Blowing Water Rings
Virtually every morning I get on my elliptical machine and pedal away for 45 minutes. I do this with a nearly religious fervor. Almost nothing can stop me--until this morning. As I was about to begin, a commercial popped up on my television that excited me so much I had to get off and run to my office to type this post.
The commercial was for something called American Blue Tip. It's a reusable device that looks and acts and supposedly feels like a cigarette. When you take a drag on it, the tip lights up and you inhale a bit of water vapor which you then exhale. I've never been a smoker, so I'm not sure just how satisfying this might be for those who still use tobacco, but I'm giddy with anticipation to see how America's "behavior police" will find a way to ban this thing.
I assume they'll start with health issues. Perhaps they'll come up with some second-hand water vapor argument. I suppose they'll also float the idea that inhaling water vapor will lead to an increased desire to smoke the real thing. And what about smoking opponents who will feel mocked by this invention and its users? Will people be banned from inhaling in public areas merely because it looks as if they're smoking?
Don't get me wrong; I'm personally opposed to smoking. I've lost loved ones to the habit, and I've seen the terrible struggles of them and others as they tried to quit. But I also believe some anti-smokers have used their campaign as a springboard to attempt to regulate all sorts of personal behavior, so I'm anxious to see how products like American Blue Tip will be treated. If it helps smokers quit, I see that as a positive. And if it makes others feel sophisticated, so what? However, I have a feeling this will really stick in the craw of people who know how we should all live. Now we'll get a chance to see whether they're more interested in public health or in regulating behavior they don't care for.
I'm too excited to pedal.
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Comments :
May '10
Re: Blowing Water Rings
The argument against it is obvious. It's a gateway drug to tobacco. Those devious Joe Camel people are at it again.
Re: Blowing Water Rings
I cannot tell you how much I hope they don't invent something like this for my beloved french fries, which also serve as a cancer-delivery device, when you get right down to it.
Of course, the problem with smoking is that part of what makes it cool is the smoke, especially the second-hand variety, curling around you and everyone else.
Edited on Sep 2, 2010 at 9:32amJul '10
Re: Blowing Water Rings
In Vancouver, multiculturism trumps health concerns, exempting hookah bars from the province's draconian anti-smoking laws. So maybe blowing water vapours through American Blue Tip could be defended on the same multiculti principles.
Jun '10
Re: Blowing Water Rings
Deeply drawing on this product will cause equally powerful exhalations of (drum roll) CO2. Has the EPA examined and approved this product? Has its impact been factored into the IPPP report on climate change?
As soon as the Justice Department finishes its slapdown of those Arizonans who want the immigration laws enforced, they'll be all over this with a motion for a permanent injunction.
Edited on Sep 2, 2010 at 9:36amMay '10
Re: Blowing Water Rings
Do ice cream trucks still sell candy cigarettes? Vapor cigs would fit so nicely into little Kelly's tea parties.
Surely, these things are a health hazard. I live in the land of 90+% humidity, but constantly inhaling steam into your lungs is bound to cause pneumonia, right?
May '10
Re: Blowing Water Rings
American Blue Tip is clearly a health threat, if only because it depresses exercise.
By the way, has anyone seen any credible statistics to support the "second-hand smoke is just as dangerous as smoking" meme? The dilutive effects of smoke diffusing into a normal-size, normally-ventilated room make this hard for me to accept.
I state this as a life-long non-smoker, but one who finds California pool halls weirdly sterile without the blue haze of smoke to peer through.
May '10
Re: Blowing Water Rings
I've been interested in these as a way for my dad to quit smoking or to just let him keep smoking in a safer way if he's not going to stop. The FDA wanted to regulate e-cigarettes as drug delivery devices, but lost that case. Now although these products are sans tobacco, they are is being prohibited in some workplaces as tobacco.
Jun '10
Re: Blowing Water Rings
At the risk of being labeled a pessimist, I ask: What will this do to Clint Eastwood's image. Can you imagine what the graveyard shootout in The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly would have looked like if Clint was sucking on an American Blue Tip? Besides, the graveyard is about the only place a guy can light up in with wreckless abandon. And don't get me started on second hand water vapor, which I conceive of as having a yellowish tinge.
Edited on Sep 2, 2010 at 10:47amRe: Blowing Water Rings
Watching the infomercial, I especially liked the sultry model who asks "It's a free country, right?"
Ah, the innocence of youth!
Aug '10
Re: Blowing Water Rings
Just as its tobacco based inspiration has done, American Blue Tip is bound to lead to the use of water in other forms. Soon, people who get hooked on American Blue Tip will wind up drinking water or immersing themselves in it. The hard core will seek to to deliver it by other means, possibly by heating it beyond the point of boling to where it becomes gaseous and then inhaling it or even freezing it and combining it with its liquid form and drinking it in long draughts on hot summer days. The possibilities are almost endless.
Jul '10
Re: Blowing Water Rings
Has anyone seen a fake cigarette? I saw one in the hand of a woman in the local city hall. It looks like a cigarette, with ashes and everything. But it isn't.
I have a theory that humans like to inhale smoke. ALL of our ancestors spent a lot of time sitting around a smokey fire waiting to the meat to cook. Smoke, in our DNA, means warmth and companionship, and food. OK, most of our ancestors didn't live beyond their 25th years. But it was a fun 25 years.
Aug '10
Re: Blowing Water Rings
Rush Limbaugh was seen puffing on an e-cigarette on his webcam two weeks ago, and it started a small but ongoing discussion on his show. The Wall Street Journal then ran a story on August 25th on the FDA's interest in regulating e-cigarettes.
I hate over-regulation. And I believe that do-gooders will try to destroy the whole enterprise, whether or not they have good information to support their arguments. But I would be interested to know if e-cigarettes are harmless. Most of them do deliver nicotine, and what the user inhales (into the lungs?) is not simply water. The WSJ article mentions propylene glycol, the stage-smoke stuff. It makes for an impressive exhalation of "smoke," if the pictures in the article are accurate.
Aug '10
Re: Blowing Water Rings
I seem to recall that at sone point during the Clinton administration there was acme thought at the FDA of regulating cigarettes as "nicotine delivery devices". That trial balloon fell flat but I wouldn't be surprised if they tried that with e-cigarette.
May '10
Re: Blowing Water Rings
This will definitely lead to the required petition to ban dihydrogen monoxide.