The Perfect Humanoid Symbol, 14

Smoking is the addiction whose consumption, as an action in itself, is the foulest. Swallowing a pill, drinking a liquid, inhaling a powder, injecting through a needle, irrespective of what poison is being consumed, are rather harmless actions in themselves; a very circumscribed stink or bad taste or upset for the shot, the same that would occur for a medication, is as far as one can get. Quite not the case with smoking. In order to survive, a living body has a need even more basic and vital than water and food and rest, and that is breathing; without water or food or rest it can resist for a day, without breathing it can resist for a minute. That basic is the vital line assaulted by smoking, and smoke is so blatantly an assault in itself whatever poison it carries, that even a child avoids suffocation instinctively, and protests against the absurd of adults doing the very opposite. Sure, men and women alike, youngsters as much as adults, from the heights of their “know best” look down on the little child that tells them, “quit it!” Just as one reaps what one sows, and just as one accuses others of one's own wrongdoings, so the smoker reserves for those who stigmatise him or her that look of pity he or she deserves. Usually, while they pretend to be listening, they also have the nerve to continue doing just that very consumption, undismayed, shameless, and almost automatically as if they were hypnotised, which may well be the case. And sure enough, an individual hypnotised by addiction is the last to know what it’s like to be torn apart by the grief to see a loved one turned into such a hypnotised monster that turns against you to protect the horror as if it was nothing.