For the children: School to ban smoking, even in parking lot, lest a kid see an adult smoking

[The Straight Story]

Curbing smoking means changing norms
While education is important to curb smoking, health officials say the best approach is through societal changes, and that takes banning lighting up nearly everywhere

“The best bang for your buck is not going into schools. We’ve done it for years and we’ve seen the tobacco initiation rate stalled,” said Theresa Knox, her voice taking on the tone of someone telling you a trade secret. “The best bang for your buck is these system-wide changes — but it takes time.”

Grand Forks Public Health’s tobacco prevention coordinator was explaining why her department wasn’t putting as much emphasis on going out and talking to people about the dangers of tobacco as it seems to do in encouraging various powers that be to impose indoor and even outdoor smoking bans.

Her point was that public health has reached a point of diminishing returns when it comes to educating children about tobacco. That is, less education might mean more kids smoking, but more education won’t necessarily mean more kids not smoking. Now, public health wants schools to ban smoking everywhere on campus, including outside in the parking lot, so kids don't see any parent or teacher smoking and think that smoking is in any way a normal, everyday activity, even if only a few do it.

The difference between the two is that the former is persuasive and the latter leverages the coercive power of local government and employers. And it may explain a little why tobacco control policy, while it may be winning the war of public opinion, seems to get a lot of grief in the process.

http://www.grandforksherald.com/event/article/id/195773/

[WolverineDG]

1. what next? Banning parents from smoking in their own homes?

Where do these control freaks stop?

dg

[Snoutport]

2. In Portland there is no smoking on any school grounds.

Inside, outside, up a tree.

Kids learn from modeling...smoking in front of them is teaching them to smoke whether we like it or not.

[dsc]

3. honestly most school districts do that

Teachers who smoke have to leave campus to do so at my school. And this is in North Carolina.

[rug]

4. Maybe they can stop glorifying the miltary inside the school.

[Dappleganger]

5. Not on school campuses, and many businesses (large ones)

prohibit it on their property. They have that right, I support it.

[MountainLaurel]

11. Our hospital system is about to

No smoking on any of its property. Can't wait to see the PR nightmare when patients still on their IVs have to roll across the street to the convenience store parking lot to light up. (Now they go out to a designated mini-park area in front of the hospital.)

[bhikkhu]

6. School grounds are non-smoking grounds most everywhere

...as far as I know. That was the case in CA in the 70's, in Washington and Oregon as well.

Its hard for me to imagine anyone defending the addiction of children and adults to one of the most insidious killing products devised by the richest and most inherently evil multi-national corporations on the planet.

If tobacco killed more quickly, they would have to engineer it to slow it down. Profit margins are healthiest where it sucks your life slowly, and keeps you dependent and paying through your working years.

[The Straight Story]

7. Smoking in your own car on school grounds, can't see a problem with it

I defend people's rights to do things.

Abortion kills a living creature, so would you call it a killing machine too? Do you want to pass laws to stop it?

I can't have one, have no skin in that game, but I still defend someone's right to do it (but if I defend smokers, I am doing because I am biased. Defend pot smokers too, and I don't smoke pot - but then, some folks don't have an argument so they trot out bias).

Your eating habits, and those of others, are killing them too. So how about no fast food in your car, a kid might see the bag and go instantly insane and rush out for junk food.

[bhikkhu]

13. Public and private are the relevant concepts

What people do in their private lives is no business of mine, while what is done in public is public business. Of course there's no end to complications to the whole thing, but that's the basic principle. In any case, it applies very simply to the ground of a public school building, which are not in any way private, and where personal addictions have no place.

[DaisyDeedles]

8. I think stuff like this might backfire.

It could make smoking look like an exotic "forbidden fruit" to kids and tempt them into trying it. JMHO.

[woo me with science]

9. Yeah, much better to have teachers in withdrawal on the job.

It'll keep the kiddies alert! :evilgrin:

[FLPanhandle]

10. I'm surprised there are still schools that allow smoking on property

I assumed the days of the smokey teachers lounge had gone the way of the dinosaurs.

[Berserker]

12. Only Assholes

smoke around kids. It used to piss me off when I was asked if I wanted a smoking area in a restaurant when I had a child with me. Do you mean people are that fucking stupid as to sit and smoke around their children? At last we have no smoking in restaurants, Fuck smokers.