer by sticking tubes down monkies' throats and pumping their lungs full of ludicriously high concentrations of tobacco, for years NON-STOP, until they eventually die from bad health.

So yeah ... don't smoke prefabs and claim to be vegan ... Smoke organic (or not at all) today!

 

I'm with apples+oranjes. I'm down with honey.
I make my own mead and everything using honey.

P.S. Girl, keep working on not smoking! If you hate it, don't do it!
You can do it! Maybe cold-turkey isn't your bag. It was for me+spouse, but maybe not for you. See what's around. If you want to stop, you can. Just want it.
It's like being veggie-you stopped eating animals, stop smoking! Both are tasks to be done (succesfully) only with conviction.

 

wait wtf...then why like..... 6 months ago you informed me that certain cigarettes like American Spirits were *okay* [okay in terms of being vegan, that is]?!


anyway---switching to something like that may be the first step in quitting. I switched before I quit like that... I believe it was just my first step towards health.

 

American Spirits is organic rolling tobacco.

 

What about switching to pot?

I say this in jest (partially) but it doesn't smell nearly as bad!

 

Uhmm... well I love honey, so for me there's no question.

But for you, if you have chosen not to consume honey perhaps there is one alternative out there that does NOT have honey? If not, it sounds like it comes down to a choice; bees or you. Not a very nice way to look at it, but it's honest. From what I know about beekeeping, it's not nearly as awful as other animal-based industries. Some bees do die, but they are accidental deaths... beekeepers just don't purposefully kill off their bees.
love,
mom

 

bees work very hard for their honey.........i would hate to work all week and then on payday have some bigger and stronger stranger steal my paycheck.

 

Yeah, you could always smoke a joint instead of a cigarette. That'll help you quit REAL fast, lol ...

Not that we take the whole paycheck. Bees produce and keep as much honey as they could possibly have an actual use for in their lives, and all of the excess that they produce, we take and use for ourselves.

Kind of like, if bees make $250,000 a year, we take maybe $150,000 of that, and the bees live in their natural state of comfort with the rest. Call it "taxing the filthy rich" if you will.

Don't believe me? We just had a big debate about this on this board, like 2 weeks ago ... you could look it up.

 

I will say it again...SCREW BEES! They attack me out of no where! ALL THE TIME. I seriously...sit there minding my own damn business and they are like "hey fellas, lets kill this bitch!"

BZZZZZZZZz!!!

Followed by my screams of pain.

Yeah.

Do I care about taking their "paycheck"----NOPE!

 

half the "paycheck" or the entire thing its still using an animal entirely to our benefit and really its stealing. you can say the bees dont miss it or they dont mind but that's a blind assumption. i'd rather give the benefit of the doubt and say what doesnt belong to me i wont take.

 

Bees. Produce. Honey. Whether or not we give them a shelter and take the extra honey that they don't know what to do with, will not stop the fact that bees produce honey. Saying that we are using an animal ENTIRELY for our benefit, is an absurd exaggeration of the relationship between bees and humans.

Secondly, bees are not harmed or impeded in any way from humans taking the extra honey. Bees are not given steroids, whipped, or genetically modified. They do not go hungry, as we only take the honey that is in excess of what they can use.

Think of this on a galactic scale. Earth only catches so much of the sun's energy. Since we can't use the energy that Earth doesn't catch, what's wrong with an alien race using that energy?

If there is too much honey, another queen is born, and the two queens *fight to the death* for control over the colony, either ending up with one winner, or having half of the colony leave to start another colony (which is the problem we are having with human overpopulation right now! we are sparing them and us problems!).

While we do benefit from bees, bees ALSO benefit from us. The nectar they are given, to produce honey, is of higher quality sugars and waters than today's polluted plants produce (forest bees are less healthy!), and they are given a hive which we protect (in the interests of economics) better than they can.

My point is, the relationship is symbiotic. Both humans and bees benefit from this relationship.

Ask any beekeeper. Like I said before, we had a discussion on these forums before about it, where two or three beekepers on the boards shed some light about the industrial treatment of bees, and it is NOT cruel or inhumane, probably especially not so because humans are afraid of bees, and would rather not piss them off and deal with their wrath.

 

I never said it was "cruel" or "inhumane". i said it was stealing. you see it as a give and take thing......... i get what you are saying but i personally do not feel comfortable with honey. i still feel it is stealing.

 

now don't go stating the obvious or anything:H

 

i would have thought smoking would be unvegan since it supports an industry that results in the needless death of animals. And unlike food, it is not a necessity...thus never justifiable


BTW, the american lung association says natural tobacco can be deadlier than normal cigarettes. So headsup on that.

 

Hmm, that's interesting to hear ... natural (possibly organic?) tobacco is more dangerous? I'll have to look into that ...

Elle:

Yeah, I see what you're saying. I just think that the benefits for both sides are greater than the consequences, therefore it is worth doing.

And, if it is truly any kind of stealing, it's taking from the rich (in honey) and giving to the poor (in honey), and providing shelter and food for the rich in return. Sounds kind of ... socialistic, if you ask me.

 

Don't buy any cigarrettes of any kind? How is that not an option?

 

Good point..........

 

http://www.californialung.org/spotlight/naturaltobacco.html