Greeks Are Defying an Indoor Smoking Ban, Even After 14 Years

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/28/world/europe/greece-indoor-smoking-ban.html

by natkr7

32 comments

  1. So are Spanish people if you count social clubs, but that’s really legal as it’s permitted in private weed and cigar clubs.

  2. It’s like half the Dutch not washing their hands after using the toilet, culture

  3. Wasn’t there a Greek minister that lit up a cigarette inside at a health conference a few years back?

  4. More inspections and sanctions for those establishments that allow it, and in less than a year everything will be fixed.

  6. Greeks are as infuriating as a piece of popcorn stuck between the teeth ay as stubborn as mules.

    Source? I’m Greek.

  8. I smoke, and I used to like smoking inside bars, when it was ok. But after the ban, me and all my friends who smoke found this great thing. Because you still can smoke outside, but your clothes don’t smell like shit after this night. And your head hurts less

  9. Banning indoor smoking was the best legislation my country gave in 20years, i absolutely despised goind at a party or restaurant where i could barely see from the smoke.

    I also smelled like smoked death afterward, even my freakin skin was reeking…

    It is beyond me how that was allowed for so damn long…

  10. In Italy smoking inside public places was banned almost 20 years ago. Best thing they could do, since then drinking a beer doesn’t taste like shit.

  11. Fck smoking.
    Breathing is a must. Smoking is a choice. 
    I didn’t choose smoking so fck away from me.

  14. > As for nonsmokers, he said, “It’s their choice to be here.”

    Poison yourself? Be my guest. Poison others? Piss off.

  15. Back in like 2013-2014 I had a pleasure of attending a basketball game in OAKA. As a lithuanian, I was in shock to see people smoking there, but at the time I lived in Greece, fully embraced it and lit a cigarette or more myself, all while drinking illegal beer from coca-cola plastic cups Ive illegally obtained in arena corridors. Wild times lol, kind of miss that atmosphere.

  16. That’s kinda BS. There are places that are characterized as smokers-only. In those places you will see people smock, but in places that are marked as non-smoking, you rarely see that.

    It felt that there was a healthy decline in smoking for a few years, but then vaporing came along, and after a year or some smoking came back.

    Some of my friends quit, then took up vaping to take the edge off, and then started smocking more than ever before while vaping.

  18. Laws mean nothing if they aren’t enforced.

    Huge surprise…

  19. I’m currently in a mountain village and this is absolutely not enforced on the covered in outdoor seating spaces

    If it was, it would inconvenience the smoker-locals and smoker-visitors who love nothing more than the sip one coffee for two hours but chain smoke through a handful of cigarettes over the same timeframe

  20. Was a t a wedding yesterday in Greece. People were sparking up indoors once the food was finished

  21. This is one of the top things I hate about Greece. Smokers don’t give a shit about anyone else, they just say “it’s my choice to smoke”. It’s not your choice to make my clothes and hair smell like ash and endanger my health, no, just like how I don’t bring tires in the bar and burn them just because “it’s my choice”.

    There was a year before COVID hit when this was enforced, and places were largely smoke-free, but that’s gone now. It was paradise, but it was short-lived.

  22. It’s actually a non-smoking ban. It’s banned to not smoke. Everything’s fine move along.

  23. It has improved quite a lot to be honest.

    Hopefully in a generation or two we will be finally rid of it.

  25. I was a heavy smoker back in my youth around a pack and something per day, nowadays I’m a casual smoker like less than 1 pack per month.

    In Romania it has been quite heavily enforced in the urban area because the fines were quite high, nobody really wants to smell like an ashtray and the police wasn’t shy to make their nonexistent fines quota.

    The only place one might smoke cigarettes would be somewhat allowed are the corner eastern european bars where they sell cheap *hand sanitizer as alcohol*, but it’s not a given, even those bars have an outside terrace with a heater.

    It’s one of the few things Romanian did good, banning indoor restaurant smoking.

    The next one would be to ban those fucking vapes indoor, seen those shit used even at the cinema …

  27. It is very interesting to see popular ideology, including in this sub, simultaneously hold the view that weed (and the smoking of it) should be legalized, while tobacco (and the smoking of it) should be supressed and prohibited.

    They are both organic compounds that you burn, inhale, and hurt public health.
    Whereas THC actually has negative mental effects added on the physical effects.

    You can argue a cigarette smoker smokes more grams per day than the weed smoker, sure.
    On the other hand, one uses a filter and the other does not.

    Eitherway it feels a bit more nuanced than the opinions expressed in this sub, which range from super enthousiastic at the headline that weed is legalized in yet another European country, to ‘fuck your cigarettes’ in comment sections such as this one.

  28. Indoor smoking ban in Spain is to me one of the best laws ever enforced I can’t understand why non smokers are ok with this.

  30. “even after 14 years” isn’t news. Corruption is rampant in Greece as well as in most Eatern European countries. It’s part of their culture.

  31. Im a smoker but I always smoke outdoors. Don’t want my house looking yellow and passing on second hand smoke!

  32. Indoor smoking ban is such a great policy. I’d bet most smokers are supportive of it in retrospect (though they didn’t like it at first)

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