Child-Resistant Lighters

I am probably hopelessly behind current fads in smoking, but I have never bumped into this fact until today.  It turned out that some 18 years ago alcohol industry (and shady junk dealers) in the US lobbied a regulation that made smoking very difficult: lighter users had to rub their thumbs sore to extract a flame out of a lighter. Of course, the official reason for the regulation was like protecting about children, etc.

Just look at what they did to lighters:

A normal lighter, as we all knew it ©

A restrictive American lighter ©

Now, this ring in there makes you push it really hard to turn the igniting wheel. I have no clue if it helped to turn people away from smoking, but this stuff really bothers me now.

As a matter of fact, I use a lighter to fight shield bugs that make it to my apartment through a not-yet-discovered chink. Toasting a bug is a guaranteed way that it won't stink as if you smashed it. But this restricted lighter is not the best weapon because my thumb hurts, and I have to retreat from bugs :) I would remove the ring if it wasn't so damn hard wired into the case of my lighter.