And you thought the statewide smoking ban in Wisconsin was strict. Try going to school at UW-Stout.
As of September, smoking and all other forms of tobacco use are prohibited on the UW-Stout campus. The tobacco-free initiative follows a pair of referendums passed by the student body banning smoking on campus property.
That means no lighting up outside of class, on sidewalks or in parking lots. When it comes to taking a strong stance against tobacco, UW-Stout students wanted to make their point loud and clear. There's almost no location on campus available to smokers. And I do mean ""almost.""
In order to enforce this over-the-top policy, campus administrators and student leaders took quite an underwhelming approach. Instead of issuing a fine or warning to students caught using tobacco on campus, UW-Stout chose to take the peer pressure route.
If you're caught smoking, your fellow students are supposed to stare you down or give you a card outlining the school's policy. I'm serious.
This method of prevention would seem better fit in a fourth grade classroom than a state university. As far as punitive measures are concerned, this one is on par with a timeout.
I'm not trying to advocate for smoking, and I appreciate the statewide smoking ban that went into effect this summer. The sheer volume of patients receiving treatment in hospitals across the country due to the effects of secondhand smoke speaks for itself.
Even today, anti-tobacco sentiment is gaining traction in Madison--as it should. Smoking is bad for you in all cases, and it makes sense that schools would consider banning it for the health and safety of their students. Recently, Madison College adopted a similar stance, prohibiting smoking on most campus properties.
""Why isn't UW-Madison a leader on this?"" asked Emily Rohloff, a communications specialist for Smoke Free Wisconsin. ""We take a lot of steps to be a leader on different things, why not this?"" Those are tough questions to answer.
Obviously there are huge health benefits to promoting a tobacco-free campus. Students with asthma or a particular sensitivity to secondhand smoke would enjoy the hike to class a whole lot more if they didn't have to walk behind a smoker. And with fewer smokers or victims of secondhand smoke, long-term healthcare costs would significantly decrease.
There are some environmental positives, too. A tobacco-free campus would reduce the amount of toxic trash littering our streets and sidewalks. Cigarette butts aren't biodegradable. Just because you forget about a cig when you toss it doesn't mean it has no impact on the environment.
But the reasoning behind UW-Madison's lack of action seems pretty obvious to me. UW-Stout's enforcement practices simply don't make sense.
If you want to truly and effectively enforce such a sweeping policy, peer pressure is a juvenile effort. Allowing smokers on campus to be victimized by their peers simply diminishes the true authority of the administration's governance. In effect, the initiative's sole purpose is to remind smokers that they are the minority.
This makes campus officials, not smokers, look foolish in the long run. And it would have the same results at UW-Madison.
Imagine what you would do if some random passerby snobbishly handed you a card outlining UW-Madison smoking policies. Personally, I'd throw it on the ground along with my cigarette. So much for helping the environment.
Taking a holier than thou approach would foster a divided campus. Smokers and nonsmokers. Right and wrong. Without structured, definitive punitive measures, the rift would increase with each lit cigarette.
The reasoning behind UW-Stout's tobacco-free policies is just. Smoking and its slough of negative side effects need to be seriously addressed--if not federally, then locally. But they need to approach adequate enforcement realistically.
Stick campus police on students caught smoking on school property. We already do it for bikers and drunk kids. Acting legally and authoritatively responsible is the only way to achieve success when it comes to outlawing anything, and that usually means police involvement is required.
I'm glad UW-Stout is a leading voice on the tobacco-free initiative for multiple reasons. First, they're taking serious strides toward achieving the appropriate steps necessary to address the issue of smoking. Secondly, we get to learn from their mistakes, and peer pressure is a big one.
Dan Tollefson is a senior majoring in English. Please send all feedback to opinion@dailycardinal.com.
