To reduce the no. of smokers, one friend at a time. Consent is the key to unlock the habit, not preaching information or making moralistic judgments.
Kick His Butt
Everyone, especially smokers, are well aware of the adverse effects of smoking cigarettes on a person's health. For those who are less aware can scroll over the details here - http://www.cancer.org/Cancer/CancerCauses/TobaccoCancer/CigaretteSmoking/index.
Worst thing about it is that its a slow killer which does not have immediate ill effects, which is exactly why it becomes a part of a person's lifestyle, routine and habit.
Also, smokers don't get socially ostracised like drug addicts or alcoholics and more often, form exclusive groups of their own that end up seeming socially aspirational for others.
Despite the wealth of information in books, news, articles and even cigarette packets, the rate of smoking doesn't seem to have gone down. At best, society and the government have been only successful to separate the smokers from the non-smokers to at least save the latter category from the effects, which are actually worse.
Your friends whose lives and lungs you care so much about! :)
Kick the Butt campaign is aimed at friends of smokers to discretely help their buddies give up smoking as a habit in their own pace and terms and act as a support group to prevent relapses. We typically witness friends, family and society berating smokers with all the 'supreme' medical knowledge to give up the habit.
Smoking usually starts out as a phase typically in the teenage years that snowball into lifestyle in the twenties and habit by the thirties. Given that the life expectancy is around 60-70 years, most people start thinking of quitting by their twenties and thirties.
Whatever age your friend may be, if she or he has talked about quitting, you can consensually get him or her into taking a decision, an oath and help them to keep it.
Share this among those friends you know who are quitting and/or helping others to quit. Don't spam this on a smoker's wall as it will invite negative attention (read, flagging/spamming) to the campaign.
Besides deeper and newer information on the ill effects of smoking, this campaign can be a place where people can share tips, rehabilitation programmes, support group stories, personal experiences and healthy alternatives for everyone to take, apply and add to over time.
Be the first one to share something.
