Bass Ackwards Society

It’s difficult to believe sometimes, just how backwards we’ve become as a society.  It’s almost like our complete, 180 degree reversal in logic and reason has been perfectly orchestrated by some behind-the-scenes puppetmaster… but that’s just me being an unreasonable, paranoid, conspiracy theorist, right?  Let’s skip that for now.  Let us instead, call on something much more accessible and readily recallable to all of us… Let’s start with our favorite topic: E-cigarettes.  Why the vehement hatred of something so obviously helpful to people who are on a collision course with the great, grim and grimy Reaper himself?  Why are we trying to rid the world of something that is not dangerous… or in the most far-fetched, worst case scenario is much less dangerous than the practice it was designed to replace… all the while protecting the very industry from which the E-cig industry is trying to save people?  Why the double standards?  Why the painfully illogical decision-making, parading around as “regulation, legal proceedings, legislation,” and the like?

First up: E-cigarettes, which by their very definition exclude the “burning” aspect of smoking, along with all those substances that burning tobacco pumps into the lungs with a hate-filled vengeance (tar, arsenic, carbon monoxide, and those 4,000 other chemicals… which in reality number less than 1,000, thank you National Association of Exaggerating Fear-Mongers… that possess the evil soul of the unholy cigarette).  But there are those elements in society which Nick Gillespie, a favorite Libertarian-minded writer of mine, refers to as “dour band of fuss-budgets constantly on the prowl for new ways to make life slightly less bearable.”  (Read his article here)  These beyond-puritanism champions of happiness-snuffing have been attempting to argue for a number of years now that E-cigarettes are actually as dangerous or more dangerous than regular (analog) tobacco cigarettes.  This is elementary backwards logic.  It’s like saying that a 60-calorie, gluten-free, reduced fat brownie is as dangerous or more dangerous than a gooey, lard-based, milk chocolate chunk-filled, 100 grams of fat, 600-calorie, heart-attack-on-a-plate brownie slothered in caramel and chocolate sauce, whipped cream, walnuts, and… oh, why not, bacon grease!  And the reasoning behind this claim is…?  Believe it or not, scientifically supported political lobbying and activism has devolved to pot-induced brain turds like, “Because they look the same.”  I can’t help but notice (living in the deadly state of Florida) that a king snake and a coral snake look the same.  This argument, however, is going to fall shocking short of the mark when some idiot picks up a coral snake because it looks like a king snake which is not poisonous.

Next up to bat:  The indelible Mayor Bloomberg of New York City infamy.  Not content to just ban soda, elevators (walking is better exercise… especially when your office is on the 75th floor), and earphones that are cranked up too loud, he has decided to just outright ban E-cigarettes altogether… that is, unless New Yorkers live up to their intolerant, angry, ready to kick someone’s ass at a moment’s notice reputation and get that psychopathic lunatic out of office.  And why not?  California (you know, the state that decides what’s healthy and what causes you to birth elephant men instead of regular children) is already banning E-cigarettes in all of their coastal cities because the vapor mixed with fog and massive plumes of unfiltered marijuana smoke is just too much.  Backwards logic, Mayor Bloomberg?  First you hide cigarettes under the counter, make them cost… oh, I don’t know, $75 per pack, but just outright BAN the one thing that has a chance of getting millions of people off of cigarettes.

And that brings us to Exhibit 3: Just what exactly is going on over there in Hippie-land?  I lived in California for four years back in the late 90s, but I’m not sure I would recognize it anymore if I went back.  Apparently… and please correct me if I’m wrong here… one can simply walk into a doctor’s office and say, “Dude!  I hurt, and I’m out of weed.”  And the Ph.D-wielding “doctor…” …says, “Don’t want to sound like a dick or nothin’, but, ah… it says on your chart that you’re fucked up.  Ah, you talk like a fag, and your shit’s all retarded” (Ten points if you caught that reference) and you get a bag of weed.  I’m sorry, but I’m gonna have to go ahead and scream BULLSHIT! at this backwards phenomenon.  The California cop says, “Hey, that guy over there is smoking or vaping!  Shoot that son of a bitch before he kills a kid!… oh, wait.  It’s just pot.  Nevermind.”  To put this into perspective, let’s imagine that you are a person of little to no reasoning skills.  You might just as well see a person with a vehicle on blocks in their front yard and say, “Holy shit!  The Klan’s in town!  We better take this guy’s 50-caliber machine guns away before he inevitably murders hundreds of thousands of starving orphans.  Oh, wait.  It’s just a Toyota.  Nevermind.”  Makes no sense?  Neither does the previous statement, so let’s just get silly with our metaphors.

I could go on and on with this… even take it to a non-E-cigarette related category, but I don’t want to fly off the handle on rant here.  Suffice it to say, I think the world is walking backwards over the edge of the Hoover Dam.  If we shift ourselves into any more of a backward position, we’re going to see mass drownings of people who waddle into the Ocean to breath salt water because someone found a new pollutant in the air that may or may not be dangerous.  But hey, at least that problem will eventually solve itself.  I don’t think Mike Judge’s vaticination is possible, as much as I enjoyed the film, because at some point survival becomes too difficult to maintain.

Sources:

Mayor Bloomberg Introduces New York City Ordinance to Ban and Regulate Electronic Cigarettes

Ban E-Cigarettes? The Anti-Smoking Lobby’s Clueless Crusade

Fox The Five Slams Mayor Bloomberg Targeting Elevators: STUPID, DUMP