Philip Morris
Why the Tobacco Industry Fears the Passive Smoking Issue
Fields
- Author
- Borland, R.
- Chapman, S.
- Hill, D.
- Owen, N.
- Woodward
- Chapman, S.
- Type
- PSCI, PUBLICATION SCIENTIFIC
- Attachment
- 2026091285/2026091295
- Area
- BOLAND,JAMES/OFFICE
- Site
- W5
- Request
- Stmn/R1-037
- Stmn/R1-109
- Named Person
- D, J.
- G, D.I.
- L, K.M.
- M, A.J.
- Nelson, D.
- Poole, J.
- G, D.I.
- Document File
- 2026091112/2026092004/Environmental Tobacco Smoke
- Master ID
- 2026091244/1314
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- Intl Journal Health Services
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Document Images
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Section on Health Policy
WHY THE TOBACCO INDUSTRY FEARS
THE PASSIVE SMOKING ISSUE
Simon Chapman, Ron Borland, David Hill,
Neville Owen, and Stephen Woodward
The tobacco industry has identified the passive smoking issue as the single most
important problem confronting its economic future. During the 1980s, the industry
has been engaged in an elaborate and expensive intemational campaign seeking to
refute the evidence against passive smoking's effects on health and to position the
issue as one essentially concemed with civil liberties and smokers' "rights." There
are three main reasons for the industry'l concem: first, the passive smoking issue
allows a widening of the definition of smoking beyond its discussion as a personal
habit, legitimizing it as a social problem; second, successful cases of litigation
against employers by workers with histories of chronic exposure to environmental
tobacco smoke have created an industrial climate of concern leading to workplace
smoking restrictions and bans; and third, the proliferation of smoking restrictions
reduces smoking opportunities and thus reduces total cigarette consumption and
hence financial returns to the industry. Based on the results of a large Australian
study of a workplace smoking ban, an estimated 654.88 million cigarettes with a
retail value of SA6,549 thousand would be forgone annually in Australia alone if 50
percent of white-collar worksites were to ban smoking. Finally, the passive smoking
issue can be considered a Trojan horse to its less discussed effects: the reduced
morbidity and mortality likely to result in smokers from the significant reductions in
smoking frequency that occur with the proliferation of smoking restrictions intro-
duced in the name of concern for the health of nonsmokers.
In May 1978, in its sixth biennial national opinion survey report to the U.S. Tobacco
Institute, the Roper Organization, Inc., wrote of the growing public concern about
involuntary "passive" smoking: "This we see as the most dangerous development to the
viability of the tobacco industry that has yet occurred" (1). The Roper report suggested
a six-point set of tactics to its tobacco industry clients, arguing that "The strategic and
long run antidote to the passive smoking issue is ... developing and widely publicizing
clear-cut, credible, medical evidence that passive smoking is not harmful to the non-
smoker's health." The suggested tactics included proposing segregated public facilities
"as the lesser of two evils," promoting the "where will it all end" argument about
government inttusions on liberty, and portraying those active in arguing for smoking
control as "fumaphobes" and "zealots . . . with an unreasonable fear of cigarette
smoking."
Internationat Journal of HeaRh Services, Volume 20, Number 3. Pages 497-427, t990
0 1990, t3aywood Publishing Co., tnc.
417

V,
In the years that have followed the Roper report, the international tobacco industry
has shown many signs of having heeded the advice it reccived. Its tactics have included:
Sponsoring scientific conferences (Vienna, 1985; Tokyo, 1987) in the apparent
attempt to display commitment to the principles of scientific impartiality, but to also
perpetuate the definition of the involuntary smoking issue as a "debate" demanding
the postponement of policy decisions, which the tobacco industry argues are unwisely
predicated on the belief that sufficient evidence has already been amassed.
Giving widespread publicity to the unofficial comments of individual delegates to one
of these conferences in a manner that seemed designed to suggest that the comments
were the official conclusions of the conference.
Suggesting that the World Health Organization officially supported the Vienna con-
ference, and so by inference, the unofficial summary that emanated from it (2).
Publishing and widely distributing quasi-scientific booklets (3, 4), workplace smoking
policy kits (5), pamphlets and "advertorials" (6-8), on themes consistent with the
Roper recommendations.
Distorting comments by (for example) the Vice President of the American Cancer
Society (9, 10) and the British Institute of Cancer Research (11) so as to imply that
those agencies believed passive smoking was not a health issue.
Supporting the establishment and activities of "smokers' rights groups" such as the
British "FOREST' (Freedom Organization for the Right to Enjoy Smoking Tobacco)
and the Australian "Fair Go."
In 1989, the British tobacco industry's trade association, The Tobacco Advisory
Council, published two information booklets on the subject (3, 4). Reviewing the
booklets in the Britisit Medical Journal, Professor Nicholas Wald concluded somewhat
rhetorically, "Although the arguments in these booklets are weak, it is interesting that
the Council has gone to such Iengths to defend environmental tobacco smoke. Why has
it chosen this hazard, rather than active smoking?" (i2).
In this article we offer several suggestions in response to Professor Wald's question.
We analyze the likely reasons for the tobacco industry's concern, and outline some of
the implications for the changing face of smoking control in countries where concern
about passive smoking has received wide publicity. We argue that the likely main public
health impact of restrictions or bans on smoking in enclosed environments-substantial
reductions in smoking frequency among smokers-should receive much more attention
from researchers and commentators. These reductions should lead to corresponding
reductions in tobacco-caused disease in smokers, to a far greater degree than any health
benefits flowing to nonsmokers. To date, the focus of the overwhelming majority of
research and commentary on the health implications of passive smoking has examined
the health of nonsmokers.
SMOKING: NO LONGER A PERSONAL ISSUE
The primary reason why the passive smoking issue must concern the tobacco industry
is the way in which this issue has radically redefined the terms within which smoking

Y
~ueslion.
some of
concern
in public
bstantial
attentiot,
:ponding
ty health
jority of
xamined
industry
;moking
can be discussed. Unlike quitting smoking and preventing its onset, passive smoking is
potentially an issue for everyone, smokers and nonsmokers alike. Cessation and preven-
tion are potential issues for smokers, future smokers, and those such as parents who are
concerned for them. Yet as subjects of public awareness efforts, these issues suffer a
major disadvantage in that the view is widespread that smoking is one's own business, a
matter of personal choice. The focus on passive smoking allows transcendence of the
view of smoking as personal because it redefines smoking as a public health issue,
moving it nearer to positions analogous to infectious disease, drunken driving, and other
health issues on which metaphors of blame, public nuisance, and therefore control are
conferred with legitimacy from the dominant culture. For nonsmokers, the increasing
evidence showing passive smoking to be dangerous positions smoking as an affront to
one's own health and to a perfectly reasonable preference for smoke-free air. For
smokers, it shatters any comfortable illusions that their smoking is purely their own
affair.
In appropriating the unassailable issue of the right to avoid noxious and irritating
fumes, passive smoking legitimizes the desire (pieviously often suspected as quasi-
authoritarian or meddling) of many nonsmokers to control the smoking of others. This is
because it allows nonsmokers to argue that the focus of the issue is no longer your
smoking but my forced, unwilling smoking. In this way, the passive smoking issue has
the propensity to create what might be termed a "reserve army" of smoking control
advocates. Proselytizing against smoking has hitherto been an activity of two main
groups: those motivated by public health concerns (generally health and medical
workers) and those who have an essentially puritanical, paternal istic, or ageist agenda of
smoking being somehow wrong either for anyone, or for specified gender (invariably
women) or age groups (children). The passive smoking issue has drawn into this arena a
large number of people motivated by concerns for their personal comfort and health. As
such, it represents a revolution in the social definition of smoking and consequently in
the ways in which it can be discussed and its control legitimized.
PUBLIC SUPPORT FOR RF.STRICTIONS
This analysis would appear to have considerable empirical support from at least two
sources: First, there is impressive and mouatirig evidence that substantial majorities of
both smokers and nonsmokers agree that passive smoking can damage the health of
nonsmokers (13), and approve of restrictions on smoking in enclosed places, including
workplaces. In a study of smoking bans in workplaces in Australia, 95 percent of
never-smokers, 90 percent of ex-smokers, and 57 percent of smokers agreed or strongly
agreed that "overall, the ban was a good thing" six months after mandated bans were
implemented. There was an overall increase in approval from before the ban's im-
plementation (14), with smokers increasing their approval of bans after implementation
more than nonsmokers. A March 1986 survey of 2,000 adults in the Australian states of
New South Wales and Victoria found majority support for total prohibition of smoking
in six of seven locations nominated (15) (Table 1). Ninety percent of Australians also
believed that cafes and restaurants should provide separate areas for smokers and
nonsmokers, and 63 percent would prefer to sit in such areas (16).

Support for smoking bans in various public places
Public transport 70 66 73 64 76
Restaurants 59 57 61 56 60
Hospital waiting 76 75 77 76 77
rooms
Enclosed work areas
61
55
68
55
68
Aircraft 57 55 60 53 62
Hotel bars 31 30 31 30 33
Enclosed entertainment 58 54 61 53 61
areas
i
Inc
with '
lions
smok
declit
know
devel
on sr.
benet
their
smo~
redu
occu
Second, if the editorial content of newspapers is a barometer of cultural preoccupa-
tions and public opinion, the recent coverage given to passive smoking in Australian Redi
newspapers is salutary. A study of all coverage of tobacco-related topics in all capital Smo
city newspapers for a 12-month period in 1987-$8 found that the passive smoking issue
ranked a clear fitst across all forms of article (17). Of 1,601 news items and letters coded 0
for content, news and commentary on the December 1987 ban on smoking on all mos
domestic airline flights ranked first (187 items), with articles on smoking in the smo
workplace ranking third (78 items) and smoking on other forms of public transport sixth eon:
(63 items). Aggregated, articles on any aspect of passive smoking appeared at 125 four
percent greater frequency than the next most common principal category. of tl
tota
INDUSTRIAL LITIGATION IMPLICATIONS OF EXPOSURE larg
TO ENVIRONMEN'I'AL TOBACCO SMOKE loc:t
six
In Australia since 1985 there have been eight workers' compensation cases involving 24-:
monetary payouts to workers claiming severe discomfort or disease arising from invol- sigr
untary, passive smoking (18). In the most pubiicized of these, an out-of-court settlement . (or
of SA65,000 was made by a transport employer to a bus driver employee with lung per
cancer, following legal argument that his years of exposure to passengers' environ-
mental tobacco smoke had caused the lung cancer. The decision was discussed widely Co,
in the Australian press as a likely precedent case that would precipitate the introduction
of smoking bans in workplaces by employers anxious to avoid illness compensation
E
litigation. 1ea'
While there has not been any formal study of the reasons for introducing workplace tha
smoking bans and restrictions in Australian industry, the proliferation of such restric- sat,
tions in recent years seems certain to be largely motivated by management concems pet
about possible litigation. In 1986, the Australian Attorney General said in the Australian po'

t
The Passive Smoking Issue / 421
,llar White-collar
76
60
77
68
62
33
61
Itural preoccupa-
ing in Australian
Acs in all capital
ve smoking issue
and letters coded
smoking on all
smoking in the
ic transport sixth
appeared at 125
ry.
>UIZE
i casesinvolving
ising from invol-
-court settlement
)loyee with lung
:ngers' environ-
liscussed widely
the introduction
>s Compensation
icing workplace
of such restric-
;cment concerns
in the Australian
t
parliament that "injury from passive smoking is reasonably foreseeable and that conse-
quently such an injury could give rise to an action for damages at common law" (19).
EFFECTS OF SMOKING RESTRICTiONS ON SMOKING
OPPORTUMTIES AND TOTAL CIGARETIE CONSUMPTION
Increased public antipathy toward exposure to sidestream tobacco smoke, coupled
with fear of litigation in employers and civic authorities, is leading to increased restric-
tions on smoking, through voluntary agreements and regulations. As the places in which
smoking is allowed are reduced it is likely that smokers' tobacco consumption will
decline-an obvious concern to the tobacco industry. In this section, we review what is
known about the effects on cigarette consumption of workplace smoking bans, and
develop a likely scenario regarding cigarette consumption as the adoption of restrictions
on smoking becomes more widespread. We will argue that the likely scenario has net
benefits in public health terms, as well as pror~iding smokers with a means of regulating
their habit. When legislation, regulation, or social antipathy acts to prevent or inhibit
smoking in enclosed public places, it seems likely that cigarette consumption will be
reduced, commensurate with the duration of the times when smoking would otherwise
occur.
Reduced Consumption Associated with Workplace
Smoking Restrictions
Of all the occasions or times when smoking is not permitted, the longest durations for
most people occur during work hours in those workplaces with restrictions and bans on
smoking. Four studies have now been published describing the effects on cigarette
consumption in smokers who are not permitted to smoke at work (20-23). All four
found evidence of reductions in smoking. The most recent of these, and the only study
of the four with a prospective design. examined the impact of the 1988 introduction of a
total ban on smoking in Australian Public Service buildings, the worksites of Australia's
largest employer group (over 170,000 workers) (23). Smokers in 44 different work
locations were surveyed prior to the introduction of workplace smoking bans. A survey
six months later found that the average smoker reduced his or her smoking over a
24-hour period by 5.18 cigarettes.a day. Light smokers did not change consumption
significantly, while moddrate smokers. reduced by an average of 5.8 cigarettes per day
(or 29.1 percent of usual consumption) and heavy smokers by 7.9 cigarettes (a 26.6
percent decrease).
Compensatory Smoking?
A common response to suggestions that restrictions on opportunities for smoking will
lead to an overall reduction in smoking frequency during a 24-hour period is the claim
that, because of the addictive nature of tobacco smoking, many smokers will compen-
sate for those cigarettes forgone by smoking more than they would otherwise in the
periods adjacent to times when they cannot smoke. The study reported above examined
possible compensatory smoking behavior by requiring respondents to record the number

I
of cigarettes smoked during seven separate periods of the day. In this way the study was
able to compare (for example) smoking frequency during lunch breaks and before and
after work, prior to and following the ban. There was an overall reduction in consump-
tion of about seven cigarettes per day during the hours spent inside buildings, and a
compensation of only 1.8 cigarettes in time periods before and after work and during
times spent outside buildings. The study did not measure "puff' topography, so it
remains possible that cigarettes smoked in times adjacent to worktimes were smoked
"harder." The lack of any compensatory smoking at coffee breaks and lunch times
suggest that smokers were generally not making extraordinary efforts to maintain
consumption. Further, the lack of compensation in the evening (excluding the hour
immediately after work) suggests that any compensation was restricted to the periods
immediately surrounding the periods of enforced abstinence.
The Spread ojWorkplace Smoking Restrictions
On the assumption that smoking bans will be progressively introduced beyond the
Australian Public Service into private sector office-type occupational settings, we have
estimated the impact on reduced consumption using the results of the study described
above as a benchmark of expected reductions.
In Australia in August 1988, approximately 4,450,800 persons worked in occupations
that usually are located within offices, shops, or other enclosed settings (24). If we
assume smoking rates in such settings are approximately the same (24.7 percent) as
those in the white-collar sections of the Australian Public Service sampled in the study
described above, then the corresponding extrapolation of annual cigarettes forgone by
such workers would be calculated thus:
4,450,800 workers x 0.247 = 1,099,348 smokers
1,099,348 smokers x 5.18 cigarettes x 230 working days/years
= 1,309,760,000 cigarettes forgone
On an assumption that 50 percent of such workplaces introduce such policies in the next
five years, then 654,880,000 cigarettes would be forgone in one year. At SAO.10 per
cigarette, this would represent an annual loss of SA6,548,800 (at 1988 prices) in retail
cigarette sales. ~
Might Smoke-Free Workplac~,~ Pro»tote Quitting?
Although research has not yet shown that smoke-free workplaces are responsible for
increasing smoking cessation among smokers, it is reasonable to suppose that they may
play important roles in this regard, although it will require the power of large longi-
tudinal studies to demonstrate such effects. Smokers in the contemplation stage of the
smoking cessation process (25) at the time smoking bans are introduced, or those who
take up a new job where smoking is not allowed, might well be "triggered" to stop
smoking. Moreover, work is a common setting for relapse during quitting attempts (26),
so workplace bans could be expected to assist quitting smokers to survive situations that
might otherwise result in relapse. Also likely in the long term is that persons entering the
workfor
cigarettt
smokinf
percent
percent
up the
signifrcL
Smoking
The N
crable ti
suburba
concert :
and atte
number
for smo
these ot
forgone
aircraft.
Smok
The nur
30,198:
the intn
airlines.
allocate
compar
is assun
smoked
estirnatt
passeng
followir
passeng
forgone
tes cost.
compen
of evide
pensato
There
those at
L
r Pav,

The Passive Smoking Issue / 423
sy the study was
. and before and
on in consump-
zuildings, and a
:ork and during
pography, so it
x were smoked
nd lunch times
rts to maintain
uding the hour
j to the periods
xd beyond the
-ttings, we have
itudy described
t in occupations
:gs (24). If we
4.7 percent) as
3ed in the study
ues forgone by
,rgone
cies in the next
At SA0.10 per
?rices) in retail
responsible for
s that they may
of large longi-
on stage of the
; or those who
gered" to stop
; attempts (26),
situations that
ns entering the
workforce as nonsmokers will be "protected," not only from passive exposure to
cigarette smoke, but also from social influence that may lead them to commence
smoking. An Australian population survey showed that among young adult smokers, 21
percent commenced smoking regularly for the first time at work (27). Furthermore, 7
percent specifically acknowledged that they had been influenced by workmates to take
up the habit. These data show that workplace bans have the potential to make a
significant contribution to reducing the uptake of smoking.
SmokingBans Outside the Workplace: Aircraft
The workplace is not the only context in which smoking has been restricted. Consid-
erable time is spent by the smoking public in commuting and traveling on nonsmoking
suburban, inter- and intra-state buses and trains; patronizing cinemas, theater, and
concert halls; visiting museums, exhibitions, hospitals, and other enclosed public places;
and attending church. In nearly all of these places in Australia, and in an increasing
number of other countries, smoking is totally prohibited. The erosion of time available
for smoking in the manner described above for workplaces could also be calculated for
these other restricted zones, albeit involving great complexity. As an index of smoking
forgone in just one of these contexts, consider the following case of the smoking ban on
aircraft.
Smoking has been banned on all domestic flights in Australia since December 1987.
Ile number of domestic passenger flying hours in Australia during the year ending June
30,1988, was 23,606,842.' Official figures on the provision of seats for smokers prior to
the introduction of the ban are not available for the seven major Australian domestic
airlines, but let us assume that before the ban an average of 20 percent of seats were
allocated to smokers-a figure that applied in Canada in 1988 (29), a country with a
comparable prevalence of smoking and a similar socioeconomic population profile. If it
is assumed that the average smoking passenger was a 25-cigarettes-a-day smoker who
smoked an average of 1.56 cigarettes during each hour of a 16-hour day, then a qualified
estimate of the number of cigarettes likely to be forgone by the 20 percent of smoking
passengers traveling on Australian domestic airlines in 1987/88 may be obtained in the
following manner: 20% of 23,606,842 total passenger hours equals 4,721,369 smoker
passenger hours; 4,721,369 hours at 1S6 cigarettes per hour equals 7,365,335 cigarettes
forgone. With the average retail price of a cigarette in 1988 being SA0.10, then cigaret-
tes costing a total of $A736,534 in retail.sales would not be purchased, assuming that
compeitsatdry pre-and'post-ilight increases in smoking did not take place. On the basis
of evideitce in the workplace discussed above, we believe that only insignificant com-
pensatory smoking would be likely.
There can be little doubt that the tobacco industry has made calculations similar to
those above. In 1978-the same year as the Roper report warnings to the American
I Passenger twun are akulated from Commonwealth Department of Transport data (28) thus:
Total passenger kilometers traveled 13,267,045,000 km
Average aircraft speed 562 lcnUhr
= 23,606,842 passenger hours

424 / Chapman et al.
erabiy more than one cigarette per day. The international industry's opposition to s
re lations desi ned to conirol assive smokin sho ld b
u
u
f' d f
t
h
one less cigarette a day, our company would stand to lose S92 million in sales annually.
I assure you that we don't intend to let that happen without a fight" (30). Since 1978, the
proliferation of laws and regulations concerning environmental tobacco smoke, together
with the rising tide of public opinion supportive of such restrictions, has almost certainly
caused the customers of companies such as RJ Reynolds to.reduce smoking by consid-
tobacco industrv-William Hobbs, a president of the tobacco multinational RJ f r
Reynolds, said about anti-smoking measures "If they caused every smoker to smoke just ; r.
~ g
g p g
e
seen us
an oremost m t
e i F
'
light of this concern for the erosion of smoking opportunities and thus the industry
s s
; market. ir
ti
: REDUCED RISK AMONG SMOKERS WHO REDUCE CONSUMPTION: a;
A "TROJAN HORSE" EFFECT rt
et
By "Trojan horse" we mean that the current preoccupation within the passive smoking
issue with the potential harm being caused to nonsmokers acts to mask what in public
health terms ought clearly to be a subject of more extensive and detailed study: the
impact of passive smoking control policics on the incidence of smoking-caused diseases
in smokers whose consumption falls as a result of these restrictions. As Peto and Doll
have commented, "The risks of passive smoking are certainly trivial compared with the
risks to smokers themselves" (31).
Almost all of the argument to restrict or ban smoking in enclosed public places has
proceeded from a concern to protect nonsmokers from involuntarily breathing environ-
mental tobacco smoke. The 1986 U.S. Surgeon General's report reflected this concern
in its title, The Health Consequences ojhvolunuory Smoking (32), and in all but four
postscript-like pages of its 359-page length, where the little available evidence on the
"indirect effects" of workplace bans such as those on cessation rates and on smoking
frequencies in continuing smokers were reviewed. Yet in terms of public health impact,
restrictions on smoking introduced in the interests of preventing involuntary smoking
may well prove to be a Trojan horse to what has to date been a barely investigated yet
potentially profound effect: the impact on smoking prevalence and smoking frequency,
and therefore on smokers' own health, of restrictions on smoking in public.
Cigarette smoking has a dose-response relationship with each of the major diseases in
which it plays a causative role (33). In the Australian study described above, reduction
in consumption due to workplace bans was greatest among medium and heavy smokers.
The dose-response relationship between cigarettes consumed and overall and disease-
specific mortality suggests that the mean reduced daily consumption found in the
Australian study may eventually be associated with a corresponding reduction in tobac-
co-caused diseases in those who might otherwise be smoking more. Doll's and Peto's
(34) review of lung cancer mortality in several countries concluded that international
differences in mortality rates and temporal trends observed were generally consistent
with different tar yields and intakes across both time and countries. The cigarettes being
smoked in Australia in 1989 have considerably lower tar yields than those smoked
during past decades (18), making extrapolation of likely reductions in mortality based
on past dose-response relationships largely speculative. Nonetheless, a reduction in
th
is
w;

The Passive Smoking Issue / 425
rr. :inational RJ
ok= to smoke just
ir ales annually.
)). =;nce 1978, the
;o-.okc, together
Ls L:,ost certainly
ncKmg by consid-
y's opposition to
nC'orcmost in the
n; the industry's
iL?MC'TION:
;: =a5sive smoking
tst what in public
e._:ed study: the
F --aused diseases
.-_ Peto and Doll
:o.-parc;d with the
r1_^i:c places has
>m-,:ning environ-
:cc~t this concern
in atl but four
e ~ idcnce on the
s L:.d on smoking
~ealth impact,
c,:_r:arv smoking
y z"estigated yet
ac,cttg frequency,
'u7;:c.
. -a;or diseases in
J 4~:ove, reduction
-ic ;cavy smokers.
er<iI and disease-
ticx; found in the
ed.ction in tobac-
I7`ii's and Peto's
t;:.at intemationai
a=ily consistent
tc cigarettes being
ia, those smoked
in mortality based
ss, a reduction in
consumption of the order of 25 percent would be expected over time to significantly
reduce tobacco-caused disease.
THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE NOTION
OF "SMOKERS' RIGH75"
The progressive introduction of restrictions and prohibitions on smoking in enclosed
spaces has been motivated by concern about personal comfort and health, and
precipitated by the recommendations of major reports, which in turn were commis-
sioned in response to the accumulating research evidence implicating passive smoking
in acute and chronic disease. The theme uniting the various objections to these restric-
tions has been that of "smokers' rights"-a generally unspecified allusion to an in-
alienable assumption of rights said to apply to smokers. These alleged rights bear some
reflection against the history of arguably comparable "rights" that have long since
eroded.
In Elizabethan England, the free exercise of flatulence even among company was
considered normal and not proscribed by considorations of politeness or offensiveness.
Similarly, public expectoration was commonplace across all social classes in Victorian
and Edwardian England, and the practice remains widespread in many countries today
without drawing any social or legal approbation (35). There are some pertinent
similarities between flatulence, spitting, and smoking. Each behavior is essentially
personal but being not involuntary, is each capable of being exercised in both private
and in public settings. As well, the performance of each behavior is usually motivated
by a desire to make oneself more comfortable, and so its execution is accompanied by a
feeling of relief and pleasure. While those performing any of these three behaviors
derive some pleasure from them, all three have also emerged as the focus of social
ostracism, and in the case of spitting and smoking, legal sanctions. The control of
spitting is thought to have played an important part in the control of tuberculosis. The
personal pleasure these behaviors allow to their perpetrators also causes unpleasant, and
in the case of spitting and smoking, potentially harmful results to those exposed to the
products of these behaviors.
In view of these parallels, it is salutary to speculate on the likely reception that would
be given to earnest talk about "fariers' rights" or "spittcrs' rights." Clearly, such terms
would be greeted with derision, while "smokers' rights" continues to maintain some
currency as a serious concept. The derision accorded to the former terms would partly
reflect their strangeness, but derive mostly from the bombastic apposition of essentially
private and discreet behaviors with the legalistic tone intrinsic to the word "rights."
Perhaps the principal difference between the three behaviors is that it is only smoking
that involves a purchased commodity (cigarettes), and hence only for smoking have
powerful groups of financially vested interests taken any role in attempting to define ihe
behavior as one appropriate to as many public situations as possible. There is no
financial gain to be made in promoting the social acceptability of flatulence or spitting.
The evolution of social norms against public spitting and flatulence has relegated
these practices to private and generally solitary occasions in most Western countries. It
is interesting to speculate whether the rapidly changing social climate about smoking
will eventually cause talk of "smokers' rights" to be considered the utterances of a

426 / Chapman et ai.
bygone era, and smoking itself largely reduced to the status of a private, solitary
behavior or one exercised among consenting adults in private. Just as the spittoon is now
a relic of the past in most cultures, perhaps the ashtray may soon also grace the shelves
of antique and curio shops.
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