To smoke or not to smoke
UIndy’s smoke-free status may arouse debate over the positives and negatives of this campus feature. Whether a student can’t stand smoke or goes through a pack of cigarettes a day, everyone has an opinion regarding its advantages and disadvantages. Here are a few differing views:
To Smoke
When a student makes the transition from high school to college, the most important change in his or her lifestyle comes in the form of unmonitored freedom. These freedoms include a lack of curfew, a liberal diet, the same outfit worn twice in one week, unlimited Facebook access and experimentation with habits that would otherwise be frowned upon by hovering family members.
Smoking is one such habit, and despite restrictions intended to prevent smokers from satisfying their cravings on campus, they continue to do so, smoke free or not.
And rightly so.
The freedom of speech allows citizens to spew garbage out of their mouths, so why not allow smokers the privilege of sucking it in whenever they choose? Not only does the issue of smoking on campus touch on basic freedoms allowed in the community, it infringes upon the rights of students to make choices about their own bodies.
There’s no need to bombard students with facts regarding smoking and its consequences. That story has been told too many times. What’s the point in stating the obvious if the obvious is only ignored? So before schools enforce a campus-wide smoking ban, they should dig deeper into the topic.
Students are young, immature and engaged in a learning process. If one day the realization that smoking truly isn’t worth it hits a smoker like a slap to a cold cheek, that’s fantastic. However, until then, schools should be more concerned with why college students are lighting up. College is the time of the unknown, when Mom and Dad are no longer prodding their kid along an acceptable path. It can be scary to realize we don’t have that guidance anymore, and students cope in a variety of ways.
Some of them eat each meal like it’s their last and gain the dreaded “Freshman 15.” Sometimes, that warm Styrofoam container filled with golden nachos is the only thing keeping them together. Some of them will take to cat-napping in the library, because at least they’re being lazy in a place of knowledge. Some of them put in an earphone under their hoodies, because the notes will be on Blackboard anyway.
And then there are those who step out of class, find a doorway no one ever uses and take a drag of the sweet nicotine that makes all the anxiety and stress of being an adult disappear like wisps of smoke.
It’s a form of coping.
If campuses wish to wean their students off of smoking, they need to implement rules that prohibit all the other nasty things they do in order to make themselves feel better. That means no more nachos, enforced curfews, no iPods and no napping on the library sectionals.
Nothing drastic needs to be done, unless being realistic falls under that category. Students forever will find ways to be unhealthy during college. So at 10 p.m., as little Jimmy carries a box of nachos back to his dorm, earphones in, he’ll wave hello to the smoker huddled on the steps outside the doors and say, “Do what you’ve got to do.”
And the smoker will say, “Right back at ya.”
-Greg Lyons
Or Not to Smoke
The message of smoking and its negative health risks is nothing new. Yet many choose daily to subject themselves to the health risks and negative effects of smoking. Even though it’s a personal choice, smokers also are choosing to put the health of others around them at risk. It is estimated that the smoker inhales only 15 percent of the smoke from cigarettes. The remaining 85 percent lingers in the air for innocent bystanders to inhale. Studies show that secondhand smoking is the third leading preventable cause of death in the United States, after active smoking and alcohol consumption.
The Centers for Disease Control has found that those who smoke often have secondary behavioral issues such as drug/alcohol use, high-risk sexual behavior and violence. Promotion of a smoke-free campus goes beyond preventing students lighting up on campus; it promotes a healthier lifestyle as well.
According to the American Cancer Society, an estimated 46,000 deaths occur from heart disease in non-smokers and about 3,400 lung cancer deaths in non-smoking adults on average per year.
Students on campus at the University of Indianapolis should not involuntary be subjected to the possibility of severe health risks. Non-smoking students should not be forced to feel as if they are walking into a local bar as they meander about Hanna Ave.
The campus rule regarding smoking dictates that there should be no smoking anywhere on university property, but students all over campus can attest to the fact that they’ve seen smokers lighting up just a few feet from the entrances of the Ruth Lilly Fitness Center, Esch Hall or the dorms.
With the large amount of construction taking place on campus, the fewer things to take away from the beauty of the UIndy campus, the better. Freshman Madison Gross said that having various cigarette butts and litter from cigarette packs around the campus make it look “trashy.” Dangers from secondhand smoke aside, the campus becomes littered and looks sloppy.
Smoking on campus also poses a threat to the environment. Butts from cigarettes are not biodegradable. The plastic filters take years to decompose. They may seem small, but with large numbers of cigarettes trashing the UIndy campus, the toxic chemicals add up. It is quite possible that smokers do not recognize the negative impact they are having on the environment.
If the University of Indianapolis would enforce its policy concerning smoking on campus instead of overlooking it, these kinds of problems would diminish. The issue at hand is not about imposing on the rights of students, but about public health and safety and promoting a cleaner and healthier campus.
-Samantha Stage
