XPost: alt.smokers, alt.smokers.cigars, alt.smokers.pipes   
   XPost: misc.legal   
   From: theprof@jonez.net   
      
   French smoking ban marks cultural change   
   By JAMEY KEATEN, Associated Press WriterMon Jan 15, 3:11 AM ET   
      
   Imagine French cafes free of cigarette smoke, without smoldering butts or ash   
   underfoot.   
      
   The prospect — an imminent reality — raises a question that smoker and   
   philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre might have enjoyed contemplating: Will France   
   still   
   be France without widespread smoking in public?   
      
   A new ban on smoking in French offices and other public buildings begins next   
   month and will ensnare bars, cafes, restaurants, hotels and casinos from 2008   
   onward.   
      
   France is following the lead of other European countries such as Ireland, Italy   
   or Spain. But kicking the habit here won't be easy. Even though the number of   
   smokers is declining, cigarettes for many remain as much a part of the French   
   art of living as wine and fatty foods.   
      
   "It's very worrisome," award-winning author and smoker Maurice Druon said of   
   the   
   ban. "For four centuries, tobacco was a wonderful thing ... It was said to be   
   the 'holy herb,' and now it's been decreed as horrifying."   
      
   The French connection to smoking runs deep. The word "cigarette" is French —   
   the   
   diminutive of cigar. "Nicotine" comes from the name of Jean Nicot, a French   
   ambassador who first shipped tobacco home from Portugal in the 16th century.   
      
   But the addiction carries a heavy price: Some 65,000 French people die each   
   year   
   from smoking-related illness or effects of second-hand smoke.   
      
   While the ban will mark an important health and cultural shift for France, the   
   country has in fact been gradually weaning itself off smokes for years.   
      
   In the 1950s, about three of every four French men smoked, though far fewer   
   women did. Now, just a quarter of the French do — roughly on par with their   
   counterparts in Britain, Italy and Germany, according to statistics agency   
   Eurostat.   
      
   Since 2003, when President Jacques Chirac first declared "war on tobacco," the   
   government has jacked up taxes, raising the average price of cigarettes by   
   about   
   50 percent to $6.66 per pack.   
      
   Starting in February, the ministry will give would-be quitters $66 coupons   
   redeemable for the purchase of nicotine patches, chewing gum or lozenges.   
      
   A key question is whether authorities will succeed in enforcing the new ban. A   
   1991 reform that ordered restaurants and bars to set up smoking and nonsmoking   
   sections — some of the toughest anti-smoking measures at the time in Europe —   
   is   
   widely ignored.   
      
   "If this decree is applied, the stage is set for pitched battles," said Michel   
   Burton, president of The Collective of Lovers of the Art of Living, a group of   
   bon vivants who are seeking ways to fight the ban in court.   
      
   But nonsmokers are looking forward to clearing the air.   
      
   "Smoke bothers everybody, and it's a sign of the times that it's now on the way   
   out," said Gregory Mathies, a 27-year-old technology consultant sipping a cola   
   in a Paris cafe.   
      
   "There was such mythology around the cigarette that just doesn't exist   
   anymore,"   
   added Mathies, a former smoker himself. "It's not 'good riddance' exactly, but   
   rather 'no regrets.'"   
      
      
      
   --   
   Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)