The ANTZ are winning?

[GinnyTx]

Not in my world they're not..another website forum where I chat, when we first quit it was very "ANTZ" in there and now the other vapers (which I've referred to here too) have come out as to the benefits they've experiences as have I and it's seen in a favorable light. As well as on our FB and spreading the word through folks we've helped stop smoking and their social media contacts.

I don't hear "you're vaping antifreeze" from them anymore at least

 

[Robino1]

My concern is not that people are saying vaping is bad. It is the fact that 6 months ago only a few were saying it. Now days I am hearing it on an almost daily basis which means the ANTZ are succeeding in spreading their message. If we just ignore these people and don't fight back we will lose this battle. IMHO

As the ANTZ get shot down, they get more panic stricken and more vocal. The more vocal they get, the more lies they tell. We can keep rebutting their lies with facts and links to those facts. Honestly we HAVE to keep plugging away. When one sees articles that spew that nonsense, we must rebut those. Be smart though, use links and facts to back up your statements. Just calling them names and trash talking them, that only makes one sound more desperate then they sound.

Our numbers are growing, hopefully our voices are getting louder.

 

[AndriaD]

Yeah and taco bell and mcdonalds are approx. 1.4x worse than cigarettes (my own [scientific] calculations).

I wish there was an ignore button in real life.

I've always wished there was a "grow a brain your stupid empty head" button. Alas.

Andria

 

[tFOrRESTee]

Sex sells, folks. Make a movie with a hot blonde dripping on a smexy mech mod will get people started, or a detective vaping at the crime scene may help too. But definitely not a gangster on vaping though, lol.

 

[Roscoe01]

If we could get the medical community on board with us we could really gain momentum. The problem there is big pharmaceutical has all the doctors bought and paid for. Not to mention BTW has the politicians in their pockets. We need irrefutable scientific evidence to make our case with.

Keep up the good fight everyone.

 

[pennysmalls]

I haven't come across this in person yet but every time I see it mentioned here I just have to snicker. Funny how people who spout this stuff don't realize how ignorant and arrogant they are in thinking that hundreds of thousands of vapers, possibly millions, must be the biggest bunch of dumb azzes on the planet. That many people vaping and not one of them is capable of making an intelligent informed decision? Not one? There is no way, with this many people taking up vaping, there could actually be something to this whole vaping thing? No way it could be a legitimate alternative? For reals, we're all illiterate, back woods poop for brains that know nothing about what we're doing, we just threw ourselves upon this new phenomenon called vaping without thinking because....,well we vape and we're stoo-pid to know why.

The people spouting this stuff don't see how ridiculous their thinking is.

And as aside...I believe the vape train has left the station. It's now chugging full speed down the tracks and I can't see it being stopped. There will be lots of stuff happening during this journey and it's going to be stressful and upsetting but nobody steps in front of a several ton locomotive and survives.

 

[Robino1]

If we could get the medical community on board with us we could really gain momentum. The problem there is big pharmaceutical has all the doctors bought and paid for. Not to mention BTW has the politicians in their pockets. We need irrefutable scientific evidence to make our case with.

Keep up the good fight everyone.

As time goes on and doctors see improvements on vapers lungs, blood pressure and overall health, they are slowly coming around. A year ago, just seeing any story about a doctor that approved vaping or was even ok with it, was VERY hard to find. Now we are getting more and more stories on the positive side.

That's a good thing.

 

[Rizzyking]

Half the problem has been demonstrated here with the "stupid" comments, when you have that attitude how do you expect to win over doubters because whether you realise it or not when you hold that view you show it in many small ways and the people you think of as stupid see that. It isn't that people are too stupid its that it doesn't directly affect them or that they are more concerned about other real life things like employment and family and vaping is a brain off subject for them. We all have things we turn our brains off for when they come on the news hell with me its anything to do with Africa for you its something else but for many vaping is that subject. As for doctors many are seeing benefits but until there is hard science there to back them up you really expect them to come out and recommend vaping given how many people have a lawyer on speed dial come on be realistic. That's the main thing here we have our reality and the majority have theirs and it isn't ours that doesn't mean we can't get them supporting us but it does mean we have to fight smarter not harder and that starts by treating every doubter as someone to be engaged with not labelled as stupid.

 

[Roscoe01]

Half the problem has been demonstrated here with the "stupid" comments, when you have that attitude how do you expect to win over doubters because whether you realise it or not when you hold that view you show it in many small ways and the people you think of as stupid see that. It isn't that people are too stupid its that it doesn't directly affect them or that they are more concerned about other real life things like employment and family and vaping is a brain off subject for them. We all have things we turn our brains off for when they come on the news hell with me its anything to do with Africa for you its something else but for many vaping is that subject. As for doctors many are seeing benefits but until there is hard science there to back them up you really expect them to come out and recommend vaping given how many people have a lawyer on speed dial come on be realistic. That's the main thing here we have our reality and the majority have theirs and it isn't ours that doesn't mean we can't get them supporting us but it does mean we have to fight smarter not harder and that starts by treating every doubter as someone to be engaged with not labelled as stupid.

Well said but I would add a point. We don't need doctors to endorse vaping as a whole. We just need for them to admit that it is an effective smoking cessation tool and/or reduced risk alternative to smoking. My argument is that they are disinclined to due so ....due to pharmaceutical reps giving them kickbacks for selling the psychotropic drug called chantix.

I do agree with penny that the train has left the station already and it's going to be a hard industry to stop ....but they can very well turn the industry over to big tobacco. I have very little worry for myself in this matter as I have enough gear and supplies to pretty much vape till the end of time.....but I want others who come after us to have the opportunity to have access to effective vape equipment other than cig a likes produced by BT.

Maybe I am paranoid but our govt has a track record of mucking stuff up and I don't want to be caught with my pants down.

 

[Tonythefiddler]

I hear pro-tobacco people complain about ecigs MORE though. Like "it puts holes in your lungs, stick to the traditional PLANT" hahaha... or the "they give you pneumonia and wet lungs." Most non-smokers I know support it because they agree on how nasty analogs are.

 

[Rizzyking]

I live in the UK that has a very different health system to the USA and we don't have doctors officially endorsing vaping simply because there is very little hard science to backup recommending it although Dr f is continuing his fantastic research. We cannot expect medical professionals to endorse vaping in anyway until the science is there to support them and they can then support the science with their own experience bit of a chicken and egg situation. I think we as a community need to be careful in how lofty we get and arrogant towards others which seems to be happening more and more because that's a fast way to totally lose this.

 

[Strings]

Trust me: in the US, Pharma money has a HUGE impact on the medical community. That, and fear of lawsuits

 

[VHRB2014]

Vaping should have never gotten political. Its about ex-smokers choosing a better way.

Unfortunately you get the administration you vote for. I fear the only way to return liberty and the idea of personal responsibility to this country is via a coupe. I feel we really need a coupe in order to save the union from allot of blood being shed. Ousting Boner may be a start, but I truly fear life time pols just don`t get it.

What I cant stand are the thinly vailed antz. These I would like to stomp into a mud pit. Never smoked a day in their life pseudo poseurs.

Iv had it with the lefts agenda. Iv had it with Global warming when its freezing outside. Iv had it with pedophiles being allowed to use my daughters public restroom. I have had it with free syringes, condoms, and poor, I mean {other stuff} phones. Iv had it with ideologues telling me {Other Stuff} should be legal while pushing for anti vaping laws. Sometimes the only way to deal with obvious insanity is to cut it out like it is cancer.

Sadly I do not feel any better after venting. Words mean nothing at this point.

 

[JustMeB]

I don't think the Antz are winning. Perhaps from a media stand point, but the media always did like to sell "the sky is falling" news to the public. I take every opportunity I have to tell people about vaping, and how it has helped me get off cigarettes. I offer to help them too if they are smokers. This, is a great way to keep fighting back. Knowledge is power, and there is safety in numbers. (That's my take on it any way).

 

[ReigntheGamer]

When people make those kind of statements I break out my Ricky Bobby quote,"98% of us are going to die at some point....."

 

[sofarsogood]

A big part of the problem as I see it is we vapers are always on the defensive. There needs to be positive news that gets attention. One possibilty is a good estimate of the number of people who are no long smoking because of vaping and an estimate of how many per day or week or month might be added to the ranks. This estimate might already have been done and held privately.

I read an estimate that there might be 7,000 speciality vape shops. Suppose on average each one of those gets two new customers per day who eventually become non smokers. That would be 5 million per year. May be that number is too high or two low but is anybody trying to find out or does somebody already know?

 

[Rizzyking]

We're on the defensive a lot because were not a united front we have so many divisions within the vaping community such as mech vs regulated, vaping vs cloud chasing and former smokers and those who Vape but didn't smoke. That's not even counting the level of vaping snobbery there is which I've got no time for I think a cigalike is every bit as good as my setup and they were how I got off smoking and onto the path I took. Hard to prevent a united anything when we're so busy infighting on stupid things. We have become an insular community that struggles to see past the end of whatever device we're using with many not prepared to engage but happy to label anyone that doesn't see things our way. As I've said many times since I started vaping I have been open and happy to discuss my vaping with anyone at anytime and have been successful in changing the attitude of many people who weren't anti vaping they didn't understand and had little information. If there was to be campaign our best bet is one that explains what vaping is, how it works and how it benefits those of us that do it. No propaganda just simple information that cannot be twisted or misrepresented.

 

[Robino1]

We're on the defensive a lot because were not a united front we have so many divisions within the vaping community such as mech vs regulated, vaping vs cloud chasing and former smokers and those who Vape but didn't smoke. That's not even counting the level of vaping snobbery there is which I've got no time for I think a cigalike is every bit as good as my setup and they were how I got off smoking and onto the path I took. Hard to prevent a united anything when we're so busy infighting on stupid things. We have become an insular community that struggles to see past the end of whatever device we're using with many not prepared to engage but happy to label anyone that doesn't see things our way. As I've said many times since I started vaping I have been open and happy to discuss my vaping with anyone at anytime and have been successful in changing the attitude of many people who weren't anti vaping they didn't understand and had little information. If there was to be campaign our best bet is one that explains what vaping is, how it works and how it benefits those of us that do it. No propaganda just simple information that cannot be twisted or misrepresented.

I kinda have to disagree. When push comes to shove, we do band together. Think of siblings or a family dynamic. Brothers and sisters fight among themselves all the time. But let someone from outside the family do something to one of them.... now you're picking on family. That doesn't fly.

We may not agree on a lot of things but if it comes down to it, we do band together. And have before.

 

[Danbrooks2k]

They are far from winning anything.

As long as there are flashlights or just batteries, cotton and resistive wire, we can build mods.

As long as there is vg/pg and tobacco leaves, we can make NET juices.

There are just too many people that have escaped the grip of big tobacco that will never go back.

They can try to buy out all the little cig-a-like companies all they want and all they will succeed in doing is keeping it legal.

Njoy has proved that a big company can make quality juice that is meant to be used in mods.

If they try to outlaw it companies will sell juices without nicotine and people will add it in themselves.

There are just too many loopholes and work arounds for vaping to get shut down.

We have known that cigarettes kill people for as long as I have been alive and they still sell cigarettes and will continue to sell more.

We live in a world where legal recreational ......... is now a thing. The federal government just found a bigger fish to fry, and a great big industry to regulate and tax.

 

[Rizzyking]

I kinda have to disagree. When push comes to shove, we do band together. Think of siblings or a family dynamic. Brothers and sisters fight among themselves all the time. But let someone from outside the family do something to one of them.... now you're picking on family. That doesn't fly.

We may not agree on a lot of things but if it comes down to it, we do band together. And have before.

If that were the case no one would be asking if the antz were winning and sorry but some of the responses in this thread also show why vaping isn't winning hearts and minds. As time goes on we are becoming more divided and more insular it's not just this forum go to any number and you can see the same thing a couple of years ago things were more united but as vaping gets bigger so do the divisions. Vaping is getting hammered with complete rubbish but that's only happening because there is nothing out there for Joe public to easily find and ingest to rebuts the rubbish. It's all well and good telling people to go look at this webpage and that webpage but until news media has a person or small group of people to contact that can present things for the public the antz will have it easy.