Sunday, January 2, 2011

Evolution...or is it?

As I sit here in this swish Bangalore airport lounge trying to find means of staying awake till 4.15 am (the flight got delayed…you know how it is right) I can think of no other means to pass my time than to write this. And since I am not as well connected as some of my peers for whom constant connectivity in the form of a tata photon or a blackberry has become de rigueur, this post may see the light of the day in a few hours from now.

This airport has a non-smoking policy, which means, people who end up waiting here as I do have to make do with the ridiculously expensive coffee served by the CCD outlet here (and there a lot of these in Bangalore!!) or as I have done, use the chewable form of tobacco.

This brings me to the thought, why is all this brouhaha about smoking caught up in the recent years. The central govt. pulling out all stops to ensure that people are discouraged (discouraged mind you…not banned altogether) from smoking. From the innocuous Statutory Warning on cigarette packs, we now have a picture of tarred lungs occupying almost 1/3rd the area of the packet.

This is even more funny if you consider the imported cigarettes that are now available. We have slogans like ‘Smoking damages lungs’ to ‘Smoking causes slow death’. Some TV ads have taken this even further discussing the ill effects of smoking on our virility (in the case of men). Ouch!! That hurt.

If we start to think over it, every little thing in this world, everything that we eat or do has a potential risk of death. Driving can cause death, drinking can cause death which follows a liver failure, over-consumption of tea has known to cause failure of kidneys, even tomatoes have this effect of causing kidney-stones and don’t even get me started on the effects of butter and cheese.

Why is smoking taboo then? If we look at our history, we have the nawabs of Ajmer and Lucknow smoking hukkas, which are more dangerous than the filtered stuff we smoke. Why that, even our older folk, be it our grand mothers or grand fathers smoked or chewed tobacco. We have portraits of American presidents smoking cigars. Che Guevara/ Fidel Castro smoked the all famous Cuban cigars.  There are as of now, to my knowledge, no cases of death by cancer of all these famous personalities.

Is it that these people had some gene combination in them, that prevented these deaths? Are we, inspite of claiming to be more evolved than our predecessors, ultimately a weaker race? Or is it that some random guy just started all this and the highly credulous people that we are, started believing all this talk about death by cancer?

Or is it that the cause of death is something entirely else. It may be the huge amounts of poisonous gases that we discharge into the atmosphere each day through our automobiles, airplanes (ironic..huh!!), trains, fast F1 cars, air conditioners, deodorants, refrigerators etc. the cigarette smoke may just be a catalyst to all this venom that we inhale everyday.
Our forefathers, who after all their smoking led healthy lives and died for reasons as varied as pneumonia to brain hemorrhage had none of this to bear. The reasons of their death are entirely  different than what tobacco is known to cause. Why blame the innocent leaf then?

We have our classical singers, whose red teeth bear testimony to the fact, that even they cannot do without tobacco. That they are alive at 70+ age and showing no signs of having undergone a chemo, goes to show tobacco isn’t that dangerous after all.

It may happen, that my theory (if I choose to call it) may be disproven in the time to come. But as of this date, this time when I am finishing my post and proceeding to the security check, this babble of mine may ring some bells.

It is with this optimism, that smoking once again brings out the beauty in the women and the masculinity in the men like the days of yore, like it did to our on-screen and literary heroes and heroines, I sign off.

Foot note:  Overdoing anything is bad and smoking is no exception.
Ankle note:  according to totally unverified statistics, cigarette consumption has increased in India, in the past     decade. The guys designing the anti-smoking logos…you need to do a better job
Shin note: Underage smoking is absolutely foolish. Grow a beard first, think about smoking next.
Knee note: I totally hate waiting alone. As they say, the devil’s workshop has done its job.  

3 comments:

Yash said...

Bhai u acting like that ostrich who hides its face n thinks that the hunter has left! But then nothing new from a smoke lover. Everyone does that. This is the only discount that you have. Keep doing, but at least don't justify!

Yash said...

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/life-style/health-fitness/health/Heavy-smoking-doubles-dementia-risk/articleshow/6815153.cms

47 said...

@yosha: bhai, i'm not justifying smoking...im questioning the taboo that has been placed over it...and please dont send these scientific fundas...u and i both know the amount of truth contained in them.