Tobacco is misunderstood.
Today I come here to talk a little bit about tobacco and to leave an historic record. Most of the nicotine movement today gravitates towards laboratory nicotine. Here I come to actually explain what tobacco really is.
Firstly, tobacco is a raw leaf of a plant, that's it. We tend to think about tobacco like some evil compound which has thousands of chemicals added by evil companies. That's not what tobacco is, tobacco is, essentially, a plant.
Now, tobacco has many ways of being consumed, not only by smoking. You can chew it, snort it (snuff), leave it in your mouth (tobacco snus, actually the classical antecessor of modern snus), even eat it. These consumption mechanisms are far safer than smoking, the problem is **Smoking is not as dangerous as many people want you to believe**.
Now, regards smoking it, cigarettes are not even the only consumption system. You may be used to cigar smoking, which is not inhaled to the lungs and is much safer than cigarette smoking. Pipe smoking gets here too, is not inhaled. Both hold significant cultural and deep importance to society, history and the tobacco world.
Now, let's talk properly about why tobacco is unique. Firstly, the nicotine. Nicotine is a cognitive enhancer and nootropic. This means its consumption, specially in proper doses and conditions improve brain functioning via the cholinergic system (system responsible for movement and cognitive functioning). Nicotine does also have other properties which are unique compared to any other substance because they are subtle but perceivable enough. It reliefs stress in a moderate way (not extremely like benzodiazépines would do). Reliefs anxiety in a clean manner, unlike alcohol or drugs. It also gives you a stable spike in dopamine to feel a pleasant sensation without it to be overwhelming like hard drugs would. Nicotine and tobacco in general can't alterate your judgement or behaviour, because the effects are too stable for that.
Furthermore we encounter something unique to tobacco which anything else doesn't have: dozens of alkaloids alike to nicotine or even different ones. This alkaloids make the effect of tobacco unique, much different yet very stable. The other one are MAOIS. This are compounds present in the smoke of tobacco. These compounds were the first antidepressants ever invented (when taken in pills) and they're well established as long term mood enhancers and offer long term cognitive modulation. Again, the effect is subtle and stable, so it's rather a quiet actor than, for example, the extremeness you would feel by taking cocaine. Yet, you feel it subtly.
Now, let's go with a myth that has been stablished over the years and has been reinforcing itself. "Tobacco or nicotine lack any positive benefits, any perceived effect is a relief of abstinence". While this may be true for some heavy consumers and is exaggerated and distorted, it is mostly and absolutely false. This can be proven with a simple truth: New smokers or recent smokers still feel the positive effects, even in the first time, and they keep feeling it as the consumption evolves, just that the feeling may change slightly depending on circumstances.
Let's talk now about the newer forms of nicotine consumption: vaping has already proving to be worse than cigarettes, not only in health effects, but in compulsive usage. Snus and pouches may seem a good option, and they partially are, but they have added chemicals, even if that's somewhat regulated, they absolute lack the other benefits tobacco has in alkaloids and MAOIS. Aside from that, they lack completely any social or ritual aspect, being soulless. Another thing tobacco has is that rarely it needs to be hidden from anyone, the only way I could think is nasal snuff, but still, tobacco was socially accepted for hundreds of years until now, and while governments are pushing for tobacco prohibition, they freely allow alcohol or discreet vapes, even legalising more harmful drugs to the mind, even the body, why?
Now, something important aside from any health considerations are the social and general depth of the tobacco world. Tobacco is completely unique and has many implications. Tobacco smoke works well as an insecticide. Tobacco is able to match the niche environments of gourmet food or premium sommeliery. Trying a high quality cigar made artesanal in Cuba which chocolate discreet and natural notes of flavour, smoking a Danish pipe tobacco blend with an unique flavour on the world can only compare as like trying advanced wines for limited vineyards. Is not something a laboratory made vape with strawberry chemically added flavour targeted towards a young audience could ever match. Aside from that, thereany cultural implications. The pause to smoke. The healthy reflection during. Even the tuxedo dress was called originally and is called in many language "smoking". Not casual, the tuxedo antecessor was called smoking jacket. They were jackets worn in exclusive clubs during the XIX century used to smoke tobacco between gentlemen. Tobacco started as a high class practice, then became something every class could share because of how stable it was. I have to admit that there's still a quality component, because high quality tobacco is more expensive but is also safer, tastier and better than low quality ones which tend to be more associated with health issues.
Now, the addiction part. It exists, I won't deny it, but it is unlike any other drug or chemical addiction because of a simple reason, most addictions are unstable. Tobacco one is more of an habit which you structure your day around but you're still functional. It is, pretty much, like a coffee addiction. It is a joke for most people but is almost alike to tobacco. You're completely functional while smoking tobacco. You don't sell a 3 million dollar house to buy cigarettes and then end on the street, other drugs do. It doesn't destroy your relationships, just may annoy occasionally someone who doesn't like the smoke. The abstinence syndrome is also just anxiety plus irritability; quitting alcohol or opioids can kill a person. And this is in the list of the most extreme cases. I'm mainly talking to addiction to free based cigarettes which I will explain in a while. Other forms of tobacco consumption are mostly harmless, such as cigar, pipe smoking. You tend to develop more of an habit than a serious addiction.
Here. Here comes the part which gave tobacco a bad reputation internationally. They're cigarette companies. Cigarettes didn't even exist back then, it was all pipe and cigars. Addiction wasn't a word to define tobacco consumption back then. The first cigarettes were natural, they didn't have any chemicals added. They were more alike to little cigars. It made tobacco more accessible but didn't change anything relevant until cigarette companies realised multiple things, first of all the habit forming tendency of tobacco (which wasn't universal), also, the slight spike in dopamine after smoking. Then they started adding chemicals to cigarettes which made cigarettes actually addictive (still a joke compared with other drugs but the capacity to repeat and the chemicals themselves allowed it). They didn't care really about what they were doing but they saw an increase in profits. This chemically altered cigarettes are called free based cigarettes and they're most of the cigarettes you find today. But NATURAL AND NORMAL CIGARETTES DON'T EVER CAUSE THIS PROBLEMS. This caused the stigma globally.
More specifical about the free based cigarettes and the health risks, yeah, they worsen mainly your respiratory health, but not catastrophically. The worst health effects which are the most shared ones are present both
Very heavy smokers of free based cigarettes.
People with an already poor health or poor lifestyle.
Any person smoking in moderation, even if it's about free based cigarettes and which has a good lifestyle overcomes most of the risks. Now, if it isn't free based cigarettes, is even better.
Smoking can absolutely offer more benefits than the harm it could cause. Tobacco has been used for thousands of years by native Americans as even a medicinal plant (yes, it has some medicinal properties) without problem. Even recreative moderate use doesn't almost any risk. Even an habit barely possess any risk with the correct lifestyle.
Lastly and this is not any kind of invitation, but many historical figures have smoked and that's precisely because they themselves attribute it good properties (which later turned to be true, nootropic). Aristocrats, kings, priests, intellectuals, respectable persons. Precisely because it didn't interfere in their judgement but rather accompanied or helped with it. A soldier would never drink before making an important decision, but smoking or drinking coffee was completely possible.
At this point, I noted a great effort by the worldwide regulators to move towards a world without tobacco, but with everything else present? Why? I can't be sure, but certainly the health excuse is not the true reason, that's just the justification. What I can say is that the future is not good for smokers. We're seen with so much stigma, even worse than drug consumers. People are moving from tobacco to more dangerous options like laboratory industrial mass vapes or even drugs. Governments want to ban tobacco, and I ask, is it really worth it and should be they deciding about this? At first it's only going to hurt themselves and the population. Tobacco is going to fall under the black market, empowering criminal groups, deleting the tax income, decreasing quality and safety. We may soon see a titular about an old man dying from a fentanyl overdose because he bought a pack of cigarettes in the black market.
Is this the future you want?