We wouldn't encourage anyone, especially our own children, to take up the nasty habit of chewing tobacco, given the health risks and the mess associated with spitting.

That said, we believe the leaders of the Oakdale Saddle Club should be allowed to decide whether to continue depending on Skoal and Copenhagen as sponsors for the Oakdale Rodeo.

The anti-tobacco coalition wanted the club to cut off its association with the U.S. Smokeless Tobacco Co., which makes both brands of spit tobacco. The nonprofit Saddle Club allows the company to distribute free snuff samples in exchange for providing a scoreboard, which is an essential part of the rodeo operation. The club said the sponsorship was critical to the success of the event.

We applaud the Saddle Club for agreeing not to put the smokeless tobacco sampling tent near concessions aimed at young people.

This situation demands a three-way balance of good individual health decisions, the economics of a nonprofit group sponsoring a major community event and free enterprise. Spit tobacco is, after all, legal for anyone older than 18 to use.

Whether it's a wise choice is another matter. People who use spit tobacco are three to four times more likely to get oral cancer than nonusers. Oral cancers include those of the mouth, tongue, throat and voice box. Treatment can be disfiguring as well as disabling. Spit tobacco also has been linked to gum disease, hypertension, heart disease and ulcers. It is, like tobacco smoking, addictive.

It's perfectly appropriate for the Stanislaus County Health Services Agency to alert people, especially children, to these dangers. Previously, there have been national campaigns targeting collegiate and professional baseball for the same reasons — concern over the health of the athletes and over the examples set for children.

Since the early 1990s, minor league baseball players have been forbidden to chew at games, practice or on the road. Some Major League clubs have active campaigns to discourage their players from chewing, for health and image reasons.

Eventually, we hope professional rodeo cowboys will take the same industrywide approach.

Two groups must make decisions in this matter — and neither requires government intervention.

Parents must decide whether they want to expose their children to advertisements promoting this unhealthy and unsanitary activity.

The Saddle Club must decide how it can best keep alive an event with a rich and long tradition that benefits the town and the entire region.