Preston Peterson/Guest Contributor

So here’s the deal: freshmen have rolled into town, some of whom hold e-cigarettes loud and proud. Now my only dilemma is the fact that if you can’t handle a real cigarette or aren’t addicted enough to need nicotine to the point where you carry around a fake synthetic chemical in your pocket, why are you even smoking?

The idea is a great substitute: a harsh, god-awful tasting Marlboro Red for a nice key lime-flavored stick, so you aren’t sucking in arsenic (rat poison), cyanide (used in electro copper plating business), benzene (key component in gasoline), but where’s the fun in that?

If you are truly addicted and know what you are smoking, you really and honestly wouldn’t want to smoke. Even the idea of looking cool while smoking is simply not cool anymore.

They aren’t selling you a safe product, either: almost none of the e-cigarettes are even FDA-approved meaning they haven’t tested the chemicals inside them for exposure to humans.

It’s simple: it is just another fad that people buy into. No offense: most of the distributors of e-cigarettes are trying to sell you with celebrities. They know if they can put someone on the box you might be stupid enough to buy it. Now if you are dumb enough to buy into Charlie Sheen’s get-rich-quick scheme, then you are probably dumb enough to ignore the fact that some e-cigarettes contain carcinogens.

On top of the fact that you might be exposed to an equally harmful chemical as a regular cigarette, exposing yourself to nicotine in general is just a gateway to smoking regularly—simply just a bad idea.

So next time you use an e-cigarette, unless it’s FDA approved, you are no better than that guy with a pack of Marlboro Reds who can’t help himself, and if you are doing it to be cool, just stop. You are only going to allow yourself to have the same exposure to the addictive effects of nicotine.

Contact Preston at [email protected]