Student Smackdown: Smoking on campus
Issue date: 2/5/10 Section: Opinion
Alicia Naish-Chadwick: Thank you for not smoking.
North Georgia should ban smoking completely!
A university that allows smoking, essentially condones smoking. Which means that the university is putting your health at risk.
To all the smokers: think of this as North Georgia taking a step to preserve your life. If you still want to smoke and do not care about the harmful effects of this bad habit, then think about the family that you have now or will have in the future.
Do you really want them to see you suffer through the medical problems that are known for afflicting people who smoke?
Do you want to see your kids graduate from high school or college, and one day see them get married or have kids of their own?
What about the health risk for your family or friends?
If you are smoking around them, you are putting them in just as much harm. Do you really want to chance having to take them to the hospital because they cannot breathe or watch them suffer from cancer?
Everyone who smokes has his or her own right to do so.
But what about the people who do not want to have the toxicity of smoking anywhere near them? Where are their rights?
If you want to smoke, keep it to yourself. Smoke in your own car or house, away from those that would rather not be affected by your habit.
Please, I ask you to think about yourself and those who are closest to you the next time you decide to light up another cigarette.
Katie Gardner: Smoke shack talk.
People should have the right to smoke.
People should have the right to not breathe that smoke. The solution?
Designated smoking areas.
Fortunately, here on campus we have designated smoking areas, they are called smoke shacks. They were designed with smokers in mind.
They are places that people can go to smoke, that others can stay away from if they don't want to breathe in the smoke. We shouldn't take away those areas because some people don't like to breathe in smoke; we don't ban cutting grass because people don't like to breathe in the cut grass.
The people who smoke are, at this stage in life, old enough to make the decision about whether or not to smoke. And, they are young enough to quit if they started smoking without thinking.
Banning smoking on campus will not make people stop smoking, and it will not make people think about what they are doing.
North Georgia should ban smoking completely!
A university that allows smoking, essentially condones smoking. Which means that the university is putting your health at risk.
To all the smokers: think of this as North Georgia taking a step to preserve your life. If you still want to smoke and do not care about the harmful effects of this bad habit, then think about the family that you have now or will have in the future.
Do you really want them to see you suffer through the medical problems that are known for afflicting people who smoke?
Do you want to see your kids graduate from high school or college, and one day see them get married or have kids of their own?
What about the health risk for your family or friends?
If you are smoking around them, you are putting them in just as much harm. Do you really want to chance having to take them to the hospital because they cannot breathe or watch them suffer from cancer?
Everyone who smokes has his or her own right to do so.
But what about the people who do not want to have the toxicity of smoking anywhere near them? Where are their rights?
If you want to smoke, keep it to yourself. Smoke in your own car or house, away from those that would rather not be affected by your habit.
Please, I ask you to think about yourself and those who are closest to you the next time you decide to light up another cigarette.
Katie Gardner: Smoke shack talk.
People should have the right to smoke.
People should have the right to not breathe that smoke. The solution?
Designated smoking areas.
Fortunately, here on campus we have designated smoking areas, they are called smoke shacks. They were designed with smokers in mind.
They are places that people can go to smoke, that others can stay away from if they don't want to breathe in the smoke. We shouldn't take away those areas because some people don't like to breathe in smoke; we don't ban cutting grass because people don't like to breathe in the cut grass.
The people who smoke are, at this stage in life, old enough to make the decision about whether or not to smoke. And, they are young enough to quit if they started smoking without thinking.
Banning smoking on campus will not make people stop smoking, and it will not make people think about what they are doing.
Be the first to comment on this story