hi all,
my personal thoughts on this matter.........
i appreciate that there are people who believe that saying e-cigs help people to quit smoking is bad and will lead to a ban, but what those people seem to forget is that the MHRA already have a massive stash of signed confessions from people who told them that they DO help people to quit!
and the thousands of people who told the MHRA that e-cigs help people to quit smoking were actually encouraged to contact them and tell them about it!
what am i talking about i hear you ask!
well, lets back track to February 2010.........myself, Hifi, Smoke2Vape, Grimm green and many, many others all recorded videos to highlight the threat of an upcoming UK ban and urged people to go along to the MHRA website and submit a written statement to express what a terrible effect the banning of e-cigs would have on our lives
for example:-
My vid -
Hifi's vid -
Grimms vid -
and there are tons more too!
my vid has now had 10,000 views, Daves has had 2000 views, Grimms has now had 6000 views etc etc etc..........add all the views together for every video that is asking for people to go along to the MHRA website and it becomes a considerable amount!
granted, only a certain percentage of those viewers would have actually gone to the MHRA website and filled out the form, but even if only 20% of the people did then it still has to be a good few thousand id wager
next, consider the type of statements that people submitted...........do you think they told them that e-cigs have NOT helped them quit smoking, or do you think the vast majority (if not all of them!) told the MHRA that e-cigs HAVE helped them quit smoking??
so basically, people can post what they like about whether e-cigs have or have not helped people quit.........it doesnt matter, the MHRA already have a huge stash of evidence to suggest the majority of people DO think e-cigs have helped people quit smoking! lol
there have been many interesting analogies in this thread and i dont think anyone's particular views are right or wrong. at the end of the day, we are ALL on the same team and dont want e-cigs banned.........its just that some people have their own ideas and beliefs about the best course of action, whereas others have a different thought process
but regardless of peoples personal beliefs and opinions, the fact remains that all parties involved dont want e-cigs banned..........so i dont think any particular person has any right to dictate to another particular person what is the correct thing to do at this present time
personally, i DONT see e-cigs as quit SMOKING device..........but (in my own personal opinion!) i DO see them as a quit TOBACCO device
i uploaded my 1st review to YouTube back in 2008 and since then i would estimate that i have received well over 8,000 emails and YouTube messages from people telling me that they want to quit smoking and are considering using an e-cig to do so.
i answer all messages and often build up a "friendship" with those people who regularly keep me updated with their vaping progress. i would estimate that a good few thousand of those people have written back to me at one stage to say that they have completely quit smoking cigarettes but absolutely love vaping and have no intention of quitting e-cigs.
by contrast, i could probably count on one hand the amount of people who have written back to me to say that they have completely quit cigarettes PLUS have now completely quit e-cigs too. however, i can then also count on my other hand the amount of people who have written to me to say that they have quit smoking cigarettes but are still vaping..........although they now only vape zero nic e-liquid as they have also quit nicotine!
so that above paragraph highlights that a very large section of people view e-cigs as a quit smoking device. it also shows that a large section of people have used e-cigs to quit tobacco but NOT nicotine, and it also shows that some people have used e-cigs to quit tobacco AND nicotine..........which kinda makes everybodys opinions in this thread both right and wrong, lol
worst case scenario, lets say a ban does eventually come into place.........will it stop us vaping? i very, very much doubt it!
if i wanted to, i could go meet some guy down a dark alley and purchase any type of illegal drug that i wanted to...........so if crap like heroin, coke, speed etc etc can still be purchased (though illegally) then cant see buying e-liquid being too much hassle either. though admittedly it wont be a pleasant purchasing experience, lol
but people also need to remember that as far as im aware any ban would only restrict the sale of nicotine based e-liquids WITHIN the UK...........so if a ban happens then there will be nothing to stop us purchasing from china etc or for the UK suppliers to simply go and set up their businesses abroad in an e-cig friendly country!
so it just means that we have to wait an extra day or 2 for delivery and postage costs will increase a bit..........im cool with that........better than going completely without!
cheers
scott
