[dionidium]

To be clear, I don't think the CDC is full of political operatives intent on fighting a culture war. What I think is that almost nobody at the CDC smokes, that they don't know many smokers, that they (correctly, more or less) perceive smoking to be a lower-class-coded activity, that there is probably near-universal agreement within the CDC that smoking is an undesirable (maybe even "gross") activity (associated with low levels of educational attainment).

On the other hand, they all fly in airplanes. They attach little or no moral weight to flying. Everybody they know flies on airplanes. Etc, etc.

I think it's unlikely that this isn't influencing their language. The risk of smoking, in their view, isn't something to be managed or weighed or compared; rather, smoking is an abhorrent activity that should be stamped out of existence.

How could that possibly not influence how they write about it?

[dahart]

That’s extremely heavy and unfounded speculation on your part. How do you know who flies, or what their morals are, or who they know?? You’re now attempting to move the goal posts to a different playing field entirely. Your beef was over radiation, which has extremely low levels of risk compared to air pollution, not the morals of flying. The questions about the environmental impacts of flying is certainly getting enormous amounts of exposure currently, why do you think people at the CDC are any different from the rest of us in that respect?

You’re still trying to paint a picture of hypocrisy where none exists. The CDC is presenting facts on risks, not moral judgements. The fact is that the risks of smoking are large, it kills many times more people than all causes of flying related mortality combined, and that is the reason there is a lot of information decided to educating people about those risks. Smoking is also one of the easiest things to change, it’s a choice, and it’s a luxury, not necessary for anyone to do. Why not try to reduce it? They’re not judging people who smoke as low class, they’re pointing out correctly that smoking is something that statistically harms people of low SES disproportionately, not just health wise, but financially. The whole idea is to try to help those people escape. It seems strange to me to spend any energy complaining about the CDC’s language of smoking, while ignoring the vast amounts of social damage left in the wake of Big Tobacco.

[dionidium]

I don't care about the morality of flying and I'm not suggesting they should, either. That's the whole point. Of course they use stronger language wrt activities they look down upon than for activities they don't.

And maybe that's as it should be! Again, I am asking people to notice when this happens.

The CDC hasn’t been “politicized,” in other words; their project is intrinsically political.

[dahart]

> their project is intrinsically political

I don’t think that case has been made here, you’re failing to demonstrate it. I disagree that intrinsic politics has anything whatsoever to do with the safety of smoking vs radiation exposure of air travel.

There are times when other people politicize what the CDC says. Your comments here explicitly and repeatedly attempted to politicize the secondhand smoke recommendations. Covid is also one of them, and it seems like you might be dancing around and hoping to implicate Covid politics while trying not to talk about it directly. The CDC has been actively trying to stay out of the politics and simply help people understand the risks and statistics, and what choices they can make to reduce their risks.

> of course they use stronger language wrt activities they look down upon

They don’t look down on any activities. They report safety stats and safety guidelines. The language is stronger when the mortality rates are higher, period.

[dionidium]

You're not the only one here who has suggested I might be trying to make some kind of clandestine point about COVID. I've been on this difference in how the CDC treats these two topics since long before COVID existed and COVID couldn't be further from my mind.

[dahart]

Then I’m sorry. Truly. I was speculating wildly and incorrectly. My apologies.

[kfrane]

It's not a proof but I really enjoyed Zizek's thoughts on how fight against smoking is an ideology :) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r238kp3ar_A

[dahart]

Hehe, I don’t know who this is, but it was fun to watch. “I’m a kind of Stalinist fascist ... if I take drugs, then I become passive, and enemies can attack!” LOL!

So, the argument he didn’t even attempt to address in his comparison of smoking to other drugs is that smoking hurts other people directly, while other drugs don’t. The primary reason we have rules against smoking in public is it’s effects on people nearby who are not choosing to smoke. This entire thread was about secondhand smoke, and Zizek didn’t address it.

Similarly, the reasons we have some regulations on smoking in private, and the entire reason we have regulations on drugs is because of the direct damage it does, statistically, to the users, and to the indirect damage it does to other people. For the minority of bad cases, hospital visits for overdoses and car accidents, social services for addicts or their children, rehab, and loss of jobs are real issues. For the larger majority there are still measurable effects on drug users’ lifespans and on the economy.

We are a collective and have no choice about that. We have some shared resources that we need to agree on. If you want to enjoy freedoms, you have to respect other people’s freedoms. Where’s my freedom to breathe clean air if you smoke near me? (I happen to have some athsma, the risks to me of secondhand smoke are greater than mild exposure to carcinogens.)

So yeah, not only is it not a proof, it’s not even a reason to buy the argument that anti-smoking sentiment is ideological. To prove that it’s ideology, you need to demonstrate that smoking is safe.