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If you’re hankering for a hit of nicotine, take time to revel in the experience.
Zyn is the no-nonsense substance that delivers dopamine to the nicotine fiend without unnecessary steps. Forget the 10 minutes of leisure afforded by a smoke break — savor the steady drip of a nicotine IV that shoots into your bloodstream without wasting a moment of your day.
A nicotine pouch takes out the leisure and conviviality of smoking and provides a continuous rush you enjoy in the solitude of your own mouth. The last thing a culture facing an epidemic of loneliness needs is a substance that offers the user contentment and mental stability without the help of others. It’s borderline addict behavior to trigger pleasure hormones with the sheerly utilitarian activity of popping in a pod.
I’m not advocating that you pick up a pack of cigarettes. The effects of nicotine are too destructive. Studies deceivingly indicate that nicotine is beneficial for mental health because it releases neurotransmitters such as dopamine and serotonin. Short term — yes, it improves memory and mood. But it only does this by raising the levels of dopamine your brain needs.
Once you start relying on nicotine, it’s a catch-22. Over time, the buzz is less potent and the crashes are more devastating, and you need more nicotine to produce the same effect. That’s why Zyn sales increased 641% from 2019 to 2022: Nicotine makes addicts.
But if you’re already an addict and looking to expand your options, or if you’re new to the sport and thinking about sampling these enhanced breath mints, think again. Zyn is not an innocent alternative to “white trash” cigarettes — it has its own host of vices.
Zyn’s essentially the “soma” pleasure drug from Aldous Huxley’s “Brave New World”: “All the advantages of Christianity and alcohol; none of their defects.” It’s not just that people around you are unaware that you’re currently absorbing chemicals — you’re hardly aware when you grab a bag. An instant, disguisable pouch you can slide between gum and cheek just before a dull class or business meeting does away with the stigma, smell, and time-suck of smoking. For the perfectly manicured youth with an attention span shorter than a goldfish, Zyn removes the biggest disincentives to consuming nicotine.
There’s a lot less to stop you from Zynning when you’re in too deep. You don’t even need to puff a vape, let alone step outside and send acrid smoke signals to every student walking into Kendall Hall that you’ve decided to light a cigarette.
They say don’t drink alone, not just to keep yourself in check, but also because it’s far more enriching to crack a beer with a friend than to have a solitary drink in front of your television. Drinking and smoking in community shifts your purpose from pounding substances to chatting with your pals.
Sure, you pass a tin around to your buddies in the back of class, but you suck on your “upper deckies” alone. It’s not the same as standing around to catch a light from a friend and smoking to the very butt of the cigarette because your reprieve from homework only lasts as long as your cigarette does.
If you’re bound and determined to have a bad habit, humanize your nicotine with a community smoke with an album cover aesthetic.
Francesca Cella is a junior studying English.
