Smoking. Admittedly, it is a dirty habit with hazardous consequences for those who partake and for those forced to inhale the noxious second-hand smoke that manages to find its way out of smoking sections. Often enough in the past, we have found ourselves writing in support of civil suits against Big Tobacco and against marketing tobacco to children. As with many issues in our society, there is a fine line between the indiscreet, unethical and often immoral actions of corporations bent on pushing their products and the rights of individuals to willingly partake of those products. Currently, the Ames City Council is considering an all-out ban on smoking in restaurants, and we find ourselves voting in this instance with the smokers. According to the Ames Chamber of Commerce, 64 Ames restaurants are already smoke-free. Only 34 still allow the demon weed tobacco to be used on its premises. In just the last decade alone, more and more restaurants have found themselves going smoke-free for one simple reason: customers like it. Obviously there are still restaurants that find business is unhindered by smoking sections or they would not have them. Rather than forcing a handful of restaurants to conform to the will of the majority, why not simply allow the market to determine which restaurants should be smoke-free and which should continue as before? People of Ames, vote with your dollars. If you don’t like the whiff of smoke you get in the non-smoking section, tell the manager and go elsewhere. If enough people do the same, they will change. Until then, legislating morality using a thinly disguised rationalization of public health should be put on the back burner. Editorial board: Carrie Tett, Greg Jerrett, Katie Goldsmith, Amie Van Overmeer and Andrea Hauser