So it looks like the British government will be imposing another limit on cigarettes in its ongoing quest to "put the public's health and safety first". They want to ban tobacco displays in a bid to discourage young children and teenagers from lighting up. Many have said that simply hiding it isn't going to do anything since a lot of the time the reason young people start smoking is down to peer pressure. So what difference will it make if they can see the cigarettes or not? They'll still know where to buy them.

Others have seen this as one more decision in a long line of bans that have demonised smokers and drinkers in the UK. Recently, there was a proposal to ban cheap booze in an effort to clamp down on issues of binge-drinking and alcohol-fuelled criminal incidents. But at the end of the day, people are still going to go and drink. Perhaps a little less, but it's doubtful that it'll be as significant a drop as the government are looking for. Making it more expensive is just a quick-fix solution which doesn't tackle those responsible and instead ends up affecting the entire population.

What people are most infuriated about this whole situation is the amount of tax that the government will be receiving on both cigarettes and alcohol. It's as if they're saying, "You're a terrible person for smoking/drinking... but we'll take your money off you anyway"; it's complete hypocrisy. Many state that one of the reasons the government don't introduce an outright ban on smoking is because of the amount of money it provides for the NHS (you can't help but marvel at the irony of that).

I'm sure I'm oversimplifying the financial aspect here since I don't know the ins and outs of the British government's spending, but after reading the BBC article on this, I couldn't help but post something about this to illustrate how different the situation here is. In Brazil, smoking is banned in indoors spaces, just like in the UK. Except that nobody respects it and nobody enforces it. So things haven't changed at all. From a smoker's point of view, you might think it's great that you can still light up in a club or enjoy your cigarette sitting down at a table with a beer, but the smoking ban isn't meant as something that limits your freedom directly, it's supposed to protect non-smokers. For anyone in the UK I'm sure this is an obvious point to make and people are happy to smoke outside (though the cold winter weather of this time of year doesn't exactly help). But there's a much more selfish view here that the ban directly imposes on a person's freedom to smoke wherever he likes, and so he decides he will continue to do so despite it being illegal. It comes down to a lack of respect for each other that Brazilians seem to have, at this level at least. I also can't help but feel bad for anyone in the UK who has to smoke in the freezing cold right now while the Brazilians have blue skies and 30 degree weather with only a slight fall in temperature accompanied by a lovely breeze at night, and still they'll smoke indoors.

So next time you venture outside into the arctic abyss of a British winter night for a quick smoke, just think to yourself that at least you care a little bit more for that non-smoker inside. If that doesn't work, well then, stop smoking.