So... why start smoking?

[kinggamecat]

Wait. Wait! I'm not trying to hang shit on smokers here. I ask purely out of curiosity.

So... I understand why people continue to smoke once they have started. Granted, my understanding is only theoretical since I have never personally touched a cigarette, but I understand the basic mechanics of chemical addiction.

But what I do not understand is why someone who is not addicted would start in the first place.

I've asked several real life acquaintances, but they all just shrugged it off or said something like, "I was young and stupid." But those don't strike me as satisfactory answers.

See, if a person started smoking any time in the last 20 years they likely would have known exactly what they were getting into. So long as they were over the age of twelve, they would have known that smoking is addictive. They would have known that cigarettes are expensive. They would have known that they are harmful.

Furthermore, people I know who smoke tell me that the first time they did it, it made them feel sick. Some of them said that they threw up afterwards. Now I would have thought that would be a pretty clear sign that something isn't doing you any good. If I ate some food that made me feel ill I sure as hell wouldn't go back for seconds.

And yet, people still take up smoking.

Why?

My friend, I've asked myself the same damn question countless times. Thanks for posting this forum ^^

 

[ScumbagEddie]

My mother died when I was 10. I started smoking the next day. I continue to smoke so that I'll die long before I get Parkinson's, which does run in my family and is definitely a worse way to go

 

[Moonpig123]

I used to smoke. It's simple. Everybody who ever started did it because they thought it looked cool.

Now that's an incorrect bold statement if I have ever seen one!

Well OK, yes, that was a bit of a blanket statement. But at the very least everyone I'VE ever met who smokes started it because they'd seen it on the movies or whatever and wanted to try it. Stressed? Jerk off. Don't start smoking.

For the record, I have nothing AGAINST smoking, so I was wasn't trying to ***** on any smokers here. As I said, I myself used to do it (as an impressionable teenager who was, again, under the naieve impression that it was what 'cool' people did).

And I still smoke cannabis from time to time, I won't lie. I don't think it's that big a deal, personally. But at least with that you get a good feeling off it; with cigarettes all I ever felt was a little calmer, and as I said before, if you're stressed out, smoking is not the cleverest thing to do to relieve it.

 

[InfiniteSingularity]

I used to smoke. It's simple. Everybody who ever started did it because they thought it looked cool.

Now that's an incorrect bold statement if I have ever seen one!

Well OK, yes, that was a bit of a blanket statement. But at the very least everyone I'VE ever met who smokes started it because they'd seen it on the movies or whatever and wanted to try it. Stressed? Jerk off. Don't start smoking.

For the record, I have nothing AGAINST smoking, so I was wasn't trying to ***** on any smokers here. As I said, I myself used to do it (as an impressionable teenager who was, again, under the naieve impression that it was what 'cool' people did).

And I still smoke cannabis from time to time, I won't lie. I don't think it's that big a deal, personally. But at least with that you get a good feeling off it; with cigarettes all I ever felt was a little calmer, and as I said before, if you're stressed out, smoking is not the cleverest thing to do to relieve it.

If you start smoking because you're stressed, as a stress relief, you're much more likely to develop a dependance - even when you've gone passed the stressed stage, your body will get used to using it as stress relief, making you more stressed. If you do it just cause, without any real reason to need it, you'll probably be less dependant overall.

And I base that on absolutely nothing

And weed is different because it's not addictive, so of course it's less of a deal. And it's pretty awesome too