The dangers of a smoke-free workplace.

last updated 8 January 2015

Spain

Juan Manuel de Prada

Maybe we had it coming, said Juan Manuel de Prada in Madrid’s ABC. For years, we Spaniards gleefully mocked the U.S. for its vicious persecution of smokers. The vilification of tobacco users, we said knowingly, was “just the clearest symptom of the raging paranoia that is rotting American society like gangrene.” The ever-widening bans on smoking showed the growth of “latent fascism” in U.S. politics. With sneering conceit, we congratulated ourselves that such a thing could never happen here. We were wrong. Parliament is outlawing smoking in the workplace. Opposing parties that can’t manage to agree on a bill to combat terrorism have miraculously united over “harassing smokers.” Spanish smokers will now have to cluster furtively outside their office buildings, just like those pathetic Americans. Such behavior will be terrible for office morale. Either smokers will be resented for their cigarette breaks, or they will refrain from smoking “and become anxious, harming their work.” Soon, employers will find them more trouble than they’re worth and stop hiring them. This type of “social segregation” is the “beginning of totalitarianism.”