Monday’s forum concerning Healthy Carolina’s Tobacco Free USC initiative was more highly attended than many similar panels in the past, a change we’re delighted to see. We also applaud those Student Government candidates present and willing to listen to student opinion on a matter that is obviously a concern of many and will affect the entire campus.
Students voiced their collective opposition to the implementation of the infeasible initiative, which would ban all forms of tobacco on campus, and we couldn’t agree more.
Like many expressed at the forum, this ban should not be a priority. Given recent crimes close to campus, student safety should be.
If enforced, and Healthy Carolina has yet to propose how it would be, the ban could force USC law enforcement’s attention away from violent crime and toward punishing its own faculty and students, who pay to attend this school and are capable of making their own health decisions.
Every student who spoke expressed opposition to the ban, and even those who initially supported the proposal, including current SG member and treasurer candidate Brandon White, noted that while good in theory, the ban is impossible to enforce and impractical given the university’s resources.
Healthy Carolina, after asking audience members how they would enforce the ban, suggested a program that could enable students to tattle on their peers online — a laughable and unrealistic proposal. Would students be expected to demand to see tobacco users’ CarolinaCards in order to properly identify them?
Tobacco Free USC isn’t a good idea. This forum showed that students won’t stand for a ban that is difficult to enforce and would divert campus security from more pressing issues.