Why ‘social smoking’ has become Gen Z’s new bad habit

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Cynthia Jimenez is a journalist and writer based in Toronto and a former academic intern with The Globe and Mail.

I knew it was becoming a problem when I’d slow down to inhale the smell of cigarette smoke. This has happened, admittedly, a couple of times. When walking down a busy street, after a night out with friends or even on my way to the streetcar from work.

Funnily enough, I used to hate the smell of cigarettes. Up until a couple of years ago, I’d wrinkle my nose at their stench.

As a child, I’d cough obnoxiously when walking by smokers on the street, making a real big show of it. At family events, I’d loudly chastise my father and his friends who claimed to only be “social smokers,” rattling off numerous harmful health effects associated with the habit. Eventually, my father quit smoking.

Now at 23 years old, I am one of these so-called social smokers, and it looks like I’m not the only one. In case you haven’t heard, smoking is back. Apparently.

Looking at the numbers, smoking rates have been decreasing over the past two decades. According to Statistics Canada, current tobacco use in 2022 among young adults (20-24 years of age) and youth (15-19) has remained low at 7.7 per cent and 4.2 per cent, respectively.

And yet, smoking has become an indicator of cool. Even if you specifically do not agree with their coolness, then at the very least one can admit they’ve become a part of a cultural and online fascination.

The cigarette is praised online, from posting dramatic and indie sleaze-style photos with friends, to TikToks about the wonders of a “drunk cig.” An Instagram account called “Cigfluencers” has been dedicated to documenting when celebrities smoke a cigarette or pose with one. The account now has more than 101,000 followers.

And Hollywood seems to be hopping on this trend as well. In 2024, more than half of the top 152 box office films included “tobacco imagery.” In 2025, eight of the 10 films nominated for best picture featured tobacco imagery.

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As my generation indulges in our new bad habit, seemingly giving it little thought, various commentators have been trying to make sense of this trend.

For one, there is an appealing social aspect. Smokers’ circles outside of a bar provide an easy way to make friends, or maybe we’re enticed by the thought of sharing a cigarette with someone we like. Others have pointed to Gen Z’s desire for all things analog, or their nostalgia for anything that might be considered vintage. Between brick phones, CDs and vinyl records, cigarettes seem to fit right in.

Now, years of public health policy implementation have not made smoking an easy habit to pick up. Smoking is no longer allowed in most indoor places, and cigarette packs come with explicit health warnings. In fact, Canada was the first country to add individual health warnings to each cigarette: “Poison in every puff,” right?

Canada’s efforts to reduce tobacco use continue even now; Health Canada is requiring that a series of 13 new graphic images be printed on cigarette packages by Aug. 1. They’re quite disturbing, ranging from the lower half of someone’s face who has had their jaw removed, to mouth cancer, to a crying baby surrounded by smoke in the image of a skull.

I can also still remember a book from my second-grade health class, which taught us about bodily functions, including breathing and our lungs. A little flip-up section demonstrated the difference between a healthy lung, pink and functioning, and an unhealthy lung, horrifyingly turned black by none other than a cigarette.

I can admit, it’s a stupid habit. So why still light them up?

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This problem, my penchant for a smoke here and there, seems to become small in the face of this current moment and the rest of our lives. Even as we joke about “drunk cigs not counting” or decide we’ll only smoke with friends, it has been made very clear to us that smoking is bad for your health. There is no such thing as a cigarette that does not count.

Knowing this, however, I’m still going to pick up a cigarette to try and ease some of the dread I tend to carry now.

Gen Z is sometimes known as an unlucky generation. As we were figuring out who we were in our adolescent years, we lived through a global pandemic. Now, as we enter the work force, youth unemployment is at nearly 15 per cent.

Alongside this labour crisis, more than half of Gen Z are anxious about their finances. An Ipsos poll found that 90 per cent of Gen Z Canadians feel that owning a home is only for the rich. We’re also in the middle of what’s being termed as a “dating recession,” with a Globe and Mail survey finding that only 8 per cent of Canadians are dating right now. And we’re also lacking in connection: a survey conducted in 2024 revealed that almost one in five Canadians between the ages of 15 and 24 “always” or “often” felt lonely.

So, in all honesty, it doesn’t really seem like the world has a lot to offer us. I take it in stride, but with a cigarette lit in between my fingers.

I tried my first cigarette when I was 21 years old. At first, I told myself I’d only smoke under certain conditions, like a night out with friends. Now I find great pleasure and comfort in the act.

I’d never convince someone else to start smoking. If it can be helped, don’t smoke. But amongst those of us who have become quietly resigned, there’s a shared understanding of how we found ourselves here, of the small lifeline a cigarette offers us.

If we can’t control the fact that the world seems to be on fire, then at the very least we can control the flame between our fingertips.