President Marx's recent smoking ban has created controversy among the student body. By prohibiting indoor smoking and forcing students to smoke at least 25 feet away from all College buildings, Marx has identified smoking as an important problem that he wants to address. Although The Student staff welcomes a campus-wide indoor smoking ban, we feel that Marx should have consulted with the student body, and that his justification could have been made more clearly. We also question the extent to which the ban is enforceable.

Marx told The Student this week that while he stands by his decision, he realizes he should have gathered additional information from the student body to more accurately reflect the views of the students. We applaud him for admitting this mistake and strongly support his commitment to have a more open discussion with students in the future.

If this ban is something that Marx feels strongly enough about that student input is unnecessary, he must give the student body a better explanation for its implementation. Marx cited his concern for smoker's health, but we feel this is paternalistic. Students should be allowed to make their own decisions regarding their personal health. We would have liked to see increased emphasis on the dangers posed by second-hand smoke, which is something that is imposed upon those living near smokers and cannot be controlled through personal choices. Additionally, we feel the danger to College property through smoke damage and fire risks related to smoking are better justifications for this decision.

We do not think that an all-community e-mail respected the gravity of the issue. The unilateral nature of the decision was even more shocking to students because of the way Marx announced the ban.

Marx also failed to inform the student body what kind of punishment will be levied against students breaking the ban. He trusts students to follow the rules, but unfortunately, we don't think students will do so in this case. He should consider more seriously how the College will enforce this new rule and should engage students in this process.

We appreciate Marx's efforts to help students stop smoking by offering workshops and nicotine patches, and we support his general intentions. We just want to emphasize the importance of dialogue on this campus, and hope we can trust Marx when he says he will commit to open discussion in the future.