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I don't think the smoking thing is a great comparison... But it is certainly one of those things that tons of studies have been done on, and as we all know studies are inherently flawed in that they only use a sample of the population. Trust me, if you have asthma, you don't need a study to tell you second hand smoke is bad... Not to mention the smell! Yuck.

The smell, the stigma and the political incorrectness of tobacco make it a very easy target. The Surgeon General recently put out a fatwa against second hand smoke that depends on the same studies that have been faulted previously for their lack of scientific rigor. Like global warming, the secondhand smoke jihad is not held to the same standards most areas of investigation must meet. And, also like global warming, anyone questioning the validity of the anti smoking crowds arguments is accused of the basest of motives while they portray themselves as saintly paragons of public virtue. I’m not saying secondhand smoke is good for you, or that there are no negative effects. But the studies conducted as of the middle of last year either did not prove causation of the negative effects they cited or were seriously flawed from a statistical viewpoint. So sayeth several statisticians I have spoken to and also a statistics professional journal they cited. I am not a statistician, a researcher, a cigarette smoker and actually have no dog in this fight. I am, however, a skeptic and deeply suspicious of anyone who wants to modify my, or anyone else’s behavior for our own good.

We all like to think of ourselves as rugged individualists. But when push comes to shove most of us are sheep who do what we are told. Worst of all, a lot of us become unpaid agents of whoever is controlling the agenda by enforcing the current dogma on the few rugged individualists who actually exist.