Make Tobacco Great Again

Satsminded
20 min readDec 30, 2022

Memory from childhood: grab Mom’s Marlboro Golds when she wasn’t looking, run to sink, turn on water, and make them unusably wet.

At 13, my moral stance on smoking — as stunted as it was- had already become established. What had shaped me?

The idea that smoking is incredibly harmful to health is as obvious as air and water to most Americans. But I can promise you that the rest of the world (except formerly wonderful New Zealand who has outlawed smoking entirely) is much less scared of smoking than we Americans are. Maybe it’s our puritanical roots that were leveraged to cast tobacco as the sacrificial scapegoat of disease.

Nevermind the soybean oils.

Regardless, tobacco use is as old as civilization and will continue likely through the end of civilization.

I’m not a die hard smoker and don’t even smoke daily. But I do enjoy tobacco in its most popular forms- cigar, pipe, snuff, chew (between the toes) cigarettes, and hookah if I have the chance.

I’m fascinated by the other side of things- and tobacco presents an incredible story. This plant alone was the foundation of America’s economy, bootstrapping the “new world”. For thousands of years this plant has delighted.

You think the story of tobacco is over?

I’m also standing up for the underdog (yes, smokers are discriminated against).

Further, I’ve always been interested with psychoactive plants, of which tobacco is a very important one. You even could say the tobacco spirit has a hold of me, but instead of compelling me to chain smoking daily, it drives me to speak out.

I’ve been sharing these pro-tobacco ideas for the past year. This article covers three of them.

  1. We start with questions of tolerance and freedom with the writing of UK activist Josie Appleton, and particularly her essay 40 Years of Hurt.
  2. We’ll look at the purported health benefits of smoking tobacco. Important disclaimer: I’m not claiming that smoking is without potential harms, or that everyone should do it, only that you should read what I’ve found.
  3. Finally, we finish with a small bit on the psychological and spiritual significance of tobacco.

Part 1: Tolerance, Freedom, and the Activist State.

At the root of the smoking issue is the “hyper-regulation of everyday life” as the writer and activist Josie Appleton puts it. When thinking deeply on the issue she found the same patterns in other areas, primarily the erosion of principles of individual autonomy and the state incursion upon informal social spaces and private life.

‘Smoking,’ she says, ‘is the canary for civil liberties.’

I found her essay on the FOREST website. FOREST (Freedom Organization for the Right to Enjoy Smoking Tobacco) was founded in 1979, as the war against smoking was accelerating, to support and defend adults who choose to smoke. They campaign against excessive regulations including comprehensive smoking bans and unnecessary government intrusion into people’s personal lives and private spaces.

I felt the best way to convey these ideas was relying on Appleton’s own words. Here are excerpts (in the form of questions from me) from her essay 40 Years of Hurt:

Josie, why do you focus on smoking in your activism?

In no other area has the elite project for the domination of civil society been so surely and openly stated. In this sense smoking is the canary for civil liberties. Measures that have been rolled out in smoking will be copied and pasted into other areas of life, as occurs when policy develops in an independent and internally networked arena.

How has the state’s approach to smoking changed over the past few decades?

The trajectory of the regulation of smoking shows a progression from public information in the Sixties and Seventies, to regulation based on ideological passive smoking in the Nineties and Oughts, to the current phase (since 2010) of direct coercion. This pattern of events shows the progressive extension of control and the disregarding of autonomy, but it was not until the last decade that this could be exercised openly and people could openly be coerced ‘for their own good’…A similar development can be found in many other areas. For example, in the area of food regulation there has been a shift from public information about nutrition and healthy eating to the imposition of state targets for the quantity of sugar or calories to be contained in particular items.

What philosophical principles are being violated with the State’s approach to smoking?

There are three interconnected principles that form the basis of individual freedom and tolerance.

The first principle is virtue and authority of individual autonomy.

The second principle is tolerance, which means allowing the other person freedom to express their views or follow certain practices even if these conflict with your own.

The third principle is the harm principle. This is the legal principle concerning the legitimate use of state coercion that emerges from the former principles. This means that a person should never be forced or pressured to change their course of action because a different course is thought to be better or more beneficial for them. Put another way, people should not be coerced ‘for their own good’ because they — as the owner of body and mind, and author of their life — are the best and only legitimate judge of what is good for them.

What is this unaccountable “Officialdom” you talk about?

Today’s new officialdom is more isolated than the old, which was rooted in social life through networks of institutions that stretched down to every neighbourhood, and founded in common beliefs and practices. By contrast the new officialdom is largely separate from society. Rather than reflect social mores it is an activist state that imposes policies upon people and acts upon them as if they were so much material for its policy projects. Rather than reflect public opinion or serve the public, the new officialdom has an autonomous existence. It has become (as I described it in my book Officious) a ‘state structure for itself’, separated from and set against civil society.

How does this structure show up in regards to smoking?

The new coercive and intolerant state policy has been possible only because of the formation of a new anti-smoking infrastructure, a network of semi-independent bodies, linked together in collaborations and alliances, and sharing a common supply of state funding…

The formation of this anti- smoking network represents a new kind of state.

The state is taking on a new form, which is as a network of semi-independent client bodies who play the role of demanding and affirming coercive policies. These bodies are funded with public money but they are also pressure groups, lobbying the government to change policy or complaining that the government has not gone far enough. It means that public policy appears not to be born out of itself but to come from public demand since it is called for and affirmed by apparently independent groups and institutions…

It is this institutional development that has made possible the recent coercive phase of anti-smoking policy, and particularly the open disregard for public opinion and the attempt to mould public norms and practices…

With the policy of ‘denormalisation’ (of smoking) it is quite clear that this is an elite imposition on society, not reflecting society’s norms, but attempting to change them for its own. This elite project of norm-construction is a new development, a sign of an age where the state draws authority from itself.

Why do so many people hate smokers?

There is no rational explanation for the pariah status of smoking. The effects of smoking are not inherently antisocial. Unlike other drugs, smoking does not screw up your mind or ruin your memory. It does not leave you pasted on the floor or mumbling at the ceiling. A smoker is a perfectly functioning member of society. They can do their job well and be a good parent to their kids. Nicotine itself is not harmful and people can find its effects beneficial to their lives, allowing them to stay calm and focussed, which helps them work better.

When 15 per cent (one in seven) of the population continues to smoke, one would expect for sensible provision to be made for them to practice their habit comfortably and conveniently. Instead, what we have seen since the 1980s, and particularly since 2000s, is that smoking policy has become detached from public opinion. It no longer reflects public opinion but rather is produced by an isolated state structure and imposed upon the population. The intolerance directed towards smoking is that of an anti-smoking lobby and state structure, whereas the general public has consistently shown itself to be more tolerant and more open to common sense accommodation of smoking in social life.

The smoking ban has also changed public sensitivity to smoke, at a purely environmental level. While we non-smokers once happily entered smoky pubs, now our nose twitches at the slightest whiff of tobacco smoke. What was once normal has become noticeable and, for some, offensive.

links to the essay

https://forestonline.org/html/pdf/Forest-40-Years-of-Hurt.pdf

Part 2: The Health Question of Tobacco Revisited

“Modern science has been a voyage into the unknown, with a lesson in humility waiting at every stop. Many passengers would rather have stayed home.”

-Carl Sagan

Search “health benefits of tobacco” and you’ll be met with a seemingly inexhaustible list of official government websites and government-funded NGOs that make the case against smoking tobacco. These sites communicate in lockstep with one another, creating a perceptual border wall over the topic.

But like any good story, there is more to it than the first 10 pages of google.

Again, I’m not claiming tobacco is without risk. I personally believe (and experience) medicinal qualities from the plant. And here I’m solely counter-information in a debate that most assume is over...

This next section, with points and scientific studies that inspired questions in me about the outright demonization of smoking is something that ant-smokers should consider. For the smokers out there, maybe this well help you..

breathe easier…

(Excerpts from Smoke Screens by Richard White, 2009)

How does social class impact the Science on the dangers of smoking?

There is a very definite class-divide when it comes to tobacco users, with most cigarette smokers tending to come from the lower classes, and pipe and cigar smokers tending to be from the upper classes.

It is no secret, of course, that those from the lower classes have less money, more physical and often more dangerous jobs (such as factory work or working with chemicals), worse lifestyles and diets than those in the upper classes, and tend to have poorer healthcare.

Statistically, then, showing that cigarette smokers contract lung cancer more than non-smokers really shows that people from lower social classes are more likely to get lung cancer.

Actually, people with a lower socio-economic status are more likely to die younger anyway, lung cancer or not.

What causes these people to be at more risk is not known entirely, given the number of possible factors such as stress, lifestyle, dangerous jobs, poor diet etc., but what we can say, based on this evidence, is that showing cigarette smokers to have a statistically increased risk of lung cancer shows nothing when we consider who the bulk of the cigarette smokers are.

In short, those figures really tell us that people with a low socio-economic status are at higher risk than people with a high social-economic status — smokers or not.

Is tobacco “addiction” a real thing?

There is a difference between ‘habit’ and ‘addiction’: physical addiction is where a substance is needed for the body to function properly, hence a heroin user suffering horrible withdrawal symptoms — the drug has become needed for regular functioning. Smokers may be psychologically addicted, where they are duped into believing they need to smoke to function properly, but in reality abstaining from smoking will not result in the body breaking down. Furthermore, smokers tend to have a pattern to when they smoke e.g. first thing in the morning or after a meal etc, which is why it is hard to cease smoking — it is a daily habit with a particular routine; to break any habit is not easy.

Are chemical additives behind the purported dangers of smoking?

Whilst there is, indeed, an extensive list of additives (in cigarettes), the first thing to point out is that not all of them are artificial chemicals. For example, water is also added as is, in certain brands, sugar and certain oils such as coriander. Secondly, whilst there are chemical additives, they make up a minute amount of the cigarette: most artificial chemicals and additives constitute 0.0001% of the cigarette. Given the size and weight of a cigarette, it is very obvious that 0.0001% amounts to practically nothing.

One of the most popular counter-arguments to this is the idea that the chemicals become more harmful when burnt, a notion that seems sound in theory but in practice has not been demonstrated.

As a matter of fact, animals are routinely used in testing chemicals to see how they affect them and could possibly affect humans. Rodents, in particular, are very similar in physiology to us and what is bad for them tends to be bad for us, and vice versa.

However, to this day, no one has managed to induce lung cancer in animals with tobacco products despite using tobacco products sold for commercial use i.e. with all the additives and chemicals present.

So why do people smoke? According to the experience of many, smoking is pleasurable, relaxing, energizing, stimulating, calming and more. Indeed it must be beneficial since it’s captured the minds of so many throughout history. (The Pleasure of Smoking, a survey on committed smokers).

Of course, indigenous use of tobacco in the treatment of disease has a long history in the Americas. Unfortunately, the political agenda against tobacco has obscured and dis-incentivized modern research on the possibility that tobacco can be beneficial.

But, studies on health and tobacco can turn up positive findings, sometimes to the surprise of the researchers…

MAOI’s, Tobacco Smoke, Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s

It has been known for quite some time that smokers have far lower rates of Parkinson’s disease and Alzheimer’s disease, and studies show that smoke contains monoamine oxidase inhibitors (MAOIs) which are used in treatment of Parkinson’s.

In the March 20th 2007 edition of Science News, Megan Rauscher wrote of a study showing that there is a temporal relationship between smoking and reduced risk of Parkinson’s disease — the study found the protective effect wanes after smokers give up.

https://www.reuters.com/article/healthNews/idUSCOL06339920070320

The study was published in the March 6th 2007 edition of Neurology, and researcher Evan Thacker, from Harvard School of Public Health, stated:

It is not our intent to promote smoking as a protective measure against Parkinson’s disease. Obviously smoking has a multitude of negative consequences. Rather, we did this study to try to encourage other scientists…to consider the possibility that neuroprotective chemicals may be present in tobacco leaves.

Preeclampsia and Smoking

Pooled data from cohort and case-control studies showed a lower risk of preeclampsia associated with cigarette smoking during pregnancy. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0002937899703418.

Hypertension and Smoking

Smoking is associated with a reduced risk of hypertension during pregnancy. The protective effect appears to continue even after cessation of smoking. Further basic research on this issue is warranted. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/10601921/

Endometrial and Smoking

The findings provide insight into disease etiology and suggest that the influence of smoking on endometrial cancer risk occurs even in early adulthood, is long-lasting, and may not be attributed solely to short-term hormonal modulation. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15645490/

Osteoarthritis and Smoking

This study demonstrates… a negative association between smoking and osteoarthritis. https://academic.oup.com/rheumatology/article-abstract/32/5/366/1781705

SOD Antioxidant and Smoking

The mean value of superoxide dismutase activity was significantly higher in the smoking group (P < 0.001), while no detectable activity level was found in nonsmokers. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20375945/

Chronic smoke exposure in humans or hamsters causes increased SOD and CAT activities in lungs. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/2310098/

Tobacco as MAO inhibitor (MAOI inhibiting drugs are marketed as anti-depressants, btw)

“The amount of the enzyme, called monoamine oxidase (MAO), is reduced by 30 to 40 percent in the brains of smokers, compared to nonsmokers or former smokers, the brain scans show. The reduction in brain MAO levels may result in an increase in levels of dopamine” https://archives.drugabuse.gov/news-events/nida-notes/1998/07/tobacco-smoke-may-contain-psychoactive-ingredient-other-than-nicotine

Further speculation on tobacco and MAOI

(excerpt from the book Smoke Screens):

There is a theoretical physicist who regularly posts on forums such as speakeasy.com (early internet forum, now defunct) under the name ‘Nightlight’, and who has conducted huge amounts of research looking at the hard science of smoking. (S)he comments on smokers having a reduced MAOI B enzyme — with smokers in their sixties having MAOI B enzyme levels of people in their twenties.

Most interestingly, this is not the result of nicotine but another, as yet unknown, compound within tobacco. A pharmaceutical drug named Deprenyl became very popular in life-expansion circles and it mimics the MAOI B inhibition of tobacco smoke, as well as being used in treatment of Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s. The theoretical physicist goes on to say how long term tobacco smoking also blocks the peripheral MAOI B also by almost halving its levels, thus keeping organs decades younger from middle age; and then shows photos of a 122 year old smoker Jeanne Louise Calment and ninety year old chain-smoker Deng Xiaoping.

Also posted on the forum link are photo scans of a smoker and non-smokers body, comparing the MAOI B levels.

The same theoretical physicist also speaks of how glutathione, the body’s chief antioxidant and metal detoxifier, as well as many other antioxidants and detoxifiers, are strengthened with smoking and provides a link to a study which I have also referenced.

The study found that: Compared with nonsmokers, cigarette smokers had 80% higher levels of ELF total glutathione, 98% of which was in the reduced form.

https://journals.physiology.org/doi/abs/10.1152/jappl.1987.63.1.152?ijkey=3ea8cff64c6d72a42e1d4ef7cf9f6fd2485e5921&keytype2=tf_ipsecsha

Mucus, Lung Function and Smoking

(Excerpt from Smoke Screens)

Many people reject any notion that smoking can have positive effects because they experience a decrease in lung function — or, at least, believe they are experiencing such a decrease. In reality, this ‘breathlessness’ is caused by excess mucous production, stimulated by smoking, hence ‘smoker’s cough’. This is not a bad thing, in fact it is quite the opposite — by increasing mucous production, the body is then excreting various toxins from the lungs, and the mucous layer adds protection against harmful, penetrating toxins or carcinogens.

The Semai people of Malaysia are actually encouraged to start smoking at age two, before they can even talk. All personal ethics aside, this does serve irreplaceable as a case study, for if smoking lowered lung capacity and so forth, the Semai people would be all but useless by about age twenty. However, Dr. C. Y. Caldwell examined 12,000 people, including chest X-rays, to determine what effects this habit of lifelong smoking was doing to them. Their paper, printed on February 26th 1977 in the BMJ, stated that of the 12,000 Semai examined, there was not a single case of lung cancer.

Smoking and Ptyregium

The results of this meta-analysis show that cigarette smoking was associated with a reduced risk of pterygium, especially in current smokers. This effect may be independent of UV exposure and sex. https://iovs.arvojournals.org/article.aspx?articleid=2166381

Associative Learning and Smoking

In this study, post-trial nicotine, obtained through smoking a cigarette, improved free recall of lists of unrelated words under conditions which limited the opportunity for associative learning. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/1410158/

Smoking and Attention

Nicotine improves attention in a wide variety of tasks and immediate and longer term memory in healthy volunteers. Nicotine improves attention in patients with probable Alzheimer’s Disease. https://www.gwern.net/docs/nicotine/1992-warburton.pdf

Smoking and Cases of Longevity

Chinese cigarettes have beautiful packaging

“Zhang Shuqing, a centenarian in Pixian, Sichuan, has his own secret for long life — smoking every day and drinking liquor after every meal. Zhang, whose daughter died eight years ago, turned 100 on May 7. He lives with his nephew Zhang Chenggui. Zhang senior said he started smoking and drinking strong liquor when he was in his early 20s. Since then, he has smoked every day and taken a drink with every meal. According to his grandson Xu, Zhang has consumed 15 tons of liquor and more than a ton of tobacco in his lifetime. Zhang, who is in good health, has a huge appetite, with a standard meal comprising two chicken legs, a bowl of steamed pork fat and glutinous rice, vegetables and fruit. And he eats the lot in less than 20 minutes.” https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2007-05/21/content_877131.htm

“On August 28th 2006, ABC News reported on the world’s oldest man: a 115 year old Puerto Rican named Emiliano Mercado del Toro. When the United States seized Puerto Rico from Spain in 1898, Emiliano was six years old. We are also told that he smoked for seventy-six years, quitting at the age of ninety. It is interesting to note that here is a man who started at fourteen and smoked for seventy-six years. Furthermore, when Emiliano started smoking, there were no filters. If he started smoking in 1916, aged fourteen, he would not have smoked a filtered cigarette until the 1950s or 1960s, meaning he smoked for forty or fifty years without a filter — something we are told helped lower the rates of smoke-induced lung cancer.” https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna14458548

“J. McMorran, 113; Oldest Man in U.S., 5th-Oldest Ever. McMorran actually gave up alcohol in his 50s, younger relatives said, but he used tobacco — chewing, smoking a pack of cigarettes a day, or his pipe — until he was 97.” https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2003-feb-27-me-mcmorran27-story.html

Milton Berle

“Milton Berle died aged ninety-three from colon cancer. The San Francisco Chronicle featured an article on March 28th 2002 on his death,285 and one paragraph stated His trademark cigar rarely left his hand. In an interview two years ago, Berle said he’d smoked cigars since he was 12. “I figure if George Burns can smoke 20 cigars a day his whole life and live to be 100, why should I worry if they’re bad for me?”

Jeanne Calment

“The world’s oldest woman, Jeanne Calment, died aged 122. She began smoking as a young woman but gave up at the age of 117 because she had gone blind and was too proud to ask someone to light her cigarette often. She started smoking again when she was 118 because not smoking made her miserable. For lunch, she’d have braised beef, eschewing the healthier fish options, and a cigarette, with a glass of Port.” https://allthatsinteresting.com/jeanne-calment

“Marie-Louise Meilleur of Canada died aged 116. She chain-smoked all her adult life, with her grandson saying “she always had a cigarette dangling from her lips as she worked”, as reported in the Miami Herald, 15th August 1997. She stopped smoking when she was almost 100, although we would be told that she was lucky to smoke and live that long.

George Cook

“George Cook was Britain’s oldest man and he died in his sleep aged 108. Houston Chronicle, 29th September 1997, stated that he “smoked heavily for 85 years before giving up tobacco at the age of 97.”

Finally, a CBS documentary from the 70’s profiling the lifestyle of Abkhazian centenarians (heavy smokers)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SD2VYFKiRhs

Excerpts on Tobacco and Spirit

Everything we ingest into our bodies effects us. In this sense, everything is a drug. Sometimes food gives us energy, satisfaction, and calmness, while other times it leads to disgust and regret.

We all know alcohol (spirits) bring out energies that normally stay dormant.

Plants provide us with many opportunities for altered experience. Coffee and tea energize many people who drink them. By selecting high caffeine beans, or by controlling the roast, certain tastes and caffeine levels can be achieved. Cannabis, mushrooms, and others will bring even more perceptual and physical changes to your door.

And this is just the tip of the iceberg.

So why would the plant, tobacco, be any different? In my own experience, tobacco energizes when I’m low, or calms when I’m stressed. It’s a subtle assistant. And I’m glad to know it.

To wrap up this piece, here are two excerpts on the nature of tobacco from Tolma and the late Dale Pendell.

Excerpt from Tolma’s thread:

With Native populations of the Americas, tobacco is often referred to as the ‘Ancient one’, and its role is the one of a teacher or a plant to consult.

Before a healer would seek to treat a patient, he would first consult the tobacco plant, which would give him greater insight into the needs of the patient. It is not so much a medicine, as it is a plant that gives one insight into medicine. In general, tobacco is said to connect one to the great Spirit of the universe, to give one greater clarity and insight. This is no wonder, as nicotine has been associated with greater focus and insight. There is a reason there is the stereotype of the smoking writer, artist, or the computer programmer nerd high on nicotine-gum, and it isn’t just cultural.

In all, tobacco is a very Apollonian plant, associated with reason, problem-solving, clarity, order. It helps one see the order of the universe, and thus one is better able to guide one’s actions. It is a plant that carries one upwards, through the head, towards Spirit. If you smoke (natural) tobacco, you feel this too. It is a sharp and clear sensation in the throat, an immediate activation of the head, and a resulting energy of focus.

With shamanic traditions which use psychedelic substances such as Ayahuasca, the psychedelic journey is often pre-ceded and accompanied throughout by the smoking of tobacco. The shaman will smoke tobacco and blow the smoke on all the participants in the ceremony. The purpose of this is to offer spiritual guidance throughout the Ayahuasca journey. Ayahuasca has a very earthy, feminine, and Dionysian energy to it. Often referred to as ‘mother ayahuasca’, connecting one to the Divine Mother, it is a substance of the body, the emotions, and the earth. The more logical energy of the tobacco is thus added to guide one through this chthonic chaos.

Tobacco acts as a mediator between humans and gods, protecting the user from negative energies, and keeping his mind set on the divine order. A spirit to guide one through the chaos of the unconscious. For many peoples in the Amazon region, tobacco has a place in their conception of life. As tobacco is conceived as a masculine energy of fire and air, a ‘yang’ energy you could say, it is used to balance with the ‘yin’ aspect of reality.

All life originates from the fertile earth, the divine feminine principle associated with earth and water. To progress from mere biological life to psychical life, this feminine energy must be accompanied by the masculine energy associated with reason, structure, responsibility, and clarity of mind. In this way, tobacco is important in many original rites of passage, to help youth make the passage from a biologically oriented sensuous life, to the life of reason. Tobacco opens up the soul to the life of spirit. Fire and air is blown into matter, and man becomes opened up to the transcendent. Immanent life is made into transcendent being. Tobacco connects earth to sky.

There is also the phenomenon of a ‘tobacco test’ in certain peoples. Youth are made to smoke enormous amounts of tobacco, to see if they are fit to become shamans in the future. If they endure without negative symptoms such as vomiting, they might be fit. The idea is that if one can endure the enormous dose of tobacco, one is probably also able to endure the higher psychical realms.

What I want to draw attention to is the traditional association of tobacco with the principles of fire and air and the masculine/reasonable principle, as opposed to the feminine principles of matter and water. It is the spiritual and reasonable principle that comes to infuse the material and psycho-emotional complex. It is mind that enlivens body. “Mothers give, fathers order.” Strength, mental clarity, purification, protection, and access to Spirit. These are the functions of tobacco.

2.

More to consider from the late, brilliant plant profiler Dale Pendell in his book Pharmako/Poeia, which I’d highly recommend to anyone intrigued by the following “correspondences” with tobacco, or plants in general.

The late, great Dale Pendell. “Tobacco is the great purifier. That is part of its weapon-nature. If you are going to mess with poisons, tobacco is a good plant to be friends with. As an ally, it is fire for fire and earth for earth.”

End.

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