Why can't they just leave us alone?
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Actually, it's the other way around - the legislators just do what the ANTZ tell them. We've seen it in action. The ANTZ actually send lobbyists to write the laws and the legislators just sponsor them. It's pretty scary to see how much special interests are involved in writing laws. We're also seeing it with the sort-of-well-meaning but completely misdirected RJR-sponsored laws going around to "support" vaping.
And WE also need to stop being sheep and believing everything we thought we knew about tobacco and nicotine. If we remind ourselves that all of the "facts" we know about tobacco, nicotine, second-hand smoke and so-called "third-hand smoke" came from the same people now claiming e-cigarettes contain anti freeze and are as or more dangerous than smoking, because they contain trace amounts of TSNAs and metals, that can put it all in perspective. Seeing all of the lies and bogus studies about e-cigarettes, how can we confidently believe that the "science" they used to demonize tobacco, nicotine and second-hand smoke is anymore reliable? Then we need to show the legislators how wrong those ANTZ claims about tobacco & nicotine are to support our claim of how bogus their claims about e-cigarettes are. They need to be completely discredited for us to be socially accepted and then they will have no ammunition to include us in smoking bans and more importantly, employers and insurance companies won't have justification to discriminate against tobacco and nicotine users anymore, either.
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People who want to control something/ Control Freaks. People have the mistaken Idea they should be in control. When they can't control something in their life they figure they can control someone else or something else. Human nature. I have it. So when they find something they have decided is wrong in some degree they want to stamp it out. Don't get me wrong there are some wrong things out there but in the grand scheme of things this should be way down on the priority list of people. Which is worse tobacco or this? The other thing is big Pharma, Tobacco, Gov. and others are going to be hit financially if E-cigs get to be more popular. So you get the perfect storm of folks coming together to stamp out a perceived evil simply because of money and control. I have no doubt that some have a real concern but it they need to prioritize. In the US and in most of the world we have an Economy that still sucks. We have terrorism as we just had happen again. We have poverty, political grid lock, Crooked Politicians, threatened rights on a daily basis, Pending water shortages and a food supply that has been compromised by pour regulation and greedy companies and may not be sustainable as is. I think we have enough on our plate with out making a big deal about a Personal Vaporizer/Nicotine delivery system that is in the words of my Doctor "Works", "has to be better than smoking".
Almost forgot. Just heard this in a movie and I think it applies hear, " Weapons of Mass Deception". The exaggeration of one problem to keep another problem hidden or ignored. Politics. You make a big deal about this or another topic so they don't get called out on things like having a balanced budget along with the ones I listed above. In the movie a Politician was wanting a law to ban desacrating the American Flag "which I hate" but in the grand scheme it is not as big a deal as other stuff going on.
Exactly - it's a distraction. The ANTZ used flavored cigarettes this very way. Based on surveys, youth weren't even using flavored cigarettes, yet the ANTZ claimed the flavors were enticing kids to start smoking (because surveys showed youth were "aware of them,") so they must be banned. It was a ridiculous argument if you think of the millions and millions of adults who started smoking before "flavored" cigarettes were even marketed. So, the ANTZ successfully got flavored cigarettes banned (even though the tobacco companies actually had stopped selling them before the ban was even passed) and could claim a "win" against big, bad tobacco, while doing absolutely nothing to actually reduce youth smoking. Now, just as before the ban, the top selling "flavors" to youth continue to be "Marlboro," "Camel," "Kool" and "Newport."
I remember the Camel Exotic Blends cigarettes. I liked the vanilla or citrus ones. I used to buy them occasionally myself, in my mid-to-late 30's. But they were much more expensive than my usual Marlboro Lights, so I only bought them occasionally. The idea that youth were buying such expensive cigarettes is laughable just for that reason alone.
I remember the Camel Exotic Blends cigarettes. I liked the vanilla or citrus ones. I used to buy them occasionally myself, in my mid-to-late 30's. But they were much more expensive than my usual Marlboro Lights, so I only bought them occasionally. The idea that youth were buying such expensive cigarettes is laughable just for that reason alone.
Can I please see the other 15/16ths? I accept that you're being rhetorical. I don't need 16 times as much data. I just need some data.
You have a favoured expert who agrees with you... Lovely, but not scientific, really, is it?
I don't doubt that there's a massive amount of propaganda in the field. I just don't think that counter-propaganda is the answer. I'd really prefer a body whose ostensible mission is in part public education to be talking in unvarnished scientific truths. If you're saying something like "nicotine is not a suspected carcinogen", I expect you to have solid data backing that up. You might be right - as I said, I basically know nothing about the subject except what I've googled in the last few days. But you haven't shown it to me yet, and if you can't, sorry, but you're acting as a propagandist.
Knowing it took me at least a year of being immersed in THR to come to that conclusion, I know I wont be able to convince you in even 100 posts on this thread. Its a process you have to go through and have to want and be able to put in the time and effort to learn for yourself. I highly recommend Dr. Phillips blog, antiTHRlies.com. There are also great blogs listed on our blog at blog.CASAA.org. I warn you, though. Stepping into this rabbit hole can change your life.
I'll keep reading, because I'm genuinely interested in the result. But I don't have a horse in this race, beyond knowing the truth. It seems nicotine on its own is vastly less harmful than smoked tobacco. The interests of smoke-free nicotine users cannot possibly be served by someone who feels the need to exaggerate or distort that.
If this were facebook, I would share and like both. I could not agree with you more.
And now the veneer of civility begins to come off, eh, generic mutant? A few well-made arguments against your premise, and the "propagandist" and "distort truth" talk starts to come out.
I read a very interesting article here
Does nicotine replacement therapy cause cancer? Evidence from the Lung Health Study
Not only in refuting the premise that nicotine is a carcinogen, it also cites several others as well. An interesting statement is made in the paper summary as well.
In this article, a large sample of 6000 is weeded down to just under 4000 and studied for a five year period. The users of nicotine replacement are compared to non users. There is no statistically significant difference. This is a compelling study with a large sample. Even more interesting is that in another article cited by the first one:
Stop-smoking medications: who uses them, wh... [Nicotine Tob Res. 2004] - PubMed - NCBI
The following quote appears:
Since there is little chance of me changing your mind any more than you changing mine, I would like to make the point of my post. The vast weight of anti-nicotine propaganda has kept many smokers using analogs since they are convinced that nicotine is the reason cigarettes cause cancer. This is no doubt killing and sickening people every day, because this unproven theory of carcinogenic nicotine continues to be repeated as fact. Calling someone names who is attempting to correct that public misconceptions may make you feel better since you are being pasted in this debate, but it does not make what she is doing less noble.
Let me know when you find some "body whose ostensible mission is in part public education to be talking in unvarnished scientific truths". I am sure there are lines of wealthy folks with no agenda and a vast store of scientific knowledge just waiting to share their wisdom with us. But until they stop waiting, we have to weed through all of the studies from people with agendas and find some truth on our own.
I read a very interesting article here
Does nicotine replacement therapy cause cancer? Evidence from the Lung Health Study
Not only in refuting the premise that nicotine is a carcinogen, it also cites several others as well. An interesting statement is made in the paper summary as well.
In this article, a large sample of 6000 is weeded down to just under 4000 and studied for a five year period. The users of nicotine replacement are compared to non users. There is no statistically significant difference. This is a compelling study with a large sample. Even more interesting is that in another article cited by the first one:
Stop-smoking medications: who uses them, wh... [Nicotine Tob Res. 2004] - PubMed - NCBI
The following quote appears:
Since there is little chance of me changing your mind any more than you changing mine, I would like to make the point of my post. The vast weight of anti-nicotine propaganda has kept many smokers using analogs since they are convinced that nicotine is the reason cigarettes cause cancer. This is no doubt killing and sickening people every day, because this unproven theory of carcinogenic nicotine continues to be repeated as fact. Calling someone names who is attempting to correct that public misconceptions may make you feel better since you are being pasted in this debate, but it does not make what she is doing less noble.
Let me know when you find some "body whose ostensible mission is in part public education to be talking in unvarnished scientific truths". I am sure there are lines of wealthy folks with no agenda and a vast store of scientific knowledge just waiting to share their wisdom with us. But until they stop waiting, we have to weed through all of the studies from people with agendas and find some truth on our own.
I only have the exact same horse in this race as you, except I hope to make that truth known beyond myself. I don't have just "an" expert, but a whole field of experts who have scientific evidence to back up what I say. The whole mission of CASAA is education and the truth and not propaganda, even to the point that CASAA has criticized favorable electronic cigarette studies and warned against using one or two studies as definitive proof e-cigs are safe. We took some heat for that, but if we are to maintain our credibility we cannot criticize bad ANTZ research and ignore mediocre research that would just make e-cigs look good.
Dr. Michael Siegel: http://tobaccoanalysis.blogspot.com
Dr. Brad Rodu: http://rodutobaccotruth.blogspot.com/
Dr. Carl Phillips: Anti-THR Lies and related topics | because cultivating the truth requires both seeding and weeding
Paul Bergen: Paul L. Bergen | Tobacco Harm Reduction: News & Opinions
Dr. Jonathan Foulds: Does nicotine cause cancer? | Freedom From Smoking
Dr. Joel Nitzkin: Misperceiving Nicotine Health Risks | R Street Institute
Doctors from the American Council on Science and Health: Treating Recalcitrant Nicotine Addiction: the EBM Way - ACSH
Action on Smoking and Health: Regulating nicotine products
That's a start. Keep reading.
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I'm not going to bother multi quoting various peoples in this little back and forth that this thread has gotten into, but I do feel the need to say this:
I spend every morning reading new articles and looking at any new studies out there on tobacco, nicotine, NRT, and of course e-cigs(or PVs which I prefer to call um). You can find most of these linked through the CASAA's site or even through simple google searches. I have not seen any blocking of unfavorable reports on the part of CASAAs members or site and they just like many of us in this forum are more interested in the truth then hearing what they want to hear.
What good would half truths do us. Isn't that what tobacco companies used to keep their customers for decades after the dangers of smoking were revealed? How does any harm reduction benefit people if the dangers of it (even if they are greatly reduced) stay hidden? We can't expect to change the way people see us and treat us with lies, half truths and over zealous claims. It will bite us in the ..... The CASAA clearly understands this and works very hard to get facts out there. Perhaps instead of thinking so much that reports in a favorable way is propaganda you should carefully read what's out there. Sometimes the truth is what you want to hear.
I spend every morning reading new articles and looking at any new studies out there on tobacco, nicotine, NRT, and of course e-cigs(or PVs which I prefer to call um). You can find most of these linked through the CASAA's site or even through simple google searches. I have not seen any blocking of unfavorable reports on the part of CASAAs members or site and they just like many of us in this forum are more interested in the truth then hearing what they want to hear.
What good would half truths do us. Isn't that what tobacco companies used to keep their customers for decades after the dangers of smoking were revealed? How does any harm reduction benefit people if the dangers of it (even if they are greatly reduced) stay hidden? We can't expect to change the way people see us and treat us with lies, half truths and over zealous claims. It will bite us in the ..... The CASAA clearly understands this and works very hard to get facts out there. Perhaps instead of thinking so much that reports in a favorable way is propaganda you should carefully read what's out there. Sometimes the truth is what you want to hear.
Thanks for the links Kristin, I'll read them as I can, though obviously that'll take a while.
Nothing personal - it is frustrating reading wishful thinking, and this forum and hobby/habbit have a major infection Anybody trying to inject a scientific viewpoint is doing a great service.
Nothing personal - it is frustrating reading wishful thinking, and this forum and hobby/habbit have a major infection
Anybody trying to inject a scientific viewpoint is doing a great service.
But you haven't posted anything that shows nicotine IS a suspected carcinogen, either? In order for a substance to be considered a "suspected carcinogen" there would usually be a general consensus in the scientific community. MOST things we call "carcinogens" are "suspected" but not proven. The American Cancer Society states, "based on how hard it can be to test these candidate carcinogens, most are listed as being of probable, possible, or unknown risk. Only a little over 100 are classified as carcinogenic to humans." Note that nicotine is not on any of the known, probable or possible carcinogens lists.
One or two studies, studies that only conclude that more studies need to be done to find if there is more supporting evidence of what they found, does not automatically make something a "suspected carcinogen."
ETA - sorry, I just picked up on that comment after I re-read your post. Not trying to beat a dead horse, but I thought it should be pointed out. Part of the reason we are in such a pickle is people have such a vast misunderstanding of what makes something "hazardous." That's why they buy the "anti freeze" and "carcinogen" claims the ANTZ make about e-cigarettes. I blame, in large part, the media that is so quick to jump on every small study and proclaim it as undeniable proof of something.
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Thanks for the links Kristin, I'll read them as I can, though obviously that'll take a while.
Nothing personal - it is frustrating reading wishful thinking, and this forum and hobby/habbit have a major infection
There are a GREAT MANY of us on this forum that DO read all the stuff that is out there. There are MANY of us that are NOT just blindly following along with the grand notion that vaping is 100% safe. There are MANY of us on this forum that DO want and CARE about the truth. Thank god for people like Kristin that are willing to spend the time and give us the links, good and bad, for us to research and come to our own conclusions. And there are MANY of us on this forum that have reached the Same conclusions, that while vaping isn't 100% safe, it is a MUCH safer alternative than smoking cigarettes.
And there are a WHOLE BUNCH of people that respect all the knowledge and the persistance of CASAA to fight on our behalf against the ANTZ.
I do understand that you are fairly new to ECF, and in time you will see how knowledgeable Kristin and the others that comprise CASAA. In point of fact, one of the advisors to the board was key in getting cigarettes banned indoors. Look up the name Bill Godshall. He fights for the rights of vaping. This is what is stated on the CASAA website about Bill:
While he does not serve on the CASAA board of directors, Bill Godshall has served as an advisor to CASAA almost since its inception. He founded SmokeFree Pennsylvania in 1990, which has advocated policies for smoke-free air, reducing tobacco marketing to youth; expanding nicotine addiction treatment services; and educating smokers about less hazardous alternatives to cigarettes, such as electronic cigarettes and modern, smoke-free tobacco products.
Type in CASAA on your search engine and you will find a wealth of information. There are MANY of us on this forum that are not sheep. Sheep do not find alternatives to smoking, like the e-cig. I consider myself a rebel since this is so much in its basic infancy......or toddler....stage now, relatively speaking.
I'm not trying to say "everyone here believes a load of rubbish". I'm here, that would be a dumb thing to say
I'm saying that as well as some very well thought out posts here, there is a fair bit of knee-jerk, emotive crud masquerading as knowledge.
You'd expect that in any new 'hobby'. Make it addictive, and potentially life-saving, and potentially harmful, and add in all kinds of questions over regulation and politics. Pour into the intertubes, and stir...
I'm saying that as well as some very well thought out posts here, there is a fair bit of knee-jerk, emotive crud masquerading as knowledge.
You'd expect that in any new 'hobby'. Make it addictive, and potentially life-saving, and potentially harmful, and add in all kinds of questions over regulation and politics. Pour into the intertubes, and stir...
Because it's all about Money.
And whenever I think about Matters of Money, I remember the Greatest performance that Ned Beatty every gave.
From the film "Network" (1976)
But you haven't posted anything that shows nicotine IS a suspected carcinogen, either? In order for a substance to be considered a "suspected carcinogen" there would usually be a general consensus in the scientific community. MOST things we call "carcinogens" are "suspected" but not proven. The American Cancer Society states, "based on how hard it can be to test these candidate carcinogens, most are listed as being of probable, possible, or unknown risk. Only a little over 100 are classified as carcinogenic to humans." Note that nicotine is not on any of the known, probable or possible carcinogens lists.
One or two studies, studies that only conclude that more studies need to be done to find if there is more supporting evidence of what they found, does not automatically make something a "suspected carcinogen."
ETA - sorry, I just picked up on that comment after I re-read your post. Not trying to beat a dead horse, but I thought it should be pointed out. Part of the reason we are in such a pickle is people have such a vast misunderstanding of what makes something "hazardous." That's why they buy the "anti freeze" and "carcinogen" claims the ANTZ make about e-cigarettes. I blame, in large part, the media that is so quick to jump on every small study and proclaim it as undeniable proof of something.
OK. You'll note that I asked what you meant by 'suspected carcinogen' earlier in the thread. I wasn't sure whether that is a 'term of art', or just meant something that real scientists reasonably suspect is a carcinogen (as vague as that may be).
If the latter, then I've posted links to search terms which point to papers mostly discussing evidence of in vitro cancerous mutations caused by metabolites of nicotine (I don't know if that would be enough to count something a 'carcinogen'), but some seemingly by nicotine itself.
EDIT (added after some of the replies below were posted) -
You'll note that various MSDS's describe it as mutagenic (normally in yeast, sometimes apparently in lab animals, though I haven't seen that MSDS myself), and the CDC thinks that nicotine's status with respect to carcinogenicity is 'inconclusive'.
http://www.cdc.gov/niosh/ershdb/EmergencyResponseCard_29750028.html
Here are a few random examples - though as I've repeatedly stated, I'm not a scientist and can't attest to their quality.
http://toxsci.oxfordjournals.org/content/79/1/1.full - this one's interesting, though quite old now.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0024320512001890 - animal model, abstract
http://www.treatobacco.net/en/page_62.php - states that nicotine metabolises to known carcinogens, and may be carcinogenic in hyperoxic hamsters.
http://cancerres.aacrjournals.org/content/69/21/8236.short - more evidence of carcinogenic metabolites.
http://carcin.oxfordjournals.org/content/33/9/1745.short - evidence of nicotine playing havoc with the pancreas.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3371638/ - "Over the past two decades, experimental models using animals, cell cultures, and clinical data have identified nicotine as a carcinogen for virtually all GI organs"
http://cancerprevres.aacrjournals.org/content/4/11/1719.short - "Laboratory studies have indicated a carcinogenic potential of nicotine"
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1600-0714.2008.00659.x/abstract - in vitro, abstract.
There are doubtless many others, these came from the first few pages of searches.
I could accept "Not widely regarded as a carcinogen", "Thought not to be carcinogenic in itself, though it may metabolise to known carcinogens", or "Displays no evidence of carcinogenicity at relevant doses", perhaps. But "Not a suspected carcinogen" still doesn't sound right, unless 'suspected carcinogen' has some special definition I'm not aware of.
Another thing I'll state is that if it is a carcinogen, it doesn't bother me in itself. Pesto and toast may be carcinogenic, I still eat them (not together - what kind of philistine do you take me for
). I still fly on planes, or get X-rayed when necessary. The fact that the public are poorly educated when it comes to understanding risk, and science generally, does not give us license to avoid 'scary' words, if they are the correct ones.
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