If you, a non-smoker, were invited to a smoker's home, would you expect them not to smoke while you were there?

It is their house, and they can do what they like, but it might impact whether or not I accepted their invitation.

Of course not. However, I would politely decline the invitation.

I wouldn’t go. If asked why, I might say I’m allergic to smoke or something like that. Just in case they really want my company and would be willing to not smoke while I was there.

Most people smoke outside these days, it seems to me. So it might be safe to go.

I really don’t have any friends who still smoke and the one that does…goes outside in the garage to smoke even when no guests are over so it is not an issue for me. But as it was years back…I would not stay if there wasn’t a smoke free zone somewhere inside or outside. I am an ex smoker too but I just can’t tolerate smoke anymore.

No, of course not. I would not go however. I’m not willing breathe someone’s smoke. On the other hand, when I smoked, I always smoked outside, and most people that I know who smoke do the same. They’re pretty considerate of those who don’t smoke.

I have had an 82 year old man here for the past several days, part of the overflow from my sister’s family. He smokes in the garage with the door open, but we can smell him and his clothes in both the house and garage. It’s truly disgusting.

@gailcalled The smokers I know don’t seem to know/ care that the smoke stays with them, even if they do smoke outside

I am a non-smoker and would never tell anyone what to do in their own home.I will not allow anyone to smoke in my home or in my car.

Generally speaking, when I am a non-smoker..I tell my smoking friends they can go smoke outside or on the balcony…when I am a smoker, I go with them…because there are kids in the apartment, I try to keep any of these activities to a minimum…

Its their home, their domain. they can do as they please in their own home. either learn to accept it or stay away.

Non-Smokers are not invited to or welcome in my house…. and I don’t smoke inside…

Also I won’t allow non-smokers in my car….I do smoke in it…the best you would get is window down….air circulation on…

I can’t stand anti-smoking preaching…...So I’m sick of kicking people out of my house/car that love to preach but know nothing about what they are preaching…...or people that think they will get cancer from being around me after I had a cigarette

I expect as a common courtesy for someone to not blow smoke in my face, especially given that (on top of me being a non-smoker) it’s a big asthma trigger for me.

The smell of cigarettes is absolutely dreadful. That is one of the very few things I remember from about my grandpa, the disgusting aura surrounding him and his house. I can’t understand how anybody would tolerate it.
I know which of my friends smoke. I’ve tried staying in their homes, but even when they weren’t actively smoking, I couldn’t deal with it, I’d always have to leave quickly. So really it’s a non-issue for me: I don’t enter the house at all any more.

@coffeenut Wow… ummm, even coming from me who’s been smoking heavily for 19 years, you seem pretty damn selfish about your bad habit. I’ve enjoyed cigarettes, I really have, but not at the expense of others. And especially not to the extent of saying that “non-smokers are not welcome in my home”. That’s incredibly selfish, and to be blunt, just plain damned rude.

No. However, I know many people who smoke and whenever I am in their presence they leave the area to smoke; I have asthma. And even if they didn’t, I can always get up and walk away.

Damn. Is anyone courteous anymore?

@coffeenut Um…. defensive much? Of all the non smoker answers I’ve seen, I saw no reference to preaching. Just a dislike for the smell of smoke. Do you really know people who are so stupid that they think they will get cancer just by being around you? That indicates a low IQ. I’ve noticed that people seem to hang out with others of similar IQ levels…..
I personally don’t preach about smoking, or eating meat, or anything else. I am adult enough to realize that different people feel differently about things and to each his own.
But you go ahead and keep that chip on your shoulder. I don’t feel bad aboput not being invited to your house.

I do believe I heard the Surgeon General telling us that no amount of second hand smoke is safe.

I’m not sure that @coffeenut isn’t coming from a generous place. She doesn’t want anyone to have to suffer her second hand smoke. She’s only trying to protect us. It think we should thank her for her consideration. I mean, I trust that none of you are saying you want to ride in her car with her?

Well, I smoke, but not in the house. If I was invited to a place where they smoke in the house I’d go, and I wouldn’t expect them to change anything. A few hours of second hand smoke seriously isn’t going to hurt me! But…I do know my clothes and hair would stink and stuff, so I’d shower when I got home.
Besides…I don’t know of anyone who smokes in their houses anymore, anyway.

I would never expect them not to smoke. If I would go to their house would really depend on who it was and what the event was. I have asthma and smoke (any smoke) is a major trigger for me. I would take my inhaler with me and go and enjoy myself. If my asthma got bad to the point I needed to leave, I would honestly tell the host what was going on. All of my close friends and family know about my asthma and don’t smoke downwind from me when we are outside, let alone in a small confined place with me present. I’ll even accompany my friends outside if everyone else is going outside and we are in the midst of a great conversation.

No one smokes in my house or my car and that is a rule that will never change.

@Seaofclouds If someone knew you had asthma, and invited you over and didn’t have the courtesy to go outside and smoke, I guess they aren’t a real good friend!

@Dutchess_III I tell people that they don’t have to go outside just because of me. I hate feeling like I’m putting someone out of their own home and I can be quite stubborn about it. The only time I’ve been in a situation were my friends have smoked in the same room as me has been while having game nights and it’s only because I tell them not to worry about it. They all make sure the smoke is going away from me though and keep the ashtray as far away as possible. I’d rather continue having fun (and use my inhaler as needed) than quit playing (as I said, I’m stubborn).

Oh, well. I wouldn’t let anyone smoke in the house if you were here, @Seaofclouds! Not that anyone does anyway….

I’m a smoker. I assume that whoever comes to my house knows that, and is cool with it.
If my guests are allergic/asthmatic/militant nonsmokers, we’ll hang out somewhere else.

If I were a nonsmoker I wouldn’t allow smokers to smoke in my home. I would never light a cigarette in a nonsmoker’s home. Why should their preferences affect how I behave?

If it’s not freezing out, I’ll go on the balcony, or at the very least, open a window. I don’t smoke in my car when I’ve got a nonsmoking passenger unless they say they’re fine with it.

I smoke like a chimney, and when I have non-smoking guests, I will either go to the kitchen where I can open a window and turn on the vent in order to smoke. If there are children, I will go to the porch or go outside, or just refrain from smoking at all. I don’t smoke in my car with non-smokers, either, nor would I ever smoke in a non-smoker’s car.
I have some friends that don’t smoke and that swear up and down that it doesn’t bother them. In fact, I have at least one non-smoking friend who claims to enjoy the scent. He had parents that were smokers, so he actually doesn’t mind the way that it smells. At least that’s what he says. If it is one of those friends who I truly believe doesn’t mind, then I will smoke around them -but even then I am always cautious to hold my smoke and my ashtray far away from them, and I will almost always open a window at the very least.

I don’t think smoke smells that bad. Old smoke on clothes smells bad. I just quit (hopefully forever) so I don’t want someone to smoke on my house now but in a few months I won’t care. I think the people are more important than a smell.

Yes I would expect him not to smoke since you are a non-smoker. People would not generally do that especially if they know the person for a long time….but I think that is the mannerly thing that a smoker should do.

No, but maybe if I were a kid. For some reason, when I was younger I was really sensitive to cigarette smoke and it would always make cough and I couldn’t stand it. In that case, they would either have to not do it or I would just not go over to their house. Now, it’s not such a big deal to me; I’m around people who smoke marijuana all the time (even though I don’t) and I don’t mind it.

@Trillian lol the retard who thought that she could get cancer like that was a friends new girlfriend….I did’t believe in dumb blonds until I met her

My answer is from personal experience only and has nothing to do with previous answers…..I’ve had to ask a lot of people to leave over the years and I’m tired of doing it…...So the people that cause certain stress are no longer welcome…...it covers friends..friends of friends…or anyone bringing stress into my house/car.. The only reason I do not allow non-smokers (among others) is the ones that preach.. Since it’s hard to tell the preachers from the regular non-smokers I decided none would until a better method can be used.

My house and my car are the only shelter from outside stresses I have…..I like it being a relaxed stress free environment….If you want to call that a “chip” then sure I love my chip…. and as it being my house I make the rules…. If you bring certain stress into my sanctuary….I’ll throw you out so fast your fucking head will spin…all my friends know this…and for those who don’t….it’s on the door mat…and a sign next to the door…..lol
some think it’s a little extreme….I don’t…stress related injuries really suck…so if they don’t like it…oh well.

@WillWorkForChocolate
My intolerance to stress at home most likely makes me a asshole as well….but that’s ok

Im a smoker myself so I cant really say, but I myself always ask non smokers how they feel about it whenever theyre at my house or in my car. If they dont mind I smoke, if they do I abstain. Im nice like that :P

I feel that in one’s own home, one should do what one wants. If someone lit up in front of me, I might make sure i was not near the smoke. However, i understand my clothes would smell, and I would deal with that and take a shower at home.

My sister-in-law and father both died in their 50’s from smoking related illnesses, but I have never preached to anyone not to smoke. I don’t allow smoking inside my home, and I don’t visit people’s homes who smoke, unless we visit outside. Most of the people I know who do smoke, go outside to smoke, even in their own home.

I can’t imagine going to someone’s home and insisting (or even politely asking) that they change a behavior that I am aware of. My husband’s best friend and his wife both smoke, although only outside or in their basement. We go to their house knowing that we will come home with some smoke smell on us. If I didn’t want to be around a smoker, I just wouldn’t hang with them!

Prolonged exposure to cigarette smoke lands me in the hospital, so yes. If the person refused, I’d just leave. I’d be leaving soon anyway, so I might as well do it while still under my own power.

(People here are such doormats. Relationships are supposed to be two-way streets.)

I wouldn’t expect them to change their ways in their own home. If they were inconsiderate enough to be the kind of smoker (rare, in my experience) that blows smoke in your face then I might avoid their house. What would bother me most would be the smell of old smoke on my clothes and hair after leaving.

I grew up with smokers and a lot of my family members (and my husband’s family members) smoke. When I was a kid, no one thought twice about smoking in the car with kids or smoking in the house with kids. Hell, I remember my dad smoking in the cafeteria at the hospital when we were there to visit my great grandma. There are probably a lot of people here who remember well the days before smoking carried such a social stigma and was allowed in most places. Maybe that’s why it doesn’t seem like such a big deal to me.

However, I wouldn’t take my kids into a smoker’s house if I thought the person would smoke around the kids. I’d hate to ask someone not to smoke in their own house unless I knew the person really well. Our family members and friends who smoke automatically go outside to smoke whenever kids are around.

If I had my son with me (he is almost 5 months old) yes, I would expect my host to smoke outside/away from my child. Although I do not smoke and dislike it, I wouldn’t expect my host to refrain if I did not have my son with me.

I would never knowingly visit a home where a smoker lived. They stink so much, I can’t stand it. Every chair they sit in becomes polluted with the nicotine that seeps out of their body, and can be absorbed by anyone else who sits in that same chair.

I do not knowingly allow smokers into my house, and that goes for smoking outside as well. I stopped hosting club events because of it.

I had a friend who kindly helped me with the layout of my book, so I visited his house twice a week for about a month. He was staying with his parents, and the entire household was a smoking one. To be honest, I rather enjoyed the irony of my being the one to go outside for five minute intervals, in order to get some fresh air!

I always expect people to not smoke, they just sometimes fail to meet my expectations.

As someone who is severely allergic to smoke, I would not go.

I would also hope that if someone were to extend an invitation, that the person would say that he or she smoked so I could avoid the extremely awkward situation of walking into their house or getting into their car and realizing I cold not breathe.

It would really depend on how much I liked the smoking person. I would have to really, really like them in order to put myself in a position of inhaling smoke. I did that for 19 years of my life (parents smoked like chimneys) and it gave me a good case of asthma that cleared up after I moved out.

I am rarely around smokers now.

To the question: if I was in someone’s house and they lit up in front of me I wouldn’t say anything as it is not my place. If they proceeded to smoke the room blue I probably wouldn’t go back either.

I have had friends who smoked so much that when I went to visit them, I’d have a sore throat from being there even as much as 30 minutes. For those of you who say second hand smoke doesn’t hurt anyone, you are lying to yourself. I’m not willing to do that anymore, but I will put up with a small amount of it if it means being around someone I love, but I would not stay as long as if they didn’t smoke.

My wife has no sense of smell, as well as being deaf.
She went to Oregon last year (an 8 hour drive) to visit some friends who smoke.
After 2 nights, she felt her throat was sore from breathing all the smoke. She came home 6 days earlier than she expected (a major change for someone I can never count on to return when she is supposed to).

If a potential friend turns out to be a smoker, I lose interest in them immediately. I know I won’t be able to spend much, if any time with them, so why bother?

People. WHY are we assuming all cigarette smokers are assholes with no consideration for anyone but themselves?

@Dutchess_III Smokers can’t help it if they stink and their houses stink, and their poison seeps right out of their skin onto every place they sit. It has nothing to do with consideration.

@Dutchess_III I don’t feel that way about smokers. Most of the smokers I know are pretty conscious of others and will ask before lighting up. I really think if you smoke you don’t notice the smell. People who have quit have said that they didn’t realize how their clothes and homes smelled until they stopped smoking. We’re all just saying that we don’t expect smokers to cater to other people in their own homes.

@Dutchess_III, I don’t assume smokers are assholes. I do assume that they have lost their sense of smell and are immune to how they and their homes smell. I would avoid people’s homes that habitually smell of pet urine, mothballs or old trash as well.

@Dutchess_III Good question. It’s been a really long time since a smoker was polite enough to apologize to me for producing a cloud of smoke that I had to walk through to get somewhere. I have noticed a lot of smokers toss out their butts on the ground (littering), or if there is an ash tray outside in front of a store, they will toss the still smoking butt at the tray rather than actually putting it out. Now that’s nasty!

I have one friend who smokes, and SHE is considerate, appologizing for the smell when I come over.

No one would expect a nonsmoker to change their behaviour to accommodate their guests (i.e. allowing smoking in their home), so why should we have to change our behaviour?

If the nonsmokers don’t like it, they don’t have to come over.

That being said, I think that otherwise I’m a very considerate smoker; I take care that my smoke doesn’t go in anyone’s face, I put my cigarettes out in ashtrays etc.

Yes, absolutely. And almost all smokers behave this way in the year 2010. It’s not the 70ies anymore. Smokers use their balcony or patio.

@YARNLADY and @BarnacleBill My house doesn’t stink and my clothes don’t stink. Edward Jones investing is very consincous of how things appeared. When I worked there my new boss mentioned that when I had left the last interview he noticed that I lit a cigarette when I got out to the car. He cautioned me that he didn’t want to smell smoke on me or my clothes. I asked him if I smelled like smoke at that moment. He was standing right next to me and he said “No.” The was about 30 minutes after I had come to work. During the months I was there not once did he ever mention anything again.
When I first started my new job teaching it took my coworkers a month to discover I smoked. They were surprised the first time they saw me with a cigarette.
So….that was an unfair sweeping generalization @YARNLADY AND YOU HURTED MY FEELINGS!! pouting.

@Dutchess_III Please accept my apology, you are indeed a rare exception. I have never been in a smokers house that did not stink. The smoke gets on the furniture, curtains, walls and every other surface.

@YARNLADY I wanna cookie too!! Yeah…IF they smoke inside. Shoot yes it stinks! Stinks bad and I hate it too BUT….MOST people no longer smoke in their houses, though. So, I’m saying that you could walk into many people’s houses and have no idea they’re smokers.

How long does it take not to stink?

Well, clothes until you wash them. It probably takes two, three days of a good airing otherwise. The house…I don’t really know. I know it gets drastically better each day so…a couple of weeks? Depends on how much airflow you get through there.

@faye Replace the furniture, carpets, drapes and paint the entire house, and no one will ever know.

@YARNLADY Truly not necessary.

@Dutchess_III To a smoke sensitive person it is the only way to de-contaminate a house. Nicotine gets in every pore of a smoker’s body, and seeps out on every thing they sit on. It sticks to every surface of a house that regular, inside smokers live in.

If you say so.

@YARNLADY My house doesn’t stink. I don’t smoke in the house, have never smoked in this house. And I take care to make sure that if I smoke on the patio before I leave to go somewhere, that I cover up my shirt with a robe or something so that the smell doesn’t get all over my shirt.

And not all smokers totally lose their sense of smell. I can smell smoke on other people and I can tell chain smokers apart from regular smokers. I can also say that when I lived with my real dad for a year, he did smoke in the house and I could smell it. And it definitely did permeate everything. I would have perfectly clean clothes, hanging in my closet, with the closet door shut, and my clothes still smelled like smoke. And it didn’t matter how many times I washed my hair. Since he smoked in the house, the smell was so strong that my clean, shiny hair still reeked of smoke. Even as a smoker, I could smell that and I hated it.

Febreeze.

@YARNLADY

“Replace the furniture, carpets, drapes and paint the entire house, and no one will ever know.”

Not really. New research has shown that buildings smokers have lived in are contaminated with carcinogens for at least a year afterward, even with these measures.

@crisw Ewwwwww.

@YARNLADY

Yep.

When we move this year, we are going to have to rent for a while, and this is one more thing I’ll have to worry about…

I can only smell smoke on people right after they’ve had a cigarette. When we’re at my in-law’s house and my mother in law goes outside for a smoke, when she comes in the smell on her clothes is really, really strong. It’s pretty bad, even if she had a coat on and has taken it off. It’s always noticeable right after she’s smoked, but other times I don’t smell it. Right now the house they are renting is “smoke free,” but whenever they live someplace where they can smoke inside, she does. I remember once helping her repaint her office in their old house. She spent a lot of time on the computer in that unventilated room, smoking most of the time. When we took the pictures off the walls, you could see the original color of the paint not stained by nicotine and smoke. It was such a dramatic difference. And don’t even get me started on cleaning the windows. :( Even if I smoked, I’d never smoke in my house after seeing that.

Also, I always kind of hated having my kids spend the night with their grandparents when they smoked in the house. Even though they smoked outside while the kids were there, the kids would come home in the morning smelling so strongly of stale cigarettes I had to give them baths and wash their hair as soon as possible. All of their clothes and things had to be washed right away. I’m not even as sensitive to the smell as other people, but when you go to give your toddler a kiss on the head and she smells like she spent the night at a seedy club, it’s pretty nasty. And that was just from the residual smell in their house. The kids were never in the home with them actually smoking. I love that they live someplace where they have to smoke outside because when my kids are at their house for a while they come home still smelling like little kids.

When you live in a house where people smoke, you don’t notice it after a while. You might think your house doesn’t smell like smoke if you smoke inside, but to other people it does.

When I was teaching, it made me really, really sad—and angry—when a little kid would come to school reeking of cigarette smoke.
I can smell the smoke on a smoker immediately after they’ve had a cigarette. I can also smell pepperoni and onions on them immediately after they’ve eaten some!

Yesterday I went to Costco and there was a guy standing right where i parked my car, and he was smoking a cigar. Cigars are the ultimate foulest stench, and I almost felt like saying to him “can you move away so i don’t have to walk past that nasty smoke?”

MY 82-year-old cranky old man smoker left yesterday after having smoked in my garage for three evenings with the door open.

I can smell the old smoke every time I walk through it, again even with the doors open. MIlo finds it repulsive also.

I hate smoking in any enclosed area, even a garage, whether the doors are open or not. You know, at the Hayett Regency in KC, an upscale hotel, their designated smoking area is a glassed in area off of the parking lot. You can’t smoke outside of it. It’s…stinky and the whole environment is insulting, and I don’t get it. Why is it OK to insult smokers?

Go to Mexico @Dutchess_III, (hopefully not that I care anymore!) There’s smoking allowed everywhere.

@faye

Actually, at least in Baja, smoking isn’t allowed in many places, including most restaurants. And, even in restaurants without a no-smoking policy, it’s very rare to see someone smoke. Smoking as a whole seems less common in Mexico, perhaps because most people cannot afford the habit.

@Dutchess_III

“Why is it OK to insult smokers?”

Come on, we have been down this road so many times before… because smoking kills people. Because smoking makes people sick. Because being a smoker doesn’t give you any right whatsoever to inconvenience anyone else because of your addiction.

I should have added outside restaurants or bars. It is extremely hard to quit smoking. Kudos to those of you who never smoked, but you can never understand this.

@crisw Wow. Never would have thought that of you. You take the actions of a few rude smokers and judge the entire group. Petty.

Of course, we can throw the entire “Because smoking kills you,” out of the answer to that question.

Driving kills people. I hate people who drive cars! And motorcycles! And bikes! And Segways (remember that guy?)!

I could go over a list of things that kill people and make people sick that I could hate people for, and insult all of them too. I bet every single one of us on this site does something worth insulting them for, by that logic.

Exactly @Seelix. I do NOT dispute having an area for smokers separate from non-smokers. I do NOT dispute the idea that smokers need to move away from groups when they smoke. I DO dispute the idea that there is ever any excuse for being rude and insulting to a certain group of people. On an individual basis…probably! I’d be lying if I said I never insulted someone under my breath. But it’s the ultimate form of prejudice to insult an entire group of people, sight unseen.

What guy? What Segway?

@Dutchess_III – The owner of Segway died when he drove his Segway off a cliff.

My computer is taking forever to bring that up, but I finally puzzled it out…the owner of the Segway company died in a Segway, right? At first I’m going, “What?” Most people who drive off cliffs do own their car! It would be so rude to drive someone else’s car off a cliff! Wait…it’s up. Oh, that’s good! He drives off a cliff and ”...The exact cause of death is not yet established, the police said.”

Yes, it was the owner of the company – sorry for the confusion!

@Dutchess_III

As far as I can see it, the behavior that you are deeming “rude” is banning smoking in various places or allowing it in only limited places. It is not truly rude or insulting to say “Sorry, no smoking here” or “If you are going to smoke, smoke there.” It’s your addiction. You have absolutely no right to subject anyone else to that addiction. It you don’t like it- stop smoking.

This is not prejudice, because prejudice is an unfounded belief about a group. Smokers produce toxic, filthy, carcinogenic smoke. That is just a fact. And containing and curtailing that smoke is a public good that outweighs the “inconvenience” smokers feel.

@Seelix

Sorry, but your analogy falls flat. We do control and curtail vehicles, in many ways, for the public good. We restrict who can drive them, where they can be driven, how they can be driven, and how they operate. We do this for the public good, and no one has a “right” to drive a car.

Similarly, smoking is restricted for the public good, and no one has a “right” to smoke where they please.

@crisw Well, I can see you read my reply above and realized that you misunderstood me.

@crisw – Smokers have the right to smoke in their own homes. That’s what this question is about, isn’t it?

@Seelix

“Smokers have the right to smoke in their own homes.”

That depends. If they own their own homes, they might (I think it’s immoral to subject children to smoke, for example). But landlords have a right to ban smoking in any property that they own, and more and more apartment dwellers are calling for a ban on smoking in shared buildings, due to the health and environmental hazards caused by smokers (such as the carcinogenic residues they leave behind even after they move, which I cited above, and the fires that they start- smoking is the leading cause of residential fires resulting in deaths.)

All right, fine – I give up.

I don’t think it’s fair for a nonsmoking guest to expect a smoking host to refrain from smoking. There are extenuating circumstances, of course, but in general, that’s how I see it. Question answered, Seelix out.