What if you already have a health problem like asthma which may or may not be caused by pollution or second-hand smoking?
Then you need clean air dammit or the resulting lung irritation can screw up your entire week breathing-wise (the asthma attack itself is only part of the fun; you get to try to suppress the symptoms over the next couple of days with various medicine knowing that you're only suppressing the symptoms.
Of course, if you don't spend an hour in a room full of smokers but only near a guy smoking a single cigarette, then maybe the only effect you'll feel is that of your lungs cramping up depending on the severity of your asthma.
That is NOT a pleasant feeling, and so I would like people to ASK if it's okay to light a smoke before they do so - in Denmark 10% of the population has asthma to some degree and I think it's safe to assume that it's about the same for the rest of the industrialized world.
This means that if one in ten asks you to please open the damn window it may not be just because they're hysterical health freaks but are planning on doing some breathing later in the day too.
Think about it.
#ifdef <flame.h>
I can only attribute wharfingers writeup to ignorance because it's not anything near witty enough to be called sarcasm - in short, write me down as offended :P
#endif