Smoking and the mixing of cultures



Women worked in departments staffed mostly by women, black men worked in departments staffed mostly by black men. Mexicans, Asians, Eastern Europeans, everybody had their own segregated place where they never had to come in contact with the rest of us. The dock was the only place where we all had to talk to each other. If you went out there as the only



It wasn't a big dock, so you either had to summon up the resolve to be a rude asshole, or you had to grab a milk-crate, sit, and do the small-talk thing. Numerous interracial, international, intercultural, hook-ups started out there on that dock. Black guys and white guys went out for drinks after discovering that they both liked football and therefore had something to talk about other than work, old white men and young black men joked around over Marlboro Reds and Newports or swapped stories about women. It sounds corny but it worked, nicotine addiction had us talking to each other even though technically we didn't have to.



Addiction has always been a great bond between people, which is why cigarette-brands are often geared to certain ethnic groups or sexualities. Drinking together is a kind of intimate, but only slightly more so than smoking together. Rehab-groups are always diverse, and are quite possibly the only places that true, lifelong, interracial friendships are formed anymore, other than a foxhole in war-time, assuming the army still uses foxholes. Addiction strips away all the shit that people hold onto to feel superior to other people. All those people standing outside their offices on a cold day, puffing away are all admitting to each other that they have a weakness, that they are dependent on something. It's a mutual agreement to step down a rung.



So when there are bans on public smoking, in effect there are bans on the last diverse group of people with a reason to get together. The assault on social smoking is an assault on a means of integration, one more way for the powers that be to rule by way of society's divisions. The back dock, out of view of the guests, was the designated employee smoking area, and the only place where you could find any kind of diversity in the whole building.Women worked in departments staffed mostly by women, black men worked in departments staffed mostly by black men. Mexicans, Asians, Eastern Europeans, everybody had their own segregated place where they never had to come in contact with the rest of us. The dock was the only place where we all had to talk to each other. If you went out there as the only smoker in your department, then you either had to go back inside and not smoke or sit out there and enjoy the company of somebody who probably didn't look like you.It wasn't a big dock, so you either had to summon up the resolve to be a rude asshole, or you had to grab a milk-crate, sit, and do the small-talk thing. Numerous interracial, international, intercultural, hook-ups started out there on that dock. Black guys and white guys went out for drinks after discovering that they both liked football and therefore had something to talk about other than work, old white men and young black men joked around over Marlboro Reds and Newports or swapped stories about women. It sounds corny but it worked, nicotine addiction had us talking to each other even though technically we didn't have to.Addiction has always been a great bond between people, which is why cigarette-brands are often geared to certain ethnic groups or sexualities. Drinking together is a kind of intimate, but only slightly more so than smoking together. Rehab-groups are always diverse, and are quite possibly the only places that true, lifelong, interracial friendships are formed anymore, other than a foxhole in war-time, assuming the army still uses foxholes. Addiction strips away all the shit that people hold onto to feel superior to other people. All those people standing outside their offices on a cold day, puffing away are all admitting to each other that they have a weakness, that they are dependent on something. It's a mutual agreement to step down a rung.So when there are bans on public smoking, in effect there are bans on the last diverse group of people with a reason to get together. The assault on social smoking is an assault on a means of integration, one more way for the powers that be to rule by way of society's divisions.