<p>Coming to college, one of the first things I noticed was the prevalence of smoking. I didn't think very many young people smoked, knowing the destruction of health associated with it. Also it has quite a negative stigma.</p>
<p>While it stands to reason that in high school a few "Greaser" types may have been smokers, but it seemed to me like 99% of the college bound students were not.</p>
<p>I don't get it and I HATE smoking. Is college VERY VERY VERY stressful or something?</p>
<p>-They think it’s cool.
-They are likely away from home for the first time.
-They have no self-control. </p>
<p>I’m amazed by the number of people that will go out in the parking lot and smoke between classes (the campus is tobacco free). If they can’t make it until the end of the day to smoke, I can’t see them making it through college. Not to be a jerk here, but it’s the fault of employers too. Stop giving people smoke breaks. Me and my friends joke about taking up smoking so that we can actually get breaks at work. </p>
<p>I’m a smoker, I’m in my third year, and I have a 4.0 with a ton of honors credits. Smokers aren’t going to make it through college? I think that’s a pretty silly generalization.</p>
<p>Why does it matter to you if people go out to the parking lot to smoke between classes? You can do as you choose on your break. It’s not always a matter of “not being able to wait.” It’s just what most smokers choose to do to pass the time. The smoking areas are often cultural hubs. Some of the most intelligent and insightful conversations I’ve ever had on my campus have been in the smoking areas. </p>
<p>Smoking is bad and you shouldn’t do it. You should be able to talk to people and have something more common then we all like to smoke.</p>
<p>They’re idiots. Yes, I’m judgemental.</p>
<p>Most smokers start before college, often in middle school or frosh year at high school. All local cultures are not alike. At one high school it might only be the greasers. At another it might be the goths and emos. At another it might be the theater people. At another it might be the jocks or the preps. It really has very little to do with being a good person or a rational person.</p>
<p>Some smokers start in college because they are without a lot of strict supervision for the first time and want to try being “naughty.” I always thought these kids were a little silly.</p>
<p>I too have been baffled by seeing otherwise smart, educated kids smoke at college, some of them for the first time in their lives. I’ve asked a couple of them why, and have been told that at large parties or other gatherings where they feel awkward, it gives them an excuse to step outside & start a conversation; it gives them something to do. They get addicted fast and regret that they ever started. If you smoke, quit. If you don’t, don’t start! </p>
<p>I’m not a smoker, but some of what you’re all saying is ridiculous. </p>
<p>1) No self-control? Maybe they enjoy it. Even if not, it’s an addiction. Physiological issues that actually cause them to “need” nicotine. Do you eat only raw, healthy food? No, well you must have no self control, because that’s harmful to your health. How DARE you not have self-control enough to stop eating bad food. People aren’t perfect.</p>
<p>2) Enjoying smoking or being addicted to nicotine has nothing to do with your ability to make it through college. That’s just ignorant. Einstein was a smoker, if I recall correctly.</p>
<p>3) Yeah, it’s bad for your health. I would never smoke because I’d rather not have all the negative side-effects. However, it’s not like all smokers just talk about smoking and never anything else. It’s a thing you do for most people, not their whole life…</p>
<p>4) Unless you’re the perfect image of health, I wouldn’t call them idiots. You can say the action of smoking is bad for you, and people who do it are making a poor decision, but calling them idiots just because they do something that is bad for their health is ridiculous.</p>
<p>So seriously guys, get over yourselves. People who don’t smoke seem to often have superiority complexes towards smokers.</p>
<p>^My problem with smoking isn’t that they smoke. I couldn’t care less if they smoke or not. It’s that I don’t want to breath their smoke, and many smokers smoke near buildings or in front of entrances, in parking lots, on pathways—pretty much anywhere, and I don’t want to breathe it. There are times when I’ve moved because people are smoking near where I’m studying or eating lunch.</p>
<p>And not to mention the time when the fire alarm went off in the library because someone was smoking in the stairwell. I wouldn’t have cared, except that I worked in the library, so when the fire alarm goes off that means I have to run up 20 flights of stairs, make everyone leave on every floor, and then let everyone back in when they decide that it was a false alarm.</p>
<p>So I don’t care that people smoke. I care when idiots smoke because then it becomes my problem.</p>
<p>@Mandalorian Smoking has nothing to do with a student being in college or not. The students who smoke would still be smoking regardless of whether they are in college or not. People of all walks of life smoke. It can be a cultural thing, it can become habit or an addiction, it can be a routine that helps some relax, whatever. Consider it part of being exposed to new types of people and cultures. Part of college is broadening your world and meeting people from different walks of life. </p>
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<p>Sometimes, I do feel like sometimes it’s a matter of “not being able to wait.” I’ve been with people who smoke on road trips, at amusement parks, or at other events where they presumably are trying to spend time with their friends or family, and they took several breaks throughout the day where they suddenly disappeared to have a smoke. Not a huge deal, but it does mean there were several times where we had to wait around for them to finish. It may be judgmental or insensitive or whatever, but sometimes, I do wonder why they can’t just wait.</p>
<p>They can’t wait because they crave cigarettes the same way some people just can’t wait another couple of hours when they are hungry.</p>
<p>When I got to college I noticed the same thing. Just from observation it seems like a social thing for many students, especially while making friends. I also can’t stand smoking. I hate breathing in the smoke and one of the worst scents for me was the smell of cigarette smoke trailing behind the person in front of me walking to their 8am class. I’m now graduated, but my school recently just went smoke free. If you really hate it that much, you can start an organization at your school, like someone did at mine, and petition to have smoking banned on campus. </p>
<p>Just to answer the question posed in this thread: they smoke because it’s a legal recrecreational activity that relieves stress. </p>
<p>I don’t get why it’s so complicated. You don’t see it in high school students because it’s illegal. It’s legal in college so more people are inclined to do so. It’s not rocket science or behavioral psychology like most seem to want it to be. </p>
<p>As someone else stated, my problem isn’t that they’re destroying their health. They can sit in their dorm rooms and shoot heroin all day long for all I care in that regard. My problem is that as a non-smoker, I have to smell/breath the rancid foul stench around doors or even walking behind idiots on crowded sidewalks. </p>
<p>@Mandalorian Just to reference an earlier point; a majority of great historical figures smoked some form of tobacco or marijuana. Just a thought but maybe these smokers you referenced are thinking that the idiots are walking behind them. </p>
<p>I don’t smoke because it’s damaging to the brain, heart, and lungs. However, I will defend anyone who does smoke in public because they have every right to do so. If I dictate they can’t smoke then they will have every right to dictate what clothes I wear, what food I’m eating, and what perfume some girl wears. I don’t want that and I don’t think anybody else does. </p>
<p>One point to keep in mind is that the “so many” college students you see smoking are in fact not “so many”. Rates of smoking in young people has gone down. </p>
<p>Smokers WILL make it through college.
Smokers are NOT idiots.
Smokers DO have self-control.
Because someone smokes DOES NOT mean they use smoking as a social crutch. </p>
<p>You are not superior to someone else just because they smoke and you do not. </p>
<p>Is is bad? Yes. Do people choose to do it? Yes. Just like people choose to eat their fast food. Just like people choose to drive a gas guzzler. Just like people choose to binge drink. And on and on and on…</p>
<p>“Don’t judge someone because they sin differently than you do.”</p>
<p>As long as they’re not right next to the building, smoking right by the entrance (plus it’s illegal maybe everywhere, but at least in multiple states), you can avoid them. Obviously them smoking right where everyone has to walk isn’t good, but otherwise it’s fine.</p>
<p>One thing about smoking is some people that operate at high intellectual capacities need a form of release, I dont smoke but i know several adults who do and they work in some of the top intellectual fields in the nation (Fermilab type). Smoking is only bad when it hinders your ability to perform other activities. I do not condone smoking for myself, but I’m not going to judge people for making their own life choices that are none of my business (before you say it yes i know what secondhand smoke is)…</p>
<p>"Smoking is bad and you shouldn’t do it. You should be able to talk to people and have something more common then we all like to smoke. "</p>
<p>This is really poor reasoning. </p>
<p>Where do you hang out between classes? Some kind of lounge area? You should be able to talk to people and have something more in common than all liking to hang out in lounges. </p>
<p>People meeting and talking in the smoking area is no different than people meeting and talking in literally any other spot on campus. That’s just the spot that some people choose to go to. </p>
<p>As I said…I’m a smoker. I’m not trying to say it’s a good thing to smoke. But judging someone and claiming that they aren’t going to make it through college due to being a smoker is absolutely ridiculous. Some of the most dedicated students I know are smokers, while some of the laziest, and absolute worst students I know are non-smokers. Being or not being a smoker has absolutely no bearing on academic ability. </p>
<p>I can understand not liking the smell. But banning smoking in public is not okay. I can understand banning it in certain areas. I’m perfectly okay with not smoking indoors. I’m perfectly okay with staying in designated areas. It really isn’t an issue. </p>
<p>There are girls who wear entirely too much perfume. It often gives me a headache and makes me want to gag. Do I think it should be banned because of this? Not at all. Point being…there are plenty of annoying things in the world. Some people are annoyed by things that others are not. You can’t bang something just because you find it annoying. </p>
<p>If smokers actually <em>stayed</em> in “designated areas” I wouldn’t have a problem with them either.
At least here, they don’t. They don’t even pretend to. I can’t even stand at the bus stops most of the time because people are too inconsiderate and full of themselves to think the rules apply to them. </p>
<p>The absolute WORST is when donkeys stand outside hospital doors smoking. I see it ALL the time and my building faces the CHILDREN’S hospital! They stand out there smoking while children are wheeled out past their cancer. It’s despicable. </p>