These days, local bar/restaurant owners in Berlin are currently gathering signatures on petitions for a referendum to make enforcement of a smoking ban voluntary in Germany’s food-serving establishments, where smoking has been prohibited since January 1, 2008. The referendum, if successful, would allow restaurant owners themselves to decide whether patrons may smoke. Similar petitions have been circulating in my adopted city, Hamburg, where I have lived since July.

Before coming to Hamburg, I worked for two years in Bratislava where there was no such smoking ban. So it was a great relief to arrive in Germany and find that I could enjoy a restaurant meal without fear that my food might actually taste like cigarette butts.

In Hamburg, Berlin or any other city, we can easily predict what the great majority of bar/restaurant owners would decide, if given a choice, about smoking in their establishments. If they allowed smoking, they would earn more money not only from smokers frequenting their establishments but also from sales of cigarettes to those customers. The result of the vote can be predicted based on pure self-interest.
    

 Hamburg: Quarantine!Smoking zones in the Deutsche Bahn

According to an article in the Berlin Express website, Initiativ Für Genuss (IFG), the organization behind the petition for the referendum, objects to the “ever-growing state interference in the private lives of individuals.” IFG claims on its website to appeal to smokers and non-smokers, alike, stating that its objective is “to respect non-smokers in public spaces, while allowing smokers to decide for themselves in bars.” Maybe the IFG folks think this sounds like a reasonable argument but what does it really mean—that smokers will stop smoking on the street, cease blowing their stinking poison into my face every day if I will just stay out of the cafes so they can smoke there in peace? If I thought that would really happen, I might consider signing the petition and eating and drinking at home but something tells me that my nicotine-addicted neighbors are not going to stop smoking outside to protect my rights in public.

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