<p>“If you look over the actual policies that FIRE takes issue with, you’ll realize that you’ve potentially run afoul of parts of it every day.”</p>
<p>Pretty much my point (and true of WUSTL and virtually any other university with the red light - which seems to be quite common among the rated schools). Not that the fact that every school has similar “issues” is any excuse. Just seems the scrutiny is rather “strict.” And to use this particular “finding” as a bellweather for … well… anything… seems a bit extreme. But then, you live there and I don’t - so take my comments for what little they are worth.</p>
<p>I completely agree with what someone said before. If you want to ban cigarettes to avoid secondhand smoke and people unwillingly walking into a crowd of smokers, that is understandable. I disagree with the ban on all tobacco products. If someone uses dip (snuff tobacco), this has absolutely no effect on anyone but themselves. If they are 18 years old and wish to use a type of tobacco that has absolutely no effect on any other person, why should they be disallowed to do so (even though I find it highly unlikely that anyone will be reprimanded for having non-smoked tobacco in their possession.)</p>
<p>Since it is a private university, WUSTL has the (legal and moral) right to ban whatever it wants. If it feels that it is serving the needs of its community better by banning tobacco, it should do so.</p>
<p>I certainly feel that the university is serving my needs better by allowing me to walk anywhere on campus without having to inhale secondhand smoke.</p>
<p>No one said Wash U didn’t have the legal right to do this. Being private has nothing to do with having a moral right. Everyone has an obigaton to do the moral thing, although many would disagree with you that this is a moral issue. I could also quibble with you whether banning a legal substance is moral, and I have never smoked a day in my life. If Wash U can make it so no one else is subjected to secondhand smoke without banning tobacco entirely, which it easily can, then why should it tell people what they can or cannot intake? And what about the point regarding chewing tobacco? By your reasoning, they have the obligation to ban fattening foods, and they should require everyone to attend a 30 minute exercise period every day. And since everyone would be better off if they studied a certain amount every day, without exception, let’s require that too. After all, procrastinating causes stress, and stress is bad. But we will have to do away with all the labs and research, because no matter how careful we try to be people will be exposed to some amount of nasty solvents. That would certainly be serving the needs of the community, whether they know it or not. Oh, let’s just figure out what makes the ideal life and tell everyone that goes to Wash U and works at Wash U that is exactly what they have to do. What could serve the community better than that?</p>
<p>I’ll admit that i’m biased by my family background, but smoking kills people. Moderate amounts of stress, fattening foods, etc. have zero effect on lifespan. But there is no “moderate” amount when it comes to smoking, it destroys your lungs, whether it does so quickly or slowly. If there were no such thing as secondhand smoke it would have no effect on my opinion of this ban — there is no good reason to allow smoking.</p>
<p>/rant
That being said, I think limited smoking areas, information on the risks of smoking, and free medication to help people quit probably would have been a more reasonable first step.</p>
<p>I agree with everything that is mentioned. hahaha. I think that the ban on smoking could help some people. But then again I know people that smoke and they have tried quitting… but it’s not as easy as you think even with all those therapies out there to help people quit. So I dunno. I feel that it’s a bit discriminatory like…they can’t help that they’re addicted. But then again it might give them more of a motivation to stop. But… who knows.</p>
<p>well said fallenchemist. i will preface my statement by saying that I, too, have never smoked in my life, and yes, I am somewhat happy that I won’t have to deal with the smoke. however, I think WashU is somwhat overstepping its bounds. They are legally allowed to do so, but I believe it would be more beneficial to restrict it to certain areas because although I believe WashU can and should promote no-smoking policies, I also believe they should not be making a life-style choice such as this.</p>
<p>Hi Don Q - I do understand your point. However, I don’t agree with your saying “If there were no such thing as secondhand smoke it would have no effect on my opinion of this ban — there is no good reason to allow smoking.” Not the opinion part, of course that is yours to have, but the implication of it. It smacks of a tyrannical nanny state. Let’s go with what you say and suppose there was not a secondhand smoke issue. People obviously derive pleasure from smoking, presumably that is why they do it, even if it is a drug induced effect. In the end all pleasure is tied up in our dopamine receptors or whatever. This is just an artificial way to do it. Not to my taste, but that is my choice to make for myself. My real point is, that what you are saying is that it can kill you so we should ban it since it has no useful purpose other than pleasure and can cause grave harm. OK, then we should also ban skydiving, since a faulty parachute would mean a 100% chance of death and there is no real social benefit. The planes waste fuel, even. My point is in life people constantly make judgements of risk vs. benefit, even if that benefit is only transitory pleasure.</p>
<p>I would also quibble with your saying fattening foods have zero effect on life span. I think any of the cardio people at Wash U med would disagree, as would all the people that think obesity is one of our more alarming trends in this country, which also goes to the lack of exercise issue. I know these bans are the trend regarding smoking, but just be aware that it truly does open the door further to having more aspects of your life and choices being controlled.</p>
I don’t have a problem with that, only with smoking in public.</p>
<p>I don’t think outright banning of any substance is morally correct, but banning it when it has a negative impact on other people is morally correct. People should be free to damage their own bodies as they please, but not at the expense of others.</p>
<p>srunni - yes, of course I totally agree that if it is unreasonably negatively impacting others (as opposed to small inconveneinces) then a ban is justified, and I agree that secondhand smoke in public falls into that category. I guess it was just easier for Wash U to ban it completely than to set up special areas. I even have some sympathy with that position, but not enough to think that they shouldn’t have at least made an effort to accomodate those that are hooked yet need to keep their jobs with Wash U, especially in these hard economic times.</p>
I phrased that poorly - I meant to say “Moderate amounts of stress, [moderate amounts of] fattening foods, etc, have no effect on lifespan. There is no moderate amount of smoking.” But that’s kind of beside the point i guess.</p>
<p>For what it’s worth, here’s the explanation of the policy (FAQ) from the healthy living website:</p>
<p>Well, that just confirms they are taking an attitude of “we know best, let us run your life if you want to associate with us”. Of course not smoking would be best, no one seriously argues with that. I will just say I told you so when they take the next step in telling you how to live a healthy life.</p>
<p>^^ They’re not necessarily saying they know best, nor are they offering to run anybody’s life. They’re merely saying “if you want to smoke, do it on somebody else’s property.”</p>
<p>People can go off campus and smoke their brains out. They’re not prohibiting smoking. They’re saying “not in my backyard.”</p>
<p>I’ve had the same policy at my house for the 16 years I’ve lived here, and nobody has complained yet. ;)</p>
<p>heyalb - I absolutely have that in my house as well, always have. And yes, I was using a little hyperbole to make a point. But while you can compare Wash U’s legal right to do this to your own right to prohibit in your house (both private property), which I never debated, you cannot compare them otherwise as you are not an institution employing thousands of people and having accepted even more thousands of students. If they had hired/accepted them with that understanding, I would have more sympathy for their action, but it seems very unfair to do it this drastically. Also, when you look at the wording of the quote that Don Q placed above, they are absolutely saying saying they know best. “We need to effectively eliminate the triggers (like smoking shelters) that make smoking cessation difficult. To spend money to erect or maintain such structures would be giving tacit approval of smoking, not the message we want to give to our community.” That says nothing if not “We as an institution disapprove of smoking to such an extent that if you want to have anything to do with us on a more than transitory basis, you damned well better not smoke or use tobacco of any kind. And because we think it is best that you quit, we will do anything we can to make you do it.” And when you live on the campus or are there for 8-10 consecutive hours per day, they are in fact running a part of your life. They do it in lots of ways, most of which are widely accepted codes of conduct. Of course it seems quite laudable on the surface, but IMHO it is overreaching as to their role in the lives of those more than casually associated with the university. They are not these people’s parents. Last time I checked, tobacco was still legal, for better or worse.</p>
<p>From what I understand, this is not yet a sure thing. They have a year (or so) to make a decision about this and they’re waiting on student feedback.</p>
<p>balancedhelium, as I understand it, this plan has been long in the making, and the Medical campus was a testing ground. Now that they’ve had a bit of experience, they intend to impose it everywhere, and it is a matter of fact rather than an issue they intend to open for review. Indeed, we know from Ben Guthorn (president of the College Democrats and apparently an SU senator) that “Jill Carnaghi warned at last nights [sic] Senate meeting that certain decisions are just made and do not require input from faculty, students or university employees.” And this was in the context of a post to the SU blog he made about the tobacco ban.</p>
<p>I haven’t even matriculated and already I’m extremely frustrated with some of WashU’s initiatives and new policies. This is the latest in what seems like a steady and unending stream of half-thought out ideas that are negatively affecting many people on campus. </p>
<p>One good example is the water bottle ban. The past 2 times I have been on campus, I’ve come back dehydrated from a lack of water. The first time, I was confused when I couldn’t find bottled water at any of the events I went to (only soda) and just assumed the university was being cheap. The second time, I brought my Nalgene (and found out about the ban) but still was unhappy. The water in the fountains was often not very cold at all. I forgot my Nalgene somewhere halfway through my visit and I could only have water if I was at a meal or taking a quick sip at the water fountain. Once, I tried to get water from the soda dispenser in Bear’s Den and it had either run out of water or wasn’t working. I came home and googled the whole thing, and to me, it just seems like WashU relishes in being the first university to do something all the time. It doesn’t seem like there was any sort of campaign to get students to understand the implications of bottled water and then let them make their own choice as to whether or not they want to buy it. It also doesn’t seem like they understand how this could hurt the eternally rushed and forgetful college student and how it inadvertently promotes a product (soda) that is terrible for you. Also, it’s hard for me to believe that the university cares so much about the environment and wastefulness when they are famed for sending students inane amounts of mostly useless mail. I’m not well-versed on recycling paper vs. plastic so there isn’t much I can argue, but I can say that the whole thing is very frustrating because it seems they just wanted to take the most radical option. The university has control over how things are recycled on their campus while they don’t at the homes of prospective students. Instead of just getting rid of bottled water, they could have launched some sort of program that included education programs that show how the bottels are produced, what happens after they are recycled, etc, and placed more recycling bins around campus. Based on a small amount of research, I found that it is true that most of the time plastic bottles that are placed in recyling bins are not actually recycled into new bottles, but I also found that there are number of companies pioneering techniques to do so. By supporting these efforts (apparently they are having trouble getting their hands on bottles since plastic companies don’t want to lose their monopoly), they could have made a stand that would benefit the entire country rather than just make the university look ‘good’. A plastic bottle ban is simply impossible for most college campuses (they can’t afford losing the revenue) and will never become the norm, but true recycling is something that could one day spread to all neighborhoods and cities. </p>
<p>Another thing that angered me was the fact that the University cut costs on a Staff Appreciation Day to cut costs since their endowment down. I was outraged. I find it ridiculous that the University looked their whole budget and decided that the one day out of the year when they appreciate the people who have devoted years of their lives to the school was a waste of money. I can point out some better wastes of money (okay, that’s an oxymoron :)) simply by looking at the way that WashU went about recruiting me and a few others I know to their Class of 2013.
Mailings. I recieved some of the same brochures about 4 or 5 times at various points in the year, as if I hadn’t already seen them. They are one of the few universities that still sends a copy of the paper common app. They mail stuff like that without even asking you if you want it. They mail the most unecessary things priority and express. Almost none of the things that I got FedExed to me were urgent, save a few travel documents. Why do they need to spend $5 to mail me my decision letter 2-day priority? I already found out online a good 3 weeks before I expected to hear back anyway! Same thing with scholarship stuff, visit stuff…it’s a humongous waste. If they want people to get stuff fast, just make the decisions faster and mail them earlier.
Free flights. I know WashU is trying to build a reputation, attract great students, blah blah blah, but they are kind of crazy with this sort of thing. I, and a few other people I know have been flown to campus for free THREE times, each time costing around $350 for a grand total of $1000 wasted on the same person, multiplied times however many people they’ve done that for. I heard they spent HALF A MILLION dollars on Multicultural Weekend, a large majority I’m sure was for flying every single person out. I’m not going to say I wish WashU wouldn’t have paid for me (if they hadn’t, I would have applied/been going), but I’m going to have to admit it’s a huge waste of cash on their part. They could save so much money by implementing limits on the number of times a single person can get their flight paid for. They really should do what other unversities of its caliber do and make people apply to get flown out instead of just throwing the money out there. A good percentage of people at MC weekend only went because it was a free vacay and weren’t even considering WashU as one of their top choices (granted the weekend could change this, but it’s still a huge assumption). These people don’t deserve a free flight, especially when there are other students of non-color who want to visit badly and aren’t even given information on how to potentially get a free flight (but I digress). I could have afforded to visit WashU and so could many of those other students. Other dumb things: paying for ED students to visit and paying for me and the other people in my scholarship class to fly to orientation.
Food. I know it’s probably very hard to predict how much food to make and things like that, but when my host and her suitemates are able to steal multiple pies after an event has ended and comment that they would have taken more if they had enough room in their mini fridge because there were dozens left, something is wrong. I applaud the uni for making cook-to-order extremely common in all their dining halls, but they are super wasteful when it comes to their catered events. The university not only provided way too much food at very short intervals, but they also gave us meal cards with $35 worth on them which people used pretty much just because they could. On one of the weekends, we had dinner and then went straight to the bowling alley where there was a full spread of food. I think it should be either the cards or the catered food, not both. If you don’t like the food, that’s your problem- bring granola bars or something if you don’t want to spend your own money.</p>
<p>I don’t even have any words for the tobacco ban, except I’m pretty sure this is the worst offense of all. People can deal with not having the Staff Appreciation day, they can buy bottled water off campus, but there is very little that can be done with the smoking ban. Like many have said (on here and the Facebook group that is against this policy), you already cannot smoke in builidngs or 15 feet near them. That is enough that someone who doesn’t want to encounter secondhand smoke will not have to unless they choose to. This is a clear violation of personal rights. NIH did something like this and as far as I can see, there has been no positive effect. I’ve seen people from staff to PI’s (top of the research food chain) hiding to smoke or hoping the fence during breaks.</p>
<p>I won’t argue with some of the stuff in your post, although interestingly the Chancellor Wrighton announced in a recent letter that the University will apparently be scaling back on the mailings they sound out. I think I read that right anyway. I have no issues with the water-bottle ban — once you’re on campus it’s easy enough to find places to fill a water bottle up — although I’ve already lost the nalgene they gave us at the beginning of the year and have been just grabbing disposable cups from the DUC to carry around with me since then, which basically defeats the purpose… They really should ban bottled soda as well if they’re going to ban bottled water, although i wouldn’t be surprised if that would cause Bon Appetit some legal issues… </p>
<p>I guess i’d just say that a lot of things the University does are good ideas, half-way implemented. In an ideal world, there would be no tobacco (or at least no lung cancer), no disposable beverage containers, and no recession. Despite the fact that this isn’t a perfect world, there’s maybe something to be said for taking steps in that direction, even if it isn’t doing any good at the time.</p>
<p>I would love to see a smoking ban on campus. Too often are there flocks of smokers outside the library and every other major building on campus. If someone wants to damage their own lungs, then they are by all means welcome to do so. However, given that I can’t walk in and out of many buildings without breathing a few lungfuls of smoke, the issue becomes a public health concern.</p>
<p>That said, I do not understand smokeless tobacco. Additionally, I wonder if the tobacco ban will include possession of tobacco, as I do not have a problem with people carrying a pack of cigarettes so long as they don’t light them up in my face.</p>
<p>As for the bottled water ban, I still buy my bottled water off-campus in cases, at far lower prices. While I also have a reusable bottle, I still find it more convenient to have bottled sometimes. I’d much rather see a proliferation of recycling bins.</p>
I think that the ban on smoking could help some people. But then again I know people that smoke and they have tried quitting… but it’s not as easy as you think even with all those therapies out there to help people quit. So I dunno. I feel that it’s a bit discriminatory like…they can’t help that they’re addicted. But then again it might give them more of a motivation to stop. But… who knows.</p>