Breaking rules; paying fines?

[Allister]

Let's say I am inside a cinema, or a restaurant, or inside a public bus or train, and I decide I have enough spare cash to afford the £2500 smoking fine, is it acceptable to light up?

 

[truthshift]

No. The fine is set in place as a deterrent for unwanted behavior. Just because you don't mind sitting in time-out doesn't mean it's appropriate to hit your little brother.

It's still not acceptable.

 

[tcampen]

Fines and fees are not the same thing.

 

[Staccato]

No. Doing so effectively sets up a way for the rich to purchase the right to extra-legal activities.

On a much smaller scale, it's what infuriates me about low library fines. Half the students at my university just keep books until they decide to give them back, regardless of who else needs it or has requested it, because they're willing to pay the money in return for their own convenience. Fines need to be a deterrent enough that no-one considers them a viable option to obeying the rules/law.

 

[quatona]

Let's say I am inside a cinema, or a restaurant, or inside a public bus or train, and I decide I have enough spare cash to afford the £2500 smoking fine, is it acceptable to light up?

I´m not sure what you mean by "acceptable" in this scenario. Chances are that someone will not accept it, that someone will be prevent you from continuing to smoke there and that you will be punished.
I think the very message of the rule is "smoking here is unacceptable behaviour".
I´m also not sure I understand what the fine has got to do with it, anyways. Let me change the question to "The punishment for murder is life-long incarcaration. I´ve got the spare time to go to prison for the rest of my life - does that make murdering someone acceptable?"
Ethically or morally speaking, he behaviour itself is acceptable or not (depending on the ethics and morality you subscribe to or are subjugated to), no matter whether the behaviour ist threatened with punishment or not.
Legally speaking, the message of the threat of punishment is "this is not acceptable, society is not willing to accept it".

 

[Autumnleaf]

Sure go ahead and light up.

 

[Maxwell511]

If you disagree with the principles on which the law is based and are willing to act non-violently in your refusal to not obey that law then it is not immoral to refuse to follow it. IMO.

For example:

God does not exist.

In Ireland blasphemy is illegal and therefore I have just now commited a criminal offence. That to me is morally acceptable because I really disagree with the law on that point.

For your specific "crime" I don't disagree with it on principle. I am a smoker, but have no problem with anti-smoking laws in enclosed spaces. So I wouldn't view lighting up in the cinema, or whatever, as acceptable or moral behaviour.

 

[Garyzenuf]

In Ireland blasphemy is illegal and therefore I have just now commited a criminal offence.

Yes, but as some say blasphemy is a victim-less crime, where there is proof I believe that second-hand smoke really can effect others negatively.

*

 

[quatona]

[...]blasphemy is a victim-less crime[...]

 

[Allister]

On a much smaller scale, it's what infuriates me about low library fines. Half the students at my university just keep books until they decide to give them back, regardless of who else needs it or has requested it

The reverse irritated me when I was at Uni. I'd hire a book, and maybe a day or two later I'd get an email telling me to return the book because some slow, lazy idiot requested it. Tough luck, IMO.

"this is not acceptable, society is not willing to accept it".

That's not the message. The message is that the Government or Corporations demands you do not smoke. Society never had a say on the issue.

Sure go ahead and light up.

Thanks

If you disagree with the principles on which the law is based and are willing to act non-violently in your refusal to not obey that law then it is not immoral to refuse to follow it. IMO.

Agreed.

where there is proof I believe that second-hand smoke really can effect others negatively.

What if I am in an empty bus or on an empty train carriage? How about an open train station platform (not covered by a roof)? Even so, I doubt one of my cigarettes second hand smoke is going to cause you any problems.

 

[wanderingone]

No. Doing so effectively sets up a way for the rich to purchase the right to extra-legal activities.

On a much smaller scale, it's what infuriates me about low library fines. Half the students at my university just keep books until they decide to give them back, regardless of who else needs it or has requested it, because they're willing to pay the money in return for their own convenience. Fines need to be a deterrent enough that no-one considers them a viable option to obeying the rules/law.

I so agree on your first line and must say OUCH on your point about library books, I do that.. just keep them for extra days - especially when I can't renew because someone has requested them... (making me an even bigger offender since someone is waiting on the book in question) and while it IS on a smaller scale it certainly is the same thing ... now I have to go to the library tonight.... (and I'm not making light.. you just completely made me feel guilty!!!)

 

[Allister]

Dont do it, WanderingOne. If you hired a taxi and were halfway home and some pleb phoned the cab as you drove and the driver said, "sorry, Love, I have just had a request, get out here. I must go and pick up this idiot who called late." Rubbish. If the book is hired, tough.............

 

[wanderingone]

Dont do it, WanderingOne. If you hired a taxi and were halfway home and some pleb phoned the cab as you drove and the driver said, "sorry, Love, I have just had a request, get out here. I must go and pick up this idiot who called late." Rubbish. If the book is hired, tough.............

Not the same thing, I've hired the taxi to get me to a specific destination just as I've borrowed the book for a certain period of time. If the taxi refuses to drop me to my destination I haven't been given what I am paying for. On the other hand the library book is allowed for 3 weeks, I knew that when I took it out, and decide regularly to ignore it. Not to mention, in years past the library was the only place I could afford to get a book, I made sure my books were back on time because I was too poor even for the 10cent fine and if someone held on to something they sometimes slowed down my ability to get access to a book needed for research. So people who were willing to and could pay the fine got to make me wait in line.. longer than I was supposed to have to wait.

 

[wanderingone]

On that note.. I've gathered up my books and I'm off to the library
I'm so glad mine is open until 9.

 

[Staccato]

Vis-à-vis the whole library fines thing, I might have been a bit rant-ish with my original comment. I can see both sides of the argument, because I've been on both sides of the annoyance: borrowing a book then having to return it a fornight earlier than I planned because someone requested it, and I've had to purchase a book I didn't particularly want because the idiots who had the only three copies kept them for around three weeks over their overdue date, accruing around £19 in fines each that they obviously didn't care about, and I needed it to actually finish a term paper.

At my university's library, you're allowed the book for one week irregardless of whether someone has requested it or not. However if someone has requested it, you are not permitted to renew it. IMO the system encourages efficient work habits: there is no book you can't read and comprehensively make notes on in a week if you put all your effort into it. On the flip side of the coin, if you need it again, just request it and you'll get it back in a week.

you hired a taxi and were halfway home and some pleb phoned the cab as you drove and the driver said, "sorry, Love, I have just had a request, get out here. I must go and pick up this idiot who called late." Rubbish. If the book is hired, tough.............

As wanderingone has pointed out, this isn't an equivalent comparison. It's more akin to someone hiring all the taxis in the city and just driving them around and around in circles so you have to walk everywhere.

And sorry for forcing you out to the library btw wanderingone. I didn't mean to guilt trip anybody

 

[morningstar2651]

I have a bunch of library fines to pay right now.

 

[Staccato]

TF2 reference? Stupid spies will fall to my obsessive pyro spychecking techniques. Muhaha.

Of course if it isn't and it's just a coincidence ignore what I just said

 

[morningstar2651]

TF2 reference? Stupid spies will fall to my obsessive pyro spychecking techniques. Muhaha.

Of course if it isn't and it's just a coincidence ignore what I just said

 

[intricatic]

Meh.

I think the problem with laws against smoking is that they imply something more disturbing than just keeping people away from a nasty habit they might not really enjoy or feel good about. The concept underlying anti-smoking regulation is that government has a responsibility to legislate against unhealthy activities, or activities that might cause a health risk to people hapless enough to wander too close to the activity as it takes place. The absurdity of that concept is daunting and it reminds me of the recent clean-air legislation that theoretically may have been applied to cows who release gas into the air. Well, if we can fine cows for methane emissions, then why not fine smokers for carbon emissions?

So no, I don't really think it would be unethical, although it would probably be self-defeating and a waste of money to flout those particular laws.

 

[wanderingone]

And sorry for forcing you out to the library btw wanderingone. I didn't mean to guilt trip anybody

I needed a nudge, we moved into the "new" house a couple weeks back and I just haven't been able to get myself moving on the "non-essential" tasks while we live in a box maze... we are very slow about unpacking....