Posted on 12/17/2007 3:39:26 AM PST by LowCountryJoe
[snip]...And if I want to remain a free man (as I most certainly do), I must accord my neighbor his own freedoms. I must accord him his freedoms as a practical matter, for if I coerce him to live as I think he should live, I unleash forces that likely will one day coerce me to live as someone else thinks I should live.
I should also accord my neighbor his freedoms as a matter of proper ethics. True equality -- the equality celebrated by America's founding generation -- means that no one has the right to play God with the lives of others.
If I assert that I have a right to order my neighbor about for his own good, I thereby also assert that I am better than he is -- that I have more knowledge than he does about his life, or that I occupy a higher social rank that affords me the privilege of dictating his choices. Any such assertion is ethically anathema to a society of free and equal individuals.
If the above seems obvious or even trite, look about you. Consider, for example, that busybodies at the Center for Science in the Public Interest recently made headline news with their demand that the Food and Drug Administration regulate the amount of salt that food preparers put in their foods.
None of the news reports that I heard or read about this would-be assault on our freedoms mentioned freedom or consumer sovereignty. Instead, pundits and reporters alike treated as unquestionable the presumption that some persons have the moral right to tell other persons how to eat...[snip]
(Excerpt) Read more at pittsburghlive.com ...
And I hope you Huckabee supporters take very good care to notice the points the author makes here and come to know that there are elements of the Republican Party who disdain most of what Huckabee is about.
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I love this piece but I suspect most freepers will hate it. His argument extends into the bedroom and “other” things people might ingest or inhale.
You know what? I don’t give a rat’s rump what people do INSIDE their homes, in their bedrooms... it’s NOT there that it makes a difference. It’s when they take it to the streets to force it down my throat or into our faces.
I don’t care if two MEN want to live together (in Sin or otherwise) that’s their prerogative, and right, but when they take it to the street and try to force you or me into ‘accepting it’ and ‘being tolerant’ of their aberrant behavior on a public street then it goes too far.
By the same token my wife and I don’t do “public displays of affection” except perhaps holding hands in public, but making out in the mall is too much even for me (a relatively tolerant individual). When I see kids doing that, I tell them to “Get a Room”.
When I see people MY age doing it, I say “Get a room” to them too. Pisses them off, but tough.
What they do inside or out is still no one’s business...insofar as they DO NOT violate anyone else’s individual rights. When they “take it to the streets” that’s fine too, again however as long as they do not advocate coercive action onto any individual.
If you see two people making out in the mall, it’s up to the mall to decide what to do with them, it’s private property after all. You’re absolutely free to tell them to get a room (hell I’d probably do the same) and even to call mall security on them but on the other side they are free to ignore you.
A lot of freepers jump on us libertarians for being FOR (gays, liberals, etc) and against them. That’s not true at all, we simply want everyone to leave everyone else alone...is that so much to ask? There is no law that can be considered moral that initiates force against someone who hasn’t done the same to another. That most notably includes government action and the theft of wealth from individuals.
I wouldn’t call mall security on someone for making out. I just say it because, well, you know little kids don’t really need to be exposed to that sort of thing. That’s just my take on it.
I don’t jump on libertarians for anything other than being lame :) lol
I DO jump on them for pushing complete and total removal of any system of rule or law however. I go WAYYYYYYY back with them when they were attacking Reagan - before the Internet existed, and all we had were dial up BBSes. I ran one, and I dealt with the extremes of all groups in those days.
Why exactly are we lame? And I’m not talking about the LP, just libertarians in general.
“We” aren’t lame. I meant when they act that way.
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