Smoking

            
             Should smoking be banned in public places? Whether or not smoking should be allowed in public places has been debated ever since the introduction of the first non-smoking law (Williams 1). There have been many reasons for and against smoking that have come about in the past few years, including the more recent anti public smoking laws that have come into effect in businesses, restaurants, and other public facilities. The problem is that most of these laws have little or no merit and undermine the personal freedoms of smokers resulting in political, economical, and social consequences.
             According to a recent survey of 17,287 high school students from the United States, a quarter of the students that went to school have at least smoked cigarettes before (Wakefield 333). The survey was taken in 1999, and it also includes the students enrolled in Caesar Rodney High School (Wakefield 333). According to this medical journal survey, twenty percent of the high school students that smoked were established smokers and twenty percent of them had only tried it once or twice (Wakefield 333). Also, most, of the smokers were ethnically white, and more then half were women (Wakefield 333). This years survey has concluded similar results from its past survey showing no decrease in high school smoking even though more strike laws have been applied (Wakefield 333). Now what those this tells us? "Teens today still smoke as much as before if not even more. Because of all these laws and restriction, smoking has been a challenge to teens, as a law .
             to break and to tell everyone, hey look at me I"m cool I"m breaking the law" (Agerwal 1). Therefore causing many teens to start smoking with out giving a regard to future consequences. .
             Some say that smoking in public places is harmful to those around them and to the environment. What smokers and non-smokers alike do not realize is that these statements are all misleading.