Just Eliminate Lies, an anti-tobacco group of Iowa teens, has set out to destroy what they call a “manipulative industry” in order to save lives.

We’ve all watched the commercials.

We’ve all noticed the billboards and newspaper advertisements. We’ve all listened to them on the radio.

What we don’t see is a balanced viewpoint on the issue, because tobacco companies don’t have access to free speech.

I watch the TV commercials and just wish someone would crack it to these little anti-smoking brats.

The vision of JEL is not to stop people from smoking, but “to fight the tobacco industry’s efforts to manipulate us into using their addictive deadly product.”

According to the organization’s vision statement, it seems the only reason these people care about getting teens to stop smoking is because the industry is dominated by corporations. Tobacco company this. Tobacco company that. JEL needs to stick to the product itself a bit more.

In their TV commercials they do a little better with sticking to tobacco rather than just the tobacco companies.

They give statistics, like 1,200 people die from tobacco use every day and over 400,000 die every year. The numbers are simply scare tactics aimed to make the big companies look like murderers.

They don’t tell you how old a person is when they “die from smoking.”

And think about it, do we really know if a person died only because of smoking? How do we not know the death wasn’t a result of all the toxins we put in the air?

Or, on a more serious note, could it have been smoking along with lack of exercise or poor diet?

The point is we don’t know if all 400,000 of these people would not have died at the same age even if they never touched a cigarette.

Of course, the blame is always placed on the big company. In some commercials, those who die from “tobacco-related causes” are said to be “victims” of the tobacco companies.

I guess anybody can be a victim these days. This is a major problem with our society.

No one wants to take responsibility for their own actions. No one made these “victims” smoke.

They tried it and they enjoyed it, so they continued to use it.

JEL members can’t get that into their heads. People know it’s not good for them. For God’s sake, they’re inhaling smoke.

In house fires, most people die from smoke inhalation, not burning to death. Can people not put two and two together? It’s obvious that smoke is not good on the lungs.

But we need people like JEL to lie to us and say we are being killed off one by one by these evil corporations.

Take for instance a commercial where a member of the organization says “tobacco companies hooked them as teenagers and wouldn’t let them go until they died.”

I’ve never seen the Marlboro Man riding around on his horse, force-feeding cigarettes to kids.

By the time you are a teenager, if you can’t figure out smoking is bad for you, we have a little more to worry about than smoking itself.

And is smoking the only bad thing out there? God no.

Before you know it the fast food industry is going to be ripped apart for causing obesity among our children.

After tobacco, someone will be next.

Obesity is a major concern in this country. The blame for killing people with obesity will have to be placed on someone who has made a lot of money. It’s just a matter of who, McDonalds, Burger King or Taco Bell.

If JEL is so concerned about the well-being of teenagers, they might want to look into fast food, or how about the automobile industry?

Think of all the kids who die in motor vehicle accidents.

In fact, car accidents are the leading cause of death among teenagers in the United States, according to www.caraccidents.com. These accidents account for 36 percent of the deaths for kids ages 15 to 19.

Since they care so much about teens, they should push to make it harder for teens to get their drivers license, since the fatal crash rate per million traveled miles is 7 times higher for 16-year-old drivers than it is for drivers in the 30 to 59 year-old bracket.

Maybe they should fight for legislation making it illegal for a teenager to carry any passenger while driving, since the number of deaths among teenage drivers is equal to the number of deaths among teenage passengers.

Of course they won’t push for anything of that sort. That would inconvenience them.

The fact is, JEL members are out to tackle the “big” in “big tobacco.” They can’t stand the fact that the CEOs of the monstrous corporations will make more money than any one of them can imagine.

It’s not a matter of health to them, it is a matter of government intervention.

They don’t say they want big government to step in, but one of their main objectives is to “protect everybody from secondhand smoke.”

The only way to do that is to pass laws banning smoking, much like the ridiculous mess of a law the city of Ames will put into affect Wednesday.

We don’t need the government to tell us not to smoke; it won’t work and it’s not its roll in society. Let people choose; that is what this country is all about.

So JEL, get off your anti-smoking kick and do something meaningful with your time.

People have been using the exact same tactics with illegal drugs for years, and look how well that has worked.

If JEL truly wants to just eliminate lies, they might want to try to telling the entire truth themselves.

Zach Calef is a sophomore in journalism and mass communication from Cedar Rapids. He is a news editor of the Daily.