This is the monster that anti-tobacco willingly created

A Canadian family who are petrified of imaginary cigarette smoke

Ban smoking in homes, Maple Ridge family urges city hall

And because of their silly, childish and unfounded fears, they want a total ban on smoking in peoples homes. Not just rented properties but all of them.

The Krossa family of Maple Ridge - Wendell, Rena and their children Kyle, 17, Kelsey, 15, and Kieran, 10 - are irritated by cigarette smoke wafting over from their neighbours. The family wants to see local government step in with legislation .

A unique rights battle is shaping up in Maple Ridge, as a family that fears for its safety because of second-hand smoke seeks to snuff out a neighbour's freedom to puff cigarettes on private property.

Citing the "very real health threat to our three children and the two special-needs people who live with us, as well as to ourselves," Wendell and Rena Krossa have written to the municipal council and provincial officials, asking for a municipal residential smoking ban.

Just take a look at that terrified family standing outside their detached house. That's right, detached.

The Krossas' single-family home in the 10,000-block Beecham Place is separated from their neighbours' by a gap of not much more than two metres in the area of the back patio, where the neighbouring couple generally smoke once or more daily, according to the Krossas.

There is a full two metre gap separating these properties, yet the Thick Family actually believe that cigarette smoke is drifting from one property to the other, and in through the windows.

They say "an awful lot" of cigarette smoke wafts into their home, and they can't bear to be continually rushing to shut their windows or leaving their own home while the air clears.

"It is a really distressing thing, because you never know when you have to run and shut the window," Rena Krossa said.

Can you believe these people? Can you? The life they must lead, a premature death from cardiac arrest must await them long before it does the average smoker. They must live their lives in constant fear.

Above all, it is the "overwhelmingly proven dangerous threat to human health" posed by the neighbours' cigarette smoke that burns the Krossas.

Passive smoking is bunkum to begin with. Environmental tobacco smoke drifting from one detached property to another and actively seeking out the occupants within is the stuff of lunacy, yet that's where the Tobacco Control Industry is taking us.

Last summer, Wendell Krossa says, he politely asked his neighbours to mitigate the threat by smoking in their front yard. The neighbours at first agreed and that helped somewhat, but they have since returned to the backyard smoking, he says.

They should have told him to take a leap. Indulging these lunatics only makes them worse.

"I don't want to argue with people's right to smoke, but it doesn't include exposing other people against their choice," Wendell Krossa said.

But that isn't happening here. The neighbours aren't coming into your house and blowing smoke up your noses, they're smoking on their own property, in the open air.

He has informed his neighbour, Scott Urquhart, that he plans to publicly push for municipal or provincial legislation around a private residence smoking ban or safe buffer zone, as well as approach the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal and consider a civil court action.

Krossa says he has consulted an anti-smoking expert who suggests about 500,000 people in B.C. face similar problems with second-hand smoke, and his family is ready to lead the fight for others.

I would like to laugh and say good luck with that, you hopelessly sad twit, but these days you can never tell where the next ban might come from.

"[Wendell Krossa] makes it sound like we deliberately stand underneath his window and blow smoke into it," Urquhart[the neighbour] said.

"Every time we let the dog out back, he's running around slamming the windows and having a Tourette's fit, cursing."

Sounds like a complete tool. Hand waving and fake coughing from the righteous is bad enough, running round slamming windows sounds like the stuff Laurel and Hardy movies are made of.

Urquhart said the Krossas can knock themselves out legally and talk to all the politicians they want, but he believes their efforts will be in vain.
"We've already spoken to city council, and until the Canadian government actually bans smoking, this bylaw will never touch us as far as smoking on our property.
"It's a private property, and what we choose to do inside or outside [on] the property is our business.
"So if you don't want to hear people and you don't want to smell people, don't buy a house that is separated by eight feet."

Your overconfidence is your weakness. You might not think you will ever be affected by smoking bans on your own property but you're just not familiar with the vindictiveness and effectiveness of anti-tobacco bullies.

Maple Ridge Mayor Ernie Daykin said he has reviewed the Krossas' letter and he understands their concerns, but the municipality would be hard-pressed to enforce smoking regulations on private property, both for practical and legal reasons. "This is a new area and it is interesting, and we are looking at our smoking bylaw right now," Daykin said. "But I'm not sure this is practical and enforceable."

You see? He didn't say get lost you utter fruitcake, which is what he should have said. He said they want to do it but just don't know how to yet. Their time will come though.

You know they want this. They just have to figure out how to get it. Idiots like the Thick Family will help them on their way.