In a letter to the editor filled with anecdotal argumentation entitled “Pity the Stanford Smoker,” Mr. Ngai claims that a ban on outdoor smoking on campus would limit the liberty of smokers and that we should not worry as smoking is but one of many dumb things kids do.

Mr. Ngai maintains that Stanford has limited the rights of smokers to such an extent that it is now time for nonsmokers to accept that Stanford’s Luft der Freiheit will sometimes carry “something that smells a little funny.” The freedom to smoke discourse misleadingly depicts smokers as liberty-loving proponents of a free and open society, whereas health advocates are compared to authoritarian-styled bureaucrats. What is the next thing they are going to have us do, Mr. Ngai asks rhetorically, force students to sleep more, eat healthy, or drink less alcohol? No rule prohibits that you do not sleep, that you eat burgers all day, or drink alcohol. Society has chosen to limit our freedom when that behavior becomes a direct risk for others. Drunk driving is a criminal offence because it puts others at risk. By underestimating the toxic air contamination by second hand smoke Mr. Ngai downplays the aggressiveness by which smokers infringe upon the liberty and health of nonsmokers. Nonsmokers have the right to deny smokers from harming them. Second-hand smoke kills and there is no-risk free level of exposure, according to the Surgeon General Reports of 2006 and 2014. The American Cancer Association estimates that in the United States alone yearly 42,000 people die every year from diseases caused by secondhand smoke. That includes diseases such as infant death syndrome, lung cancer and cardiovascular diseases, to name but three categories. Where is the freedom of those people? I pity them.

This brings us to the second topic in Mr. Ngai’s letter: the trivialization of the health hazards of smoking. Mr. Ngai describes smoking as a hobby, an innocent yet risky relief without addressing addiction or smoking-related diseases. This two-legged stance — smoking is just a dumb thing kids do, yet with certain “risks” — is a marketing ploy to make cigarettes seem cool and sexy. All the risk is borne by the consumer and none by the manufacturer. Smokers, according to the tobacco companies’ legal argument in court, make an informed choice to start an addiction and accept all the health risks. Yet only experts fully appreciate the cigarette design’s deadly effects and that the chemically enhanced nicotine levels addict smokers after smoking as few as one hundred cigarettes. The tobacco industry constantly seeks new and young smokers to replenish the ranks of their dying customers. Internal industry documents speak of “replacement smokers.” Most smokers start smoking as kids when they are not fully knowledgeable of the dangers involved because of marketing ads and newspaper articles focused on liberty and enjoying a little head rush once in a while without mentioning addiction, disease and death. A dumb thing implies innocence of youth and the ability to fix it, smoking allows for neither.

I hope that readers will give more attention to the initial Op. Ed. on this topic of Oct. 1 by Mr. Donald Bentley on Stanford’s reluctance to follow the urging from the State of California Tobacco Education and Research Oversight Committee to make Stanford a smoke-free campus, like many of Stanford’s peer institutions. For there lies the true freedom of smokers and nonsmokers alike, a campus where minds and bodies are free from cigarette-induced addiction and disease and with truly free and healthy air flowing through the halls and grounds of this wonderful university.

-Ramses Isis Delafontaine