Let smokers enjoy their right to have cigarettes

In a community of health food stores, homeopathic medicines,
yoga classes taught and attended by every other person, I am a
leper. I am a smoker.

I find it almost incredulous that while I am both female and
Hispanic, nearly every time I am discriminated against it is for a
stick that I like to call my ticket into flavor country.

Despite the smoking laws, which have removed me from
restaurants, bars, clubs and certain parks, I sense that the
general populous would like me even further away. If you are a
smoker, you have perhaps heard the whispers in the air that
cigarette prices will soon increase again to pay for something or
other, and we may soon pay $5 or more for a pack of heaven.

I find it interesting that in the land of the free, you have the
liberty to make your own decisions concerning your health, but if
you don’t make the “correct” choice, i.e. quit
smoking, you will pay dearly. It’s like peer pressure to quit
but by the masses and the government.

As I walk to my classes, there inevitably is a clever student
who decides, despite all the open space, to roll their eyes and
cough as if it were their last breath. I would dismiss it as
someone who just happens to be feeling ill that day, but every day
I get the same thing.

Generally, if I am smoking on campus, I huddle in a corner to
avoid the stones grazing my head but still find people making
throat noises, coughing, waving their hand before their face or
just giving me a good, old-fashion dirty look. I get it. You
don’t like smoke. But I can’t go anywhere else!
You’ve run me out of house and home.

The immensity of the smoker’s disadvantage was revealed to
me as I attended a job interview. The place was a medical office,
only a medical office the likes of which I had never seen before.
Patients were required to remove their shoes before entering to be
“cleansed.” A mystical chart was hanging over head
delineating the quiet zones of the body and the healing power of
the toes. I filled out the usual, “So you’re poor and
looking for a job sheet,” only it was not so typical.

The first question asked if I smoked and how much. I knew
instantly that this was the end of this job opportunity. Two
ethereal maidens, laden with beads, beckoned me to the back room
where they praised me on my “wonderful energy” and
further related that they would love to hire me, but the smoking
factor is something they were not “willing to
accommodate.”

They asked me two or three times if I was considering quitting,
insisting that I was the best person they had met with excellent
qualifications, but I quietly shook my head and said that I
understood their position on the smoking issue.

Now that I have had some time for reflection, I can safely say I
do not understand their position, nor do I feel it is right. If I
was the best candidate and my smoking did not interfere with my
working, what was the problem?

Furthermore, smokers are entitled to their cancer sticks. The
Surgeon General, Drug Abuse Resistance Education, and at least one
person a day reminds us how we really should quit. Yeah, I got the
memo that second-hand smoke kills. However, I am seldom in your
space for a large length of time and crane my neck to blow my smoke
away from any living organism.

I would think and hope that on an enlightened campus, such as
UCLA, where people rally for human rights, embrace their ability to
protest, and have unlimited free speech, I would be allowed my
legal right with minimum repercussions. I would hope that I would
be allowed my corner, with my cigarettes.

Varona is a third-year English student. E-mail her at
[email protected].