Smoking should be banned

Rebuttal"You provide no examples of this, so this point is invalid." [referring to other ways of reducing smoking other than a ban]I did, to quote my last argument: "In the last 40 or so years there has been a significant pushback against smoking by both governments and NGOs" and I cited the reduction in smoking rates associated with the pushback against them."Again, examples please." [referring to reasonable legal restrictions]Here I specifically cited the "Smoking, Health and Social Care (Scotland) Act 2005" (btw that link may be broken) and elaborated by explaining: "Where I live (Scotland) it's illegal to smoke in most places where anyone could conceivably cause problems with second hand smoke and this has lead to most people smoking in their homes or in places where they would never possibly pass smoke onto anyone. This means that they smoke in the places where people would likely smoke with a smoking ban in place however it has several benefits:1. It's much easier to get treatment because it isn't criminal to smoke.2. Packaging legislation can be introduced (such as the current campaign in Australia where cigarette packets carry pictures of the damage of smoking).3. The rebellious attraction of the use of illegal drugs isn't present leading to lower smoking rates among young people. 4. People who above anything else need help to get off smoking aren't criminalized. Something that we have seen fail in the war on drugs where the problem hasn't been addressed (see previous sources) and the prison population has hugely expanded.""You also state that banning smoking will be harmful. How?"Well as I said past examples of prohibition have lead to increases or plateau in the consumption of drugs, a significant increase in gang activity and a reduction in the ability of people to seek treatment [1] (see previous sources).That means no decrease in smoking."If you smoke in your house alone, you hurt yourself. How can a government allow that?"Because we don't live in a fascist society. We understand that a society with totalitarian restrictions on individual liberty is a society that we don't want to live in. Also these restrictions are ineffective as I have previously shown."If someone has kids, but smokes outside, it's a terrible role model and the kids could lose their Mom or Dad. If they smoke indoors or outside in the presence of others, both parties get harmed. None of these are good situations, therefore there are no "reasonable" restrictions on smoking."There are no alternatives here, banning smoking wouldn't stop this."If the ban went into effect, tobacco plantations would grow other crops, and we would no longer import it."It's interesting because despite cannabis being criminal in the UK there's been a substantial increase in domestic the production of the drug. The same thing would likely happen if smoking was banned."Cigarettes, pipes, and cigars would no longer be sold, therefore most people would no longer able to smoke."Of course they would be sold. It's incredibly easy to make something that could be used as a pipe with just basic woodworking knowledge and access to the internet [2] and rolling paper alternatives are very easy to come by [3]."Unless people turn to illegal methods, which many wouldn't, then smoking rates would drop to less then a percent."I love how you provide no evidence for this. No there are no serious examples of prohibition which have made any substantial long term impact on the rates of drug consumption and many that have increased the rates of drug consumption [4] and in fact drug legalization can lower drug consumption [5]. Remember people would turn to illegal methods, smoking is an addication not something you choose to do."Also, you would not be arrested if caught smoking; you would get fined every time you are caught."And this would help? At the very least this is regressive taxation and at the most you would be encouraging theft by removing money that addicts would use to fund their addiction to the now ridiculously expensive tobacco [6]."If you are addicted, then you can go to rehab with tobacco companies paying for you."This already happens in the UK through taxes on tobacco making enough money for rehabilitation programs. I suspect it also happens in most developed countries. But that isn't even the questionable part of this statement. There is not way on earth that you could get tobacco companies to pay for rehabilitation in a country that they don't operate in due to a ban.Conclusion If tobacco was banned it would lead to:Drug gangsDecreased treatmentNo long term decrease in smokingAnd other measures similar to the "Smoking, Health and Social Care Scotland Act 2005" would more than take care of the worst excesses of smoking. In addition propaganda by government and NGOs has shown to be more than effective enough in the reduction of smoking in ways that banning tobacco just wouldn't.[1] http://alcoholrehab.com...[2] [3] [4]http://3.bp.blogspot.com...[5] http://s3.amazonaws.com...[6] http://www.bloomberg.com... (my point here being that cannabis prices were ridiculously inflated by prohibition and the same would happen for tobacco)