Julianne > writes:

> Drunk driving is not new but years ago, it was largely overlooked
> until awareness of the dangers became a national passion.

It moved into the public spotlight as part of the Nancy Reagan-
sponsored "Just Say No" moral panic and scolding puritanism of
the time. If you remember the early 80s, the news media were
positively obsessed with fanning the flames of public fear over
two issues: drunk driving and child molestation. Remember the
McMartin Preschool hoax, and more to the point, how long it took
for it to be _exposed_ as one?

(You know what a McMartin Sandwich is, don't you? It's a big
piece of meat between two little buns.)


> Cigarette smoking was acceptable until public awareness increased
> about the dangers.

Correction: it was acceptable until society at large became ****y
enough that people felt at liberty to bitch about things that
they'd accepted for decades. The whole "secondhand smoke" thing
is nothing but a way for people who simply hate the smell of
tobacco to couch their protestations in more compelling terms.
They know that if they simply said, "Ewwww, that smells icky,
please put it out," they be dismissed out of hand.

If cigarette smoke is so toxic that even secondhand exposure
to it is a health hazard, consider the level of concentration
of the smoke that people inhale directly from their cigarettes.
Why, it'd be so insanely toxic that smokers would all drop dead
right where they stood, after a single puff!



Geoff

--
"Had Chinese food in Berlin once. An hour later,
I was hungry for power." -- Alan Gore