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DSAs provide harmonious solution to call for policy change

September 10, 2010

by Lindsey Bosse

I was walking around Portland the other day, when suddenly that craving for a cancer-stick blind-sided me right in the middle of the street. There I am, in downtown Portland, surrounded by hipsters and their American Spirits, hippies and their rollies, and all the other urban cultures of Portland sucking down smoke.  My heart began to flutter as I realized that I saw no green umbrellas nearby, and had no place to smoke!  The greater Portland area has not been warned that we need DSA’s! Where is the Dolphin Sex Afterparty? 

In all honesty, I understand the motive behind the designated smoking areas on campus. Honestly I’m just glad that they didn’t turn Lewis & Clark into a non-smoking campus, which I know exist in this country.  Smoking is a part of our culture here at LC. Not for everybody, and I know that, but look around—most of us are at the DSAs. I appreciate that there are places for us to still smoke on campus, and I appreciate that people no longer want us blowing smoke into their faces on the way to class. If I remember correctly, there were surveys and questionnaires and the like that really asked all of us on campus what we felt about smoking. It’s not like the DSAs popped up overnight because smokers were making the campus look bad.  It was a community vote, and the majority said they wanted a change.

Overall, I think that we’ve all been accommodated in the ways that were possible for the school to accomplish. Every DSA is 1000 times better than any smoking lounge I’ve ever been to. We have trash, there’s a cigarette butt container thing; it’s a well-supplied smoking area!  Not to mention, now when you forget your cigarettes or your lighter, there are 15 people right there who have your back. If anything, the DSAs have united us as a smoking culture. It’s unfortunate that now on top of our cigarettes, we have about 15 others contributing to second hand smoke (which I hear is worse for you than actually smoking), but I guess when you’re already sucking down slow nicotine suicide, it’s hard to tell the person next to you to cut it out, because they’re polluting your ‘clean air.’

Of course there are arguments against the DSAs: we’re being outcast to green umbrellas because of our habits, we’re being put on display sitting at our little round tables while the non-smokers walk by, etc. Obviously I’m not stoked about leaving for class another ten minutes earlier than I would so I can get to the DSA before it’s time to get to class, but that’s the way it is now.

Our society has become very good at telling people where to do certain things. For example, there are bike lanes, dressing rooms and restaurants.  No one really likes it when I bike on the sidewalk, because that’s where the walkers are. It doesn’t thrill sales people when I strip down and try on new clothes in their front window, when they have designated a dressing room area.  And I don’t go to the library to eat my food, when there is a perfectly good restaurant where I ordered it.  We like putting people and things into places, and the DSAs are no different. There are certain inconveniences to us smokers, yes, but I think we’ve come to as close to a harmonious conclusion on the matter as possible.