Kaat Zoetekouw - Karin Elizabeth fotografie
71/365 ...please
Photo: january 21st 2007.
Dark on purpose. Fits the mood.
www.help-eu.com. (This photo is not part of this campaign, merely a plug.)
My goal is to raise a little bit of awareness on the EU campaign, and on second hand smoking. It isn't meant to bitch at smokers so don't be offended!
Don't comment if you're just going to butcher my point of view. This is a personal point of view out of personal (bad) experiences with second hand smoking.
I'm an asthma patient who has already been ill many times due to smoke, which for asthmatics is one of the main causes of attacks, infections or worse.
Some of us can't go out to a club, can't eat in a restaurant, can't even stand to be near smoke. Some of us abide to 'living rules', based on avoiding places where people smoke. (Why should we have to be the ones to adjust to someone else's choice?)
The argument? "Why shouldn't we be able to smoke when alcohol is allowed? It's a much worse drug!" Unless people are stupid enough to get in a car while drunk, alcohol doesn't kill people who don't drink. There is no 'natural' second hand drinking. I don't get sick because someone else drinks...
The other argument often is,"They should avoid us". That just doesn't hold up in a world where smoke is all around you. Smoke free zones? Most of the time airconditioning is so bad, you're still in a smoke zone.
Smoking outside still bothers people. Non-smokers still inhale your smoke. It still smells. It still means most smokers (to say it carefully) inconsiderately force non-smokers to find a new place to wait for the bus to work.
Sure. We won with the ban on smoking at the workplace. But it doesn't solve the problem in general. And it is a problem! 19.000 deaths every year in Europe alone.
February 2005. Second hand smoking gave me pneumonia. I was ill for 6 weeks and had to sleep sitting up. Try it, just for one night. I thought I would die in my sleep, thinking I'd stop breathing.
I still haven't recovered. I have no stamina, despite the fact that I bike for 40 minutes every single day. A daily struggle.
I'm happy to be alive.
But I want nothing more than a world without smoke. Knowing in my heart it will never happen, I won't stop waiting. Standing in someone else's smoke at the busstop every morning, I will keep hoping.
If you're not planning on stopping at all in your life, just try to at least be more considerate of non-smokers around you, inside AND outside.
...please.
71/365 ...please
Photo: january 21st 2007.
Dark on purpose. Fits the mood.
www.help-eu.com. (This photo is not part of this campaign, merely a plug.)
My goal is to raise a little bit of awareness on the EU campaign, and on second hand smoking. It isn't meant to bitch at smokers so don't be offended!
Don't comment if you're just going to butcher my point of view. This is a personal point of view out of personal (bad) experiences with second hand smoking.
I'm an asthma patient who has already been ill many times due to smoke, which for asthmatics is one of the main causes of attacks, infections or worse.
Some of us can't go out to a club, can't eat in a restaurant, can't even stand to be near smoke. Some of us abide to 'living rules', based on avoiding places where people smoke. (Why should we have to be the ones to adjust to someone else's choice?)
The argument? "Why shouldn't we be able to smoke when alcohol is allowed? It's a much worse drug!" Unless people are stupid enough to get in a car while drunk, alcohol doesn't kill people who don't drink. There is no 'natural' second hand drinking. I don't get sick because someone else drinks...
The other argument often is,"They should avoid us". That just doesn't hold up in a world where smoke is all around you. Smoke free zones? Most of the time airconditioning is so bad, you're still in a smoke zone.
Smoking outside still bothers people. Non-smokers still inhale your smoke. It still smells. It still means most smokers (to say it carefully) inconsiderately force non-smokers to find a new place to wait for the bus to work.
Sure. We won with the ban on smoking at the workplace. But it doesn't solve the problem in general. And it is a problem! 19.000 deaths every year in Europe alone.
February 2005. Second hand smoking gave me pneumonia. I was ill for 6 weeks and had to sleep sitting up. Try it, just for one night. I thought I would die in my sleep, thinking I'd stop breathing.
I still haven't recovered. I have no stamina, despite the fact that I bike for 40 minutes every single day. A daily struggle.
I'm happy to be alive.
But I want nothing more than a world without smoke. Knowing in my heart it will never happen, I won't stop waiting. Standing in someone else's smoke at the busstop every morning, I will keep hoping.
If you're not planning on stopping at all in your life, just try to at least be more considerate of non-smokers around you, inside AND outside.
...please.