People have known for some time now that smoking is bad for your health and discourage people from smoking is a logical public health initiative. But what happens when the public health infringes on people's personal rights and freedoms to choose what to do with their bodies? Yasutaka Tsutsui short story “The Last of the Smokers” explores how a fanatical anti-smoking movement leads to a mass genocide smokers. The story chronicles how the anti-smoking movement evolves from a public health campaign on the margins, to an anti-smoker crusade that is supported by the majority of people. The movement through a series of steps legitimizes the discrimination of smokers and eventually the genocide of them. Yasutaka Tsutsui uses this hyperbole to demonstrate
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One day he encounters a sign in the park near his house that asserts “no smokers or dogs”, the writer recognizes this attack on his humanity, as smokers are now grouped together with dogs (scource). The anti-smoker movement begins entering a new phase where smokers humanity is stripped away from them, this is used to justify harsher and harsher actions against them.The author tries to contact “the association for the protections of human rights” and the man on the phones tells him that they protect the non-smokers rights the now majority. An organization that would have once protected those that are discriminated against no longer recognizes the humanity of smokers to deserve protection. A “smokers” humanity is no longer deemed worth of protection. The irony of this phone call shows how effective the movement has become in persecuting smokers, even an organization that was meant to protect all people have no interest in protecting smokers as they are no longer worthy of human rights. The writer does not seem surprised by the turn of events when he rejects the theory that “natural intelligence usually prevents humans from behaving too stupidly”(SCOURCE), he points to history as an example. The issue of smokers quickly moves beyond public health and through a series of steps becomes something much more sinister and repressive. A process that human natural intelligence fails to
One day he encounters a sign in the park near his house that asserts “no smokers or dogs”, the writer recognizes this attack on his humanity, as smokers are now grouped together with dogs (scource). The anti-smoker movement begins entering a new phase where smokers humanity is stripped away from them, this is used to justify harsher and harsher actions against them.The author tries to contact “the association for the protections of human rights” and the man on the phones tells him that they protect the non-smokers rights the now majority. An organization that would have once protected those that are discriminated against no longer recognizes the humanity of smokers to deserve protection. A “smokers” humanity is no longer deemed worth of protection. The irony of this phone call shows how effective the movement has become in persecuting smokers, even an organization that was meant to protect all people have no interest in protecting smokers as they are no longer worthy of human rights. The writer does not seem surprised by the turn of events when he rejects the theory that “natural intelligence usually prevents humans from behaving too stupidly”(SCOURCE), he points to history as an example. The issue of smokers quickly moves beyond public health and through a series of steps becomes something much more sinister and repressive. A process that human natural intelligence fails to