s/o Poll re: meat and dairy can kill you

[MWOS]

Definitely not less sympathy. I imagine they might feel a certain level of guilt and/or shame and my heart goes out to them.

[dramallama]

Yes.

I also have less sympathy for someone who get hit by a train because they were going AROUND the bars as opposed to someone who gets hit by a train because their car got stuck on the tracks while it was legal to cross.

[ladyk]

Nope. Both of my parents have smoked all of my life. They are about the last of their generation in my family to still smoke and they are trying to quit. Smoking is an addiction and I have sympathy for those that are caught up in that (and other) addictions.

[meggers5]

I think the answers for this will be much different than if there were an anonymous poll.

[Deleted]

IDK. Cancer is a bitch and nobody deserves it. But at the same time, we know for a fact that smoking causes cancer, full stop. I maybe have more sympathy for older folks who have smoking-related cancer, since the risks weren't well known years ago. And smoking addictions are so, so hard to kick.

You know who I do feel really sorry for, are the people who get lung cancer but never smoked a day in their lives. They, wrongly, get neither sympathy nor the comparable amount of research funding for their disease.

[spitforspat]

No. I don't think anyone deserves to die because they have an addiction.

[MWOS]

God help me if I see any of you judgement people standing outside on a sunny day

[cville]

Oh, I don't know. I want to say no because having a disease is enough already. But then I remember when David Crosby got a liver transplant I was all "seriously? That asshole leapfrogged people who didn't drink their livers away?"

[dana2006]

I don't know about having less sympathy, but if it's someone I know and love, I'd be more angry. Take my dad. He has always been horrible with his dental hygene habit. Then he got hit with major dental issues and lost most of his teeth. This really impacts his quality of life, the type of food he can or cannot eat. I definitely hold him accountable for his sufferings, but I also feel bad for him. It's complicated.

[Champagne Supernova]

Kinda but shit, having cancer fucking sucks. I don't think anyone deserves to have cancer or some sort of deadly disease, kwim?

[kirra]

Less sympathy? No.

More angry if they're someone I love? Absolutely.

[Kristinmo]

Mar 5, 2014 10:10:21 GMT -5 dana2006 said:

I don't know about having less sympathy, but if it's someone I know and love, I'd be more angry. 

This.  Both of my paternal grandparents died of smoking related lung cancer when I was very young.  I was/am angry that I missed all of those years with them.

[BaliHai]

No. I imagine coping with cancer while knowing/wondering if it was caused by something you did is enough without judgment from anyone else.

However, I will admit, as a loved one who watched someone lose their cancer battle, knowing if they had done something differently maybe they would have had a better chance of survival (in this case, not waiting five years to see a doctor when suspicious things began happening), I found it incredibly difficult to not be desperately angry at times. But it was anger without judgment; more like helpless fury in general, at everything, that she was dying.

[cville]

Mar 5, 2014 10:13:59 GMT -5 @tambcat said:

My uncle smokes, and my aunt (non-smoker) died of lung cancer when I was in high school. I can only imagine the guilt my uncle must have felt, even if it didn't have anything to do with his smoking. I bet some people in her family blamed him.

Also, my dad needed a liver transplant, but couldn't get one because he had cancer. He might have been able to beat the cancer if he'd had a decent liver. But I guess he didn't deserve one anyway since he was an alcoholic.

See, I get that my reaction to David Crosby is uncharitable and wrong.  I wish suffering on no one.  I was just trying to be honest about examining my emotions--my gut reaction is "of course not" but then I recalled those feelings I'd had about his case long ago.  I think I'd react entirely differently to someone I know than to a famous person I can be all US Weekly critical about.  I hope what I said didn't hurt you. 

[shopgirl07]

Mar 5, 2014 10:05:54 GMT -5 freedom said:

No I'm sad for anyone that has cancer. Also 20 years ago we did not know what we know about cancer today.

This is not really true. We knew smoking caused cancer by the late 1960s.

[Deleted]

No.

[cville]

Mar 5, 2014 10:20:36 GMT -5 @tambcat said:

Mar 5, 2014 10:16:51 GMT -5 cville said:

See, I get that my reaction to David Crosby is uncharitable and wrong.  I wish suffering on no one.  I was just trying to be honest about examining my emotions--my gut reaction is "of course not" but then I recalled those feelings I'd had about his case long ago.  I think I'd react entirely differently to someone I know than to a famous person I can be all US Weekly critical about.  I hope what I said didn't hurt you. 

I know.  I probably would have felt that way too before all of this happened with my dad. Maybe I'd still feel this way if I was reading about a celeb. I shouldn't have said anything. It was just a really frustrating thing to go through.

No, you absolutely should have.  I need a reminder now and again that I should check myself when I'm musing Stossely.

I am absolutely on board with addiction as a disease, and, when thinking about that in concert with everything else I realize that if it's a disease that can have deleterious effects on the body like, for example, diabetes, why would I have sympathy for the one but not the other?  So I'm wrong about my own emotions anyway. 

[sergey]

I feel bad that anyone gets cancer and to end up with cancer because of a long-term addiction must add another level of guilt/loathing/blame which sucks. Honestly though, I don't understand why anyone would start smoking today like current teens/20's. I know it's not this simple (peer pressure comes to mind in particular) but you can't get addicted if you don't start ya know?

[amberlyrose]

Mar 5, 2014 10:13:54 GMT -5 kirra said:

Less sympathy? No.

More angry if they're someone I love? Absolutely.

I'm here.
The anger I would have towards my mom would be off the charts, but I would still feel sympathy for her. I don't think anyone deserves to die from a horrible disease. 

[nursewife]

No. Regardless of the probable cause, lung cancer is awful. I always have a hard time seeing patients die of lung cancer particularly.

[VeryViolet]

Being angry with a loved one that the choices they made led to them getting sick is probably a pretty normal reaction. Not feeling sympathy for someone with any kind of cancer makes you a dick.

[Deleted]

Nah.

[MWOS]

Mar 5, 2014 10:30:48 GMT -5 sergey said:

I feel bad that anyone gets cancer and to end up with cancer because of a long-term addiction must add another level of guilt/loathing/blame which sucks. Honestly though, I don't understand why anyone would start smoking today like current teens/20's. I know it's not this simple (peer pressure comes to mind in particular) but you can't get addicted if you don't start ya know?

Skin cancer from tanning beds is going to be this generation's lung cancer from smoking. You knew it was bad, you did it anyway, wanted to look good/cool/whatever, started when you were 16 and by the time you stopped it was too late, etc etc etc.  The next generation is going to look at us the same way.

[hereigo]

no.

[captainobvious]

I have the same amount of empathy, but I'm not sure on sympathy. It's hard for me to say one way or the other.

[txgrandma]

No.

[sergey]

Mar 5, 2014 10:36:56 GMT -5 MWOS said:

Mar 5, 2014 10:30:48 GMT -5 sergey said:

I feel bad that anyone gets cancer and to end up with cancer because of a long-term addiction must add another level of guilt/loathing/blame which sucks. Honestly though, I don't understand why anyone would start smoking today like current teens/20's. I know it's not this simple (peer pressure comes to mind in particular) but you can't get addicted if you don't start ya know?

Skin cancer from tanning beds is going to be this generation's lung cancer from smoking. You knew it was bad, you did it anyway, wanted to look good/cool/whatever, started when you were 16 and by the time you stopped it was too late, etc etc etc.  The next generation is going to look at us the same way.

Agreed, teenagers are invincible of course but (maybe I missed them although I only tanned once or twice before each prom) but I don't remember constant TV ads, gross photos and warnings all over the tanning bed. In general I agree with your point but I think smoking is to a different degree now than tanning 15 years ago.

[janiejones]

Mar 5, 2014 10:16:51 GMT -5 cville said:

Mar 5, 2014 10:13:59 GMT -5 @tambcat said:

My uncle smokes, and my aunt (non-smoker) died of lung cancer when I was in high school. I can only imagine the guilt my uncle must have felt, even if it didn't have anything to do with his smoking. I bet some people in her family blamed him.

Also, my dad needed a liver transplant, but couldn't get one because he had cancer. He might have been able to beat the cancer if he'd had a decent liver. But I guess he didn't deserve one anyway since he was an alcoholic.

See, I get that my reaction to David Crosby is uncharitable and wrong.  I wish suffering on no one.  I was just trying to be honest about examining my emotions--my gut reaction is "of course not" but then I recalled those feelings I'd had about his case long ago.  I think I'd react entirely differently to someone I know than to a famous person I can be all US Weekly critical about.  I hope what I said didn't hurt you. 

I think your David Crosby reaction is an honest one.  And for just that- you don't know him any better than anyone in Us Weekly.  It's easy to allow visceral reactions to his case because it's not complicated (to you).

Tamb , I don't know how I would feel if it were my dad in your situation two years ago.  He drinks a lot.  Binging multiple times a week, but on the flip side can not drink for days.  It's not in any way healthy.  If/when he gets sick, and if/when his liver function factors into his treatment/care I'll be mad.  at him. for him. for me, my family.
About drinking, and about sickness in life. I'm sure my emotions would show no bounds, but I'd be more careful about how I shared them, or which I let surface.

It's always going to be complicated when somebody could have prevented parts of things.  Not all illnesses are related to a person's behaviour and addictions, and their behaviours and addictions don't always predict sickness.  But we we KNOW there are links, it's just like "yep, everyone knew this was a possibility".

And to whomever said we didn't know what we did about cancer 20 years ago, SURE.  But we knew smoking was a leading factor in many cancers and other diseases 20 years ago.  You;d have to go back much farther in time for an argument like that.

[snickers]

No. I feel bad for anyone with caner, that's an awful way to live/possibly die.


My aunt and uncle both had lung cancer, and both were told in the very early stages of it to stop smoking, but they both continued to smoke. This annoyed me because they already had cancer and are being treated by our medical system (Canada)and don't seem to want to help themselves. With that said, quitting smoking sounds hard, and doing it with a terminal illness sounds much harder, so I think my annoyance is bitchy.

[obladi]

No I don't. Lung cancer is a terrible terrible way to die and I feel nothing but sympathy for those who have it.