"My concern is that public health bureaucrats are now more interested in whether there should be a cultural norm of individuals putting small cylindrical devices between their lips than whether the consequences of doing so are life threatening."
-Mark Littlewood
Wednesday, May 28, 2014
What's in a name?
Electronic cigarette.
I have never used one.
Not even that very first BlowOne.
I smoked a cigarette on the way to the store to buy the BlowOne. I even smoked a cigarette on the way back from the store. I got home, filled the tank, turned on the battery and… the BlowOne is not a cigarette. It isn't a good replacement or alternative for a cigarette. It doesn't look like a cigarette, doesn't taste like a cigarette, and it certainly doesn't satisfy the craving for a cigarette…
So why the name ‘electronic cigarette’?
I quit smoking with a Beyond Vape Spire, a Kanger pro tank 3, and an assortment of e-liquids... a setup that was, well, most definitely not an electronic 'cigarette'. In fact none of the hardware that I have since collected bear any resemblance to cigarettes. Nor do any of the e-liquids that I use.
So why the name ‘electronic cigarette’?
To be fair, there are some devices that the label seems to fit… mostly the offerings of companies like Altrias, Lorillard, Njoy, and RJ Reynolds. Products that are designed to be artificial cigarettes. Products that many of us refer to as cig-a-likes. ...But I’m not thinking about cig-a-likes today, I’m thinking about everything else, everything that isn't a cig-a-like.
And I’m thinking that calling everything else electronic cigarettes is bad. It’s bad for the community, it’s bad for the industry and its bad for public perception.
Over the years the anti smoking brigade has convinced 80% of the population that smoking is bad. That a cigarette ember is actually a tiny rift exposing the very fires of hell and that cigarette smoke is a vile miasma issued from the burning souls of the damned… and… I may just be overstating things a little bit, but the point remains that the more vaping is equated to cigarettes in the mind of the public, the more of an uphill battle we face in our efforts to oppose anti-vaping legislation. We can’t change the legal definitions, but we can challenge the language that we, ourselves, use. We can, hopefully, realize a shift in the terms that the general public associates with vaping, and separate vaping, if ever so slightly, from all the negativity associated with the word ‘cigarette’.
I have never used one.
Not even that very first BlowOne.
 |
| Do these look like cigarettes? |
So why the name ‘electronic cigarette’?
I quit smoking with a Beyond Vape Spire, a Kanger pro tank 3, and an assortment of e-liquids... a setup that was, well, most definitely not an electronic 'cigarette'. In fact none of the hardware that I have since collected bear any resemblance to cigarettes. Nor do any of the e-liquids that I use.
So why the name ‘electronic cigarette’?
To be fair, there are some devices that the label seems to fit… mostly the offerings of companies like Altrias, Lorillard, Njoy, and RJ Reynolds. Products that are designed to be artificial cigarettes. Products that many of us refer to as cig-a-likes. ...But I’m not thinking about cig-a-likes today, I’m thinking about everything else, everything that isn't a cig-a-like.
And I’m thinking that calling everything else electronic cigarettes is bad. It’s bad for the community, it’s bad for the industry and its bad for public perception.
Over the years the anti smoking brigade has convinced 80% of the population that smoking is bad. That a cigarette ember is actually a tiny rift exposing the very fires of hell and that cigarette smoke is a vile miasma issued from the burning souls of the damned… and… I may just be overstating things a little bit, but the point remains that the more vaping is equated to cigarettes in the mind of the public, the more of an uphill battle we face in our efforts to oppose anti-vaping legislation. We can’t change the legal definitions, but we can challenge the language that we, ourselves, use. We can, hopefully, realize a shift in the terms that the general public associates with vaping, and separate vaping, if ever so slightly, from all the negativity associated with the word ‘cigarette’.
Monday, May 26, 2014
Good Reason To Vape #3: It's safer than Canada
Vaping... safer than Canada
Seriously, I don't know what's up with that, but if you vape and are in the market for life insurance, it's something you may run across. Most insurance companies treat vaping just like they treat smoking... a fact which boggles the mind and makes one wonder what they are passing off as logic. Of course, most of us aren't interested in paying an exorbitant smokers premium, which means that we aren't interested in most insurance companies. so we keep looking for that rare company that recognizes the difference between the 450,000 U.S. deaths attributed to cigarette smoking each year... and the 0 deaths attributed to vaping. Eventually we find that mythical vape friendly company. and then it happens. there are conditions. No existing cancer, no existing heart disease, and no recent or planed trips to Canada.
Canada
Because...? how many deaths are attributed to Canada each year? Maybe it's not actually Canada, maybe it's something about crossing the Canadian boarder, or it could be Canadian Mounties or maple syrup or, well, I don't know, but whatever it is, vaping is safer. And that's something, right? So next time someone gets all up in your face about vaping, you just look them straight in the eyes and tell them that Vaping is safer than Canada! They won't take you seriously, but it may confuse them for a moment or two.
Seriously, I don't know what's up with that, but if you vape and are in the market for life insurance, it's something you may run across. Most insurance companies treat vaping just like they treat smoking... a fact which boggles the mind and makes one wonder what they are passing off as logic. Of course, most of us aren't interested in paying an exorbitant smokers premium, which means that we aren't interested in most insurance companies. so we keep looking for that rare company that recognizes the difference between the 450,000 U.S. deaths attributed to cigarette smoking each year... and the 0 deaths attributed to vaping. Eventually we find that mythical vape friendly company. and then it happens. there are conditions. No existing cancer, no existing heart disease, and no recent or planed trips to Canada.
Canada
Because...? how many deaths are attributed to Canada each year? Maybe it's not actually Canada, maybe it's something about crossing the Canadian boarder, or it could be Canadian Mounties or maple syrup or, well, I don't know, but whatever it is, vaping is safer. And that's something, right? So next time someone gets all up in your face about vaping, you just look them straight in the eyes and tell them that Vaping is safer than Canada! They won't take you seriously, but it may confuse them for a moment or two.
Friday, May 23, 2014
Rambling thoughts with gratuitous references to Alice's Restaurant and Star Wars.
We all have our story. and we like to share them. We've quit smoking, we've cut down our nicotine intake, we're cleaner, healthier... We've rehabilitated ourselves. and we're proud of it. We have every right to be.for many of us our success comes after years of failed attempts.
So we share our stores
Sometimes it's just adding a signed cigarette pack to the wall at your favorite B&M to show that we quit.
Other times it's more like the story of the Alice's Restaurant Massacre, With Full orchestration and five part harmony and stuff like that and all
and he stopped me right there and said, "Kid, did you ever Go to court?" And I proceeded to tell him the story of the twenty seven eight-by-ten Colour glossy pictures with the circles and arrows and the paragraph on The back of each one, and he stopped me right there and said, "Kid, I want You to go and sit down on that bench that says Group W .... NOW kid!!"
And I, I walked over to the, to the bench there, and there is, Group W's Where they put you if you may not be moral enough to join the army after Committing your special crime, and there was all kinds of mean nasty ugly Looking people on the bench there. Mother rapers. Father stabbers. Father Rapers! Father rapers sitting right there on the bench next to me! And They was mean and nasty and ugly and horrible crime-type guys sitting on the Bench next to me. And the meanest, ugliest, nastiest one, the meanest Father raper of them all, was coming over to me and he was mean 'n' ugly 'n' nasty 'n' horrible and all kind of things and he sat down next to me And said, "Kid, whad'ya get?" I said, "I didn't get nothing, I had to pay $50 and pick up the garbage." He said, "What were you arrested for, kid?" And I said, "Littering." And they all moved away from me on the bench There, and the hairy eyeball and all kinds of mean nasty things, till I Said, "And creating a nuisance." And they all came back, shook my hand, And we had a great time on the bench, talkin about crime, mother stabbing, Father raping, all kinds of groovy things that we was talking about on the Bench. And everything was fine, we was smoking cigarettes and all kinds of Things, until the Sargeant came over, had some paper in his hand, held it Up and said.
"Kids, this-piece-of-paper's-got-47-words-37-sentences-58-words-we-wanna- Know-details-of-the-crime-time-of-the-crime-and-any-other-kind-of-thing- You-gotta-say-pertaining-to-and-about-the-crime-I-want-to-know-arresting- Officer's-name-and-any-other-kind-of-thing-you-gotta-say", and talked for Forty-five minutes and nobody understood a word that he said, but we had Fun filling out the forms and playing with the pencils on the bench there, And I filled out the massacre with the four part harmony, and wrote it Down there, just like it was, and everything was fine and I put down the Pencil, and I turned over the piece of paper, and there, there on the Other side, in the middle of the other side, away from everything else on The other side, in parentheses, capital letters, quotated, read the Following words:
KID, HAVE YOU REHABILITATED YOURSELF?
and that's it isn't it. As smokers we were all made to feel like Group W, and at times it felt as if all that anyone wanted to know, unless they were sitting on the Group W bench with us, was if we had rehabilitated ourselves. well, we have. So why are we still sitting on the Group W bench?
Aw... do you wan't a cookie?
No. We don't. Look, we're not asking anyone to reward us with a cookie just because we quit smoking., and we have cookie flavored vapes if we want the taste of snicker-doodles or chocolate chip... we're just tired of being treated like a wretched hive of scum and villainy. We thought that we had left the Dark Side when we quit smoking. It's a bit disheartening to find that the rules have been changed and our success is met with a frown of disapproval. Although... the more I think about it, my Innoken 134 does look a bit like a lightsabre, and sith lords are cool... so if, from here on out, you'll kindly refer to me as 'Darth Vaper' I'll be far less prickly about the Dark Side thing and the Group W bench.
but let's be clear... when it comes to vilifying ex smokers who switched to vaping your'e being a bit disingenuous. You can worry about our nicotine after you've delt with your sugar addition, and your caffeine addiction. You an criticize its use as a mood stabilizer when you get over your political correctness and also criticize the use of carbamazepine, divalpreoex sodium, gabapentine, lamotrigine, lithium, lurasidone, olanzapine, oxarbazepine, paliperidone, quetiapine, riluzole, risperidone,sodium valproate, topiramate, valproic acid, or ziprasidone (that list quickly got longer than I expected). You can treat us like drug users when you treat everyone that uses the aforementioned addictions and mood stabilizers the same... and everyone that uses alcohol. You can complain about the smell when... wait? what? It can't possibly be about the smell, even if it is, when incense and aromatherapy, and poeple dousing themselves in a gallon of overbearing cologne/perfume becomes illegal, then we can talk about the smell.
I would like to be able to walk down the street or sit outside and enjoy a vape without someone going into some sort of epileptic interpretive dance convolution as they try to wave away a few wisps of vape cloud. ...and it is a few wisps, I'm an off-the-shelf coil, tank using vaper. Every time I encounter someone treating us like we're blowing clouds of pure evil what I really want to do is yell "fuck off you teetotaling twat", well, that or force-choke them.
So we share our stores
Sometimes it's just adding a signed cigarette pack to the wall at your favorite B&M to show that we quit.
Other times it's more like the story of the Alice's Restaurant Massacre, With Full orchestration and five part harmony and stuff like that and all
and he stopped me right there and said, "Kid, did you ever Go to court?" And I proceeded to tell him the story of the twenty seven eight-by-ten Colour glossy pictures with the circles and arrows and the paragraph on The back of each one, and he stopped me right there and said, "Kid, I want You to go and sit down on that bench that says Group W .... NOW kid!!"
And I, I walked over to the, to the bench there, and there is, Group W's Where they put you if you may not be moral enough to join the army after Committing your special crime, and there was all kinds of mean nasty ugly Looking people on the bench there. Mother rapers. Father stabbers. Father Rapers! Father rapers sitting right there on the bench next to me! And They was mean and nasty and ugly and horrible crime-type guys sitting on the Bench next to me. And the meanest, ugliest, nastiest one, the meanest Father raper of them all, was coming over to me and he was mean 'n' ugly 'n' nasty 'n' horrible and all kind of things and he sat down next to me And said, "Kid, whad'ya get?" I said, "I didn't get nothing, I had to pay $50 and pick up the garbage." He said, "What were you arrested for, kid?" And I said, "Littering." And they all moved away from me on the bench There, and the hairy eyeball and all kinds of mean nasty things, till I Said, "And creating a nuisance." And they all came back, shook my hand, And we had a great time on the bench, talkin about crime, mother stabbing, Father raping, all kinds of groovy things that we was talking about on the Bench. And everything was fine, we was smoking cigarettes and all kinds of Things, until the Sargeant came over, had some paper in his hand, held it Up and said.
"Kids, this-piece-of-paper's-got-47-words-37-sentences-58-words-we-wanna- Know-details-of-the-crime-time-of-the-crime-and-any-other-kind-of-thing- You-gotta-say-pertaining-to-and-about-the-crime-I-want-to-know-arresting- Officer's-name-and-any-other-kind-of-thing-you-gotta-say", and talked for Forty-five minutes and nobody understood a word that he said, but we had Fun filling out the forms and playing with the pencils on the bench there, And I filled out the massacre with the four part harmony, and wrote it Down there, just like it was, and everything was fine and I put down the Pencil, and I turned over the piece of paper, and there, there on the Other side, in the middle of the other side, away from everything else on The other side, in parentheses, capital letters, quotated, read the Following words:
KID, HAVE YOU REHABILITATED YOURSELF?
and that's it isn't it. As smokers we were all made to feel like Group W, and at times it felt as if all that anyone wanted to know, unless they were sitting on the Group W bench with us, was if we had rehabilitated ourselves. well, we have. So why are we still sitting on the Group W bench?
Aw... do you wan't a cookie?
No. We don't. Look, we're not asking anyone to reward us with a cookie just because we quit smoking., and we have cookie flavored vapes if we want the taste of snicker-doodles or chocolate chip... we're just tired of being treated like a wretched hive of scum and villainy. We thought that we had left the Dark Side when we quit smoking. It's a bit disheartening to find that the rules have been changed and our success is met with a frown of disapproval. Although... the more I think about it, my Innoken 134 does look a bit like a lightsabre, and sith lords are cool... so if, from here on out, you'll kindly refer to me as 'Darth Vaper' I'll be far less prickly about the Dark Side thing and the Group W bench.
but let's be clear... when it comes to vilifying ex smokers who switched to vaping your'e being a bit disingenuous. You can worry about our nicotine after you've delt with your sugar addition, and your caffeine addiction. You an criticize its use as a mood stabilizer when you get over your political correctness and also criticize the use of carbamazepine, divalpreoex sodium, gabapentine, lamotrigine, lithium, lurasidone, olanzapine, oxarbazepine, paliperidone, quetiapine, riluzole, risperidone,sodium valproate, topiramate, valproic acid, or ziprasidone (that list quickly got longer than I expected). You can treat us like drug users when you treat everyone that uses the aforementioned addictions and mood stabilizers the same... and everyone that uses alcohol. You can complain about the smell when... wait? what? It can't possibly be about the smell, even if it is, when incense and aromatherapy, and poeple dousing themselves in a gallon of overbearing cologne/perfume becomes illegal, then we can talk about the smell.
I would like to be able to walk down the street or sit outside and enjoy a vape without someone going into some sort of epileptic interpretive dance convolution as they try to wave away a few wisps of vape cloud. ...and it is a few wisps, I'm an off-the-shelf coil, tank using vaper. Every time I encounter someone treating us like we're blowing clouds of pure evil what I really want to do is yell "fuck off you teetotaling twat", well, that or force-choke them.
Thursday, May 22, 2014
Good Reason To Vape #2: Weather
We are mothers and fathers. And sons and daughters. Who every day go about our lives with duty, honor and pride. And neither snow, nor rain, nor heat, nor gloom of night, nor the winds of change, nor a nation challenged, will stay us from our vapes. Ever.
Smokers, on the other hand, may find it exceedingly difficult to even light a cigarette, especially if they are using matches rather than a lighter. Think back to every time you found yourself out and about in foul weather... umbrella pinched under your arm, one hand flicking a lighter while you desperately try to shield the flame from wind and rain with the other... wasn't fun was it? and if the weather was particularly bad, there was always the chance that a shift of the wind would result in a splash of rain right on your cigarette. Or you could pull out your vape. Sure, the wind is still windy, the rain still wet, and the snow still cold, but none of that keeps your vape from working perfectly.
Smokers, on the other hand, may find it exceedingly difficult to even light a cigarette, especially if they are using matches rather than a lighter. Think back to every time you found yourself out and about in foul weather... umbrella pinched under your arm, one hand flicking a lighter while you desperately try to shield the flame from wind and rain with the other... wasn't fun was it? and if the weather was particularly bad, there was always the chance that a shift of the wind would result in a splash of rain right on your cigarette. Or you could pull out your vape. Sure, the wind is still windy, the rain still wet, and the snow still cold, but none of that keeps your vape from working perfectly.
Where were all the vapers?
Yesterday I again made the trek out to Sacramento attend the California State Assembly Appropriations Committee hearing on AB 1500.
I was originally going to write about the actual hearing, and I may still do that later, but right now I keep getting distracted by a frustration… where the heck was everybody?
A number of businesses came out: CultiVapors, Grand Vapor Station, Luxe Liquid Vapor, Tasty Vapor, and The Vapor Spot, as well as representatives from VMR Products (V2 Cigs) and NJoy.
Jim Root from California Vapor Association was present
And 4 individuals… 2 vapers and 2 spouses of vapers.
Only 2 vapers.
Yes, the number of vaping business that showed up to oppose AB 1500 was disappointingly small when compared to the total number of such businesses in California (and let us all remember to send our business, and money, to those that did participate), but we, the consumers outnumber the businesses by a very wide margin. so where were we?
How many of us are there in California? There does not seem to be any reliable statistic available, so I’m going to fudge it a little to come up with an estimate… according to the CDC over 3,839,000 individual adults smoke in California, and as of 2011, one in five of those had tried electronic cigarettes or roughly 767,800 adults. We can safely assume that many more have tried electronic cigarettes since then, but we can also assume that not everyone that ‘tries’ becomes a regular consumer, so we’ll stick with 767,800 as a reasonable estimate for now. 2 out of 767,800… That gives us a whopping .0002% of California vapers showing up to the hearing. Shameful
It’s true that , as of now, AB 1500 has failed passage. It’s true that there is currently no indication that the legislation will be proposed again anytime soon. It’s also true that we, as a community, can’t sit on our butts and hope that these things work out. If we care about the continued viability of the vaping industry, if we care about the continued availability of vaping products for our own continued use, and for use by others that may switch from smoking to vaping in the future, then we need to stand up against restrictive legislation.
California is a big place, and Sacramento certainly isn't geographically accessible to everyone in the state. Travel time, travel cost, and the need to maintain other aspects of our lives (like jobs) mean that we can’t expect some arbitrary percentage of California vapers to show up to these things, but there are enough of us that we should be able to make a better showing than just two people. Next time, and inevitably there will be a next time as some bill or other attempts to squash e-cigs, next time we should aspire to fill the hearing room to capacity with vapers.
I was originally going to write about the actual hearing, and I may still do that later, but right now I keep getting distracted by a frustration… where the heck was everybody?
A number of businesses came out: CultiVapors, Grand Vapor Station, Luxe Liquid Vapor, Tasty Vapor, and The Vapor Spot, as well as representatives from VMR Products (V2 Cigs) and NJoy.
Jim Root from California Vapor Association was present
And 4 individuals… 2 vapers and 2 spouses of vapers.
Only 2 vapers.
Yes, the number of vaping business that showed up to oppose AB 1500 was disappointingly small when compared to the total number of such businesses in California (and let us all remember to send our business, and money, to those that did participate), but we, the consumers outnumber the businesses by a very wide margin. so where were we?
How many of us are there in California? There does not seem to be any reliable statistic available, so I’m going to fudge it a little to come up with an estimate… according to the CDC over 3,839,000 individual adults smoke in California, and as of 2011, one in five of those had tried electronic cigarettes or roughly 767,800 adults. We can safely assume that many more have tried electronic cigarettes since then, but we can also assume that not everyone that ‘tries’ becomes a regular consumer, so we’ll stick with 767,800 as a reasonable estimate for now. 2 out of 767,800… That gives us a whopping .0002% of California vapers showing up to the hearing. Shameful
It’s true that , as of now, AB 1500 has failed passage. It’s true that there is currently no indication that the legislation will be proposed again anytime soon. It’s also true that we, as a community, can’t sit on our butts and hope that these things work out. If we care about the continued viability of the vaping industry, if we care about the continued availability of vaping products for our own continued use, and for use by others that may switch from smoking to vaping in the future, then we need to stand up against restrictive legislation.
California is a big place, and Sacramento certainly isn't geographically accessible to everyone in the state. Travel time, travel cost, and the need to maintain other aspects of our lives (like jobs) mean that we can’t expect some arbitrary percentage of California vapers to show up to these things, but there are enough of us that we should be able to make a better showing than just two people. Next time, and inevitably there will be a next time as some bill or other attempts to squash e-cigs, next time we should aspire to fill the hearing room to capacity with vapers.
Tuesday, May 20, 2014
A quick update on AB 1500
For those of you planning on heading to Sacramento tomorrow for the hearing on AB 1500… You are going? Right? If for no other reason than to show support for both the vaping industry and vaping community… For those of you planning on attending the AB 1500 hearing, plan on it being a long day. Word is that, while the committee meets at 9:00AM, AB 1500 won’t be heard until it’s sponsor, Dickinson, arrives… and he has another hearing that’s scheduled to run till 12:00. Since items are heard in the order that their sponsor signs in, this could push AB 1500 to last in line, or at least near it, for the day.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)