Cigarettes should be banned

Counter-arguments “The / A government role is to ensure the well being of it's citizens, and make the best calls regarding their welfare.” This is a faulty premise. As shown in my appeal to liberty argument, people have the natural right to make dangerous choices. It can be argued that unless people are hurting others (arguably second hand smoke, but that is not every case) then their rights should not be infringed upon. Cigs) Again, people have the right to make dangerous choices (heading: A3). The argument made there has largely been dropped, too. Some people also take a lot of enjoyment out of smoking. “Tobacco alone causes over 5 million deaths yearly…” My opponent has quoted a worldwide statistic. This exaggerates the claim. For example, in Australia 1 million occur each year. Australia’s population is ~23 million. If the world population is 7 billion, then it can be assumed that 304 million people are injured via sport. Second hand effects) Parents should not smoke around their children. There is no argument here that necessitates the banning of cigarettes. Just like it should be illegal to give children alcohol, it should be illegal to smoke near children. “Just in the US alone second hand smoke causes 34,000 deaths from heart attacks and 7,300 from lung cancer.” People can always move away from the smokers. If they cannot, there are usually laws in place that create a smoke-free zone (such as certain pubs or university campuses). If people want to hang around the smoke and be negatively affected, then that is their choice. Re-Rebuttals A1 I am dropping this argument to focus on the ones which won me the debate. A2 Again, dropping. A3 My opponent completely ignores the latter of my argument. The appeals to liberty and the comparison to sport are therefore dropped and are enough for me to win the debate. “Their is a fundamental difference between using a product for what it's intended to be used for, and having an accident. Car's are not made with the knowledge they are knowingly going to kill (x) amount of people.” There really is not. As I showed, the statistics indicate that we can predict how many people will die in car accidents. There is no question as to whether driving can cause you to die. Besides, even if the intent to kill is not there, that does not make the people who die less dead. A4 “but if you ban them it's safe to assume you can reduce the death count from possibly 8 million to 1 million, or half a million in the us to 100,00 thousand.” This is a guess. With Marijuana and alcohol, people still used it in huge numbers despite it being banned. The banning of something does not stop people from using it, plus it opens black markets and drug cartels. “Banning things always results in the product being harder to get.” My examples given (particularly the marijuana) render this inaccurate in the long-run. “Take gun bans for example…” Guns are different because they can instantly kill someone, whereas smoking cannot. For example, you could accidentally kill something with a gun, yet you could not accidentally kill someone with cigarettes in the same way. Conclusion: why you should vote for me Cigarettes are a harm that people choose, not one which is forced. Similar to sports, which is a point my opponent completely dropped, there are positives to be found in smoking, or else people would not do it. Again, this is people’s liberty at stake. Also, drug cartels and black markets result from banning things, which is also a serious problem that my opponent has no real answer to, partially due to his/her gun example being non-congruent. Finally, my opponent, I think, has shown that there should be restrictions on cigarettes (i.e. not smoking in the presence of babies), but an outright ban infringes on people’s liberties and encourages illegal trade. Thus, my ultimate argument is that restrictions are a good idea, a ban is going too far. Resolution negated.Thank you for reading :)