A Generational Ban On Everything

NOTE:  The following is SATIRE!

The UK has just famously passed a generational ban on tobacco.  That is, anyone born on or after January 1, 2009 will be permanently banned from ever buying any tobacco products legally.  Like, ever.  It seems that the days of "prohibition" somehow being a dirty word are quite numbered indeed.

But why stop at tobacco?  Why not apply that to ALL adult rights, privileges, and responsibilities?  Why don't we simply do that the for the age of majority in general?  Based on the general cutoff year for Generation Alpha, how about simply declaring anyone born after January 1, 2010 to be perpetual minors?  Or perhaps until they prove themselves otherwise through some arbitrary tests?  After all, kids today are supposedly taking longer to mature than previous generations, perhaps even a permanent state of arrested development.  So why not have the law reflect that?

If you were born before that date, the status quo rules apply, and you are thus grandfathered in by the skin of your teeth.  You truly lucked out.  But if you were born before that date, you are SOL.

How will this affect you, if born after that date?  Not only will you be forbidden from buying or using alcohol, tobacco, cannabis, or any other age restricted products (there is always the black market to fall back on), but also voting, driving, contracts, consent to sex, marriage, and pretty much everything else.  Oh, and you will also be permanently banned from social media as well.

But don't worry, Gen Alpha, you WILL still be fully able to join the military and go to war at 18 if we, your betters, deem it necessary for you to fight for the wealth of the few....I mean "national security" and "making the world safe for democracy!"  

I mean, it's kinda like those video games you used to be allowed to play before we banned them for your generation as well.  Only when you die, you do NOT respawn, and there is NO reset button.

And if you are caught doing anything illegal, including the new "status offenses" you will be subject to, rest assured that you WILL be tried and punished as adults.  That's because we, your betters, can be as whimsical as we want.  You do what we say, and we'll do what we wanna do.  Because reasons.  Or something.

Now, if you behave yourselves like good boys and girls, we MIGHT just open up a pathway for you to prove yourselves and earn "conditional adulthood".  For a fee, you can go take some tests of our choosing at this newly created agency of ours that looks and feels suspiciously like a clone of the DMV, of course.  If you pass by our arbitrary standards, and we are in a good mood that day, then you will be treated thereafter as a quasi-adult with some of the conditional privileges typically associated with adulthood.  Your ID will be upgraded to reflect that, and will be colloquially known as a "freedom tag" or "passport to freedom".  But remember, this is entirely conditional on following the rules that go along with it.  Break those rules, and you will go back to being a minor, and (in a cartoon villain voice) "you belong to the state".

Those rules include a very strict work requirement, by the way.  You will work wherever we assign you to, for as many hours as we assign you to.  And you shall report directly to your overseer....I mean supervisor, which literally means the same thing, only Latinized to make it sound nicer.  Not like you could get out of all that by remaining a perpetual minor, of course.  You would have to work either way, because we said so.  It will just be done in somewhat better taste as a conditional quasi-adult.

Remember, as the saying goes, "work will set you free".  Which admittedly sounds much better in the original German.

(Wow, that escalated quickly!)

Again this is SATIRE.  So let's keep it that way!

UK's "Generational Ban" On Tobacco Has Passed. What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

Well, it's official now.  The UK's "Generational Ban" on all tobacco products has now become law.  Effective January 1, 2027, this law permanently bans anyone born after January 1, 2009 from buying any cigarettes or tobacco products, herbal cigarettes, or rolling papers.  And yes, like New Zealand's now-repealed effort that would have exempted vape products, the UK's ban does NOT include non-combustible nicotine products, including vapes and presumably pouches, which shall remain at 18 (for now).  Though it does increase restrictions on vaping, banning its use in locations where smoking is already prohibited, the generational ban does not apply to vapes. Thank God for small mercies, right?

Read that again.

It's safe to say that Twenty-One Debunked opposes this generational ban 100%, full stop.  Not because we like tobacco or nicotine products (we do not encourage the use of these things at all by anyone, period), but because it is inherently ageist, illiberal, impractical, and a massive government overreach.  Not to mention it is bloody daft, as the locals would say there.  And it also clearly sets a very questionable precedent as well:  what is the next thing to be banned in like fashion?  Hmmmmm.

The UK should have just kept the age limit at 18.  Their tobacco taxes are already very high, and the black market is rife, so there is not much wiggle room there as a strategy now.  But they could still have done other things to further reduce smoking rates, like 1) cap the amount of nicotine in combustible tobacco, or at least ready-made cigarettes, to a non-addictive level, 2) ban all non-tobacco additives in tobacco products, 3) restrict the sale of tobacco products to only dedicated tobacco stores or other adults-only stores, and stuff like that.  Otherwise, they should butt out.

Meanwhile, the black market is clearly salivating like a Pavlov's Dog as we speak, per the Law of Unintended Consequences....

Australia is already a cautionary tale, with their ridiculously high taxes on combustible tobacco paired with their ban on nicotine-containing vapes.  Imagine this, but at a MUCH larger scale.

(And by "ridiculously high taxes", we mean the price of a pack of legal 20 cigarettes in Australia is a whopping $40 to $50 Australian dollars on average, or $30 to $45 US dollars.  Let that sink in!)

And now, over to you, America.  Those watching this from this side of the pond should take this as a warning, NOT an example!

ERRATUM:  The original version of this article stated incorrectly that this generational ban applied to vapes and pouches, which has since been corrected.  But apparently it does unfortunately apply to (non-tobacco) herbal cigarettes and rolling papers, regardless of whether or not they are used for tobacco.