(and 6 reasons non-smokers feel tempted to start)
1. It just looks good.
Whether you're an elegant she-devil or a machismo-loaded cowboy, cigarettes are part of the picture. It gives you a chance to whip out that expensive Zippo, to dangle your slim ciggie holder like Cruella De Vil, while looking like you Couldn't Give A Fuck. Smoking is also a symbol of female liberation & bad-assery, as Kristen Stewart's Joan Jett in Runaways proved. Silver screens whisper that the languid serpentine coil drifting from the glowing tip of your cancer stick is sexy. And goddamnit, they're right.
Speaking of cancer...
2. Your grandpa smokes 10 Marlboros a day and is still alive.
He also downs Guinness like a mofo, which seems to further prove that everything your li'l yuppie health mag ever told you was bullshit. Lung tumours? Are you kiddin'? He looks tumours in the face and laughs like the cowboy he is. Meanwhile, you're 25, hit the gym every evening and still struggle with a spare tyre.
You'd think ol' granddad was the exception. But no....
3. Rock stars who look great for 50-year-old nicotine addicts
There's a reason rebellious youths get an urge to play some shredding guitar with a roll between their teeth. It goes with the whole...image. The leather; the tight ripped denim; the nonchalance of checking out chicks through a faint haze of smoke. It makes you bad-boy archetype. It makes you feel like Slash. A guy who once drank and puffed himself into cardiac arrest, and still looks like sex. Him and your grandpa are out to make the entire medical community look like dicks.
And since the mention of dicks came up...
4. Phallic power & all that loaded symbolism
Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. And sometimes it's a badge of Arnold's action-hero testosterone. Or an innuendo-laden flirtation tool. If you've ever felt turned on by a lover lighting your smoke, you know the power of the humble deathstick*. It also possibly provides an explanation to the post-coitus cigarette.
(*that's what they call it in Star Wars Ep III. because Obi-Wan never met Slash or your granddad.)
It's not just a useful come-on, though. Cigarettes are also great for perfectly platonic interactions...
5. It's what social people do.
As if staring at computers all day long wasn't unhealthy enough, most yuppies pick up ciggies as a convenient bonding activity. It's a great way to meet someone new or catch up on old times. It's the great equaliser between you and your boss (one pair of tar-stained lungs look the same as another). And notice how you don't need to be a good conversationalist? Having something to do with your fingers and mouth means the effortless filling of silent awkward gaps.
However, if there's one thing that beats the perks of social smoking, it's...
6. The cool stuff that comes with it
The sleek silver case. The lighter with an emblem of your favourite whisky or band. The countless novelty ashtrays into which to empty your butts. The limited edition packs. Humans love their toys, and the fact that ciggies are addictive in themselves doesn't help. While it's unlikely that people will start lighting up just so they can amass a cool collection of Zippos, people with said collectionof Zippos are less likely to stop.
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It is better to indulge knowingly than to sin in ignorance.
Serpent 3:16
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