All you never wanted to know about vaping

I'm somewhat an earlyish adopter here.  That is, beginning back in 2010 before everything found its way into grocery and convenience stores.  That is, before there were physical stores specializing in vaping supplies, back when only a few Internet companies were actually located in the US.  The time when users often had to get everything from the source areas of China. (Even though the original concept was created in the US, the recent methods were pioneered in China.)

Certainly, as far as anyone knows, none of this history and experience necessarily means anything, in the sense of how qualified I am to discuss vaping.   However, in my defense, I'd say there's enough experience there to be at least somewhat qualified to offer some information and opinion on the subject.   Information derived at least partially from those experiences and other experiences like them.  Thus I have at least some first-hand idea of what I'm writing about. 

At the simplest, vaping is just inhaling some sort of atomized/vaporized/heated material or liquid.  In our sense of vaping, vaporizing a particular liquid mix.  There is a heater (a coil made of resistive wire that electrically is put through) and a carrier liquid that is flavored and that much of the time also contains nicotine.   The entire device doing the heating is often called an electronic cigarette.  Many times it is not electronic (just electrical) and is not a cigarette (because nobody is lighting dried vegetable matter on fire).   Yes, if  the process is controlled by circuitry other than just the heater that's pretty much electronic, and often the device itself on purpose resembles a cigarette, and performs much the same function.  An airplane is still not a bird.   Either way though, quibbling about these recently invented terms of e-this and e-that (terms that are perhaps not quite always correct) might not be quibbling worth carrying out.   So we'll just  point out that the terms might not be exactly explanatorily descriptive per definition specifically.

One might believe that as somebody who'd been vaping for a number of years, I'd be claiming that vaping is factually all sorts of things compared to smoking.  Proven to be not as  inconvenient and damaging to self and others, less expensive, and safer.   Not at all.   I'm saying maybe yes, sometimes.   True, in some cases with certain qualifiers.  Depending.

Anyone telling you that vaping is cheaper, better, faster, smarter, safer, healthier?  Either they don't vape and don't know, or they're just making things up.   Yet the same goes for anyone telling you that vaping is more expensive, worse, slower, dumber, more dangerous, unhealthy.  By and large, none of these things are facts and you should be wary of anyone suggesting they are.

That's racist!!!

Just to be clear about this, it's not really about anything in particular, other than an observation about some language-related matters.   That is the misuse and abuse of words.

What is racism?  In the sense of being a noun, it means

A belief that members of each race possess characteristics or abilities specific to that race - especially so as to distinguish that race  as being inferior or superior to another race or races.

Which brings up another question, what is race?

A social concept, where a group of people share similar distinct physical characteristics.

Which leaves us pretty much nowhere, because how can one set of similar distinct physical characteristics be inferior or superior to some other set of similar distinct physical characteristics?   If some group has longer legs and another larger lungs.  If some group has curly hair and another straight.   Why would being of some color or shade (yellow, brown, white, black, red, pink, dark, light) or from some area (continent, section, place; Caucasian, Asian, African, Scandinavian, Pacific Island, Atlantic Ocean, Antarctica) make one of those better or worse than another.    No, some grouping of arbitrary criteria isn't any more or less superior or inferior to another grouping of arbitrary criteria.

If we take some endeavor (say, NASCAR driving) and then look at who is doing the bulk of it to create a group with a name describing in some way its members (say, Rednecks) we might be able to then suggest the reason rednecks are NASCAR drivers is because they're superior at it, and other groups with less people doing that endeavor are inferior at it.      Yet there are other types of competitive sports involving vehicles, so how about F1 drivers, we can make the same sort of statement, suggesting  that Europeans are superior at that because numbers of participants.   But then we're down  whining about which sort of driving is better or worse, and if there are other endeavors where the two groups are equally good or bad and not superior or inferior comparatively to each other.   Or even asking if being able to "drive cars fast" is important to argue about.   The whole idea is as stupid as this paragraph.

Race is an entirely ridiculous concept to begin with.  Your skin color or the size of your face or the length of your nose or the shape of your brain doesn't do anything except perhaps at best make you personally (in that trait) better or worse at doing something.   Say, if you live where the air is thin, and your lungs are bigger, you probably have an advantage at running that somebody who is from where the air is thick and has smaller lungs; unless they are better practiced at running, or have stronger legs, or more endurance just because they do.   Or they have an affinity at building tables made of wood and you don't.

In common usage though, what we might refer to as a race is actually more to the point an ethnicity or a nationality.

But by the heading of race, and being superior to another race (say, by shade, that  as a whole,  brown people are better than pink people)   it's quite possible people (who are brown) living on the US side of a town are superior to people (who are pink) living on the Canadian side of a town   Again, ridiculous even in concept.

Now, let's say that some people live in New Mexico on the southern border of that state. Say also that some people (who some are otherwise exactly the same and who some are instead vastly different) live in Chihuahua on the northern border of that state.    If the people in Chihuahua are against the people in New Mexico immigrating (either legally or illegally) then how can that be racist, or even racially motivated?   It might be nationalistic, or it might be ethnic, or it could be political.   But racist?

Yes, of course, some of the people could have racial reasons for not wanting anyone from the other side of the border coming over.  In the end result though, the social matters between the two groups is about location, and about residency, not about anything else when it comes to the big picture.

It's like suggesting that the two sides of Punjab (state versus province) are racially separated, when it's far more likely the differences are at best religious and political.

But you know what, I hate people who are older than I am.  

How racist is that!