Posted on 02/24/2010 3:24:36 AM PST by Scanian
I’m sure the sailing ships of the day were filled with men that held church services each day and no buggery ever went on.
Does the constitution say what rights belong to the government to be granted to the citizen?
Ok. The progressives want the age of consent lowered to puberty, about 10 years old. Should they have the right to take these kids at will if they consider it moral themselves? Who decides they can't have sex with your kid? What if there are 10 leftists and only one of you on the playground? Who wins? If morality is gray, what color would this be? Light gray? Charcoal gray? Off white?
Where's the line, and who gets to make the choice if there are no rules or moral guidelines?
We were talking about what the government can insist you not consume. Now we’re jumping around a bit.
Is someone harmed? Government force is called for.
It’s not a bit of tissue, it is a child.
Age of consent in early American history was when they reached childbearing age. Do you condemn them for doing this?
Should someone be due reparations for the rape that happened in our history because millions of brides were under the age of 16,17,18?
Age of consent is something agreed to by society. So if society agrees that drugs should be legalized. Would this be OK with you because it was agreed to by society?
Radical Libertarianism is all about strawmen. It is a lot like the “zero tolerance” mentality that has become so common in our schools. No room for the exercise of judgment, by society, as to what behaviors create too great a danger to others. If it doesn’t directly harm another person, every time, radical Libertarians have zero tolerance for laws against it.
In principle I largely agree with sensible Libertarians, that generally laws should only be in place that have a legitimate purpose in protecting people from the actions of other people (not merely protecting people from themselves). However, society needs to be able to regulate behaviors that indirectly cause great harm to others.
We need to balance the benefit of the behaviors against the risk to innocent lives. Illegal drugs have no benefit to individuals and cause great harm to innocent people.
In other words, no room for Nanny Staters to exert unwarranted power over their neighbors.
Don't be afraid of it. Say it. "I want more government control over everyone's life."
You'll feel better once you admit it openly.
FWIW, I believe drugs laws should be on the state level. The government is not trying to control what people consume, except to the extent that that consumption causes harm to other people.
If I were your next door neighbor, I’m sure you wouldn’t want me to use my house as a poorly run explosives factory, with little or no safety standards. There is a good chance I wouldn’t have an explosion that would destroy your home and kill or injure members of your family. So, the government would have no right to shut me down, right?
A drug using neighbor is a lot like that explosives plant next door. There is a very good chance his drug use is going to blow up in his neighbors’ faces, and cause them great harm.
Not at all, but the parents raised the children back then. They had adult minds by the age of 16. Life was a lot harder. Today, 27 year olds are still on mommy and daddies health care program.
I'd like to respond to more of your comments, because this is a good debate, but my 17 year old is getting out of college and I have to pick him up. (He could have his own license if he wanted it, but he doesn't. Even though we raised him ourselves, I can't imagine him being a dad at 16 today. He doesn't even drive!).
Sorry to cut and run, but I really do have to go. Thanks in advance for your understanding.
No, I want LESS government control over most areas of life. I want sensible government control over behaviors that casue a grave threat to innocent people, and have no benefit to the individuals practicing them.
Do you think drunk driving should be legal? After all, not all drunk drivers cause accidents. We cannot make the judgement that this behavior creates too great a danger to innocent people, can we?
An alcoholic living next door can be explosive and unpredictable. He/she might even own a gun and shoot holes in my house when they get drunk.
I keep hearing reports of recent studies that the brain doesn’t fully develop until the age of 25. If they are incapable of making rational decisions until that age, why shouldn’t the age of consent be raised until they can make rational decisions?
Liberatarians just want to smoke pot without getting hassled by “the man.” If we legalized it, would they all be too stoned to post? Has it stopped them yet?
This is another common Libertarian logical fallacy. It is sort of like the “all my friends are doing it”, reasoning you get from a child.
The fact that one behavior might be dangerous and legal, does not mean that it is either required or prudent that we legalize additional dangerous behaviors.
70+ years of "drug war". Trillions spent. Countless innocent, as well as guilty, lives lost.
And yet... We still have, as a percentage, about the same number of people taking a self destructive path. We can't even keep drugs out of our prisons.
And yet, any talk of finding an alternative, decriminalizing softer drugs, revamping the criminal code to punish actual harm done, etc... all end up in the same idiotic strawman mouthbreathing platitudes by those convinced that if we dared loosen the laws it'd be Armageddon in the playgrounds from Coast to Coast.
Give it a rest. That line of reasoning didn't even ring true in 1933.
Although, I wouldn't mind de-criminalizing androstendione and it's variants again. That was a big WTF moment for a lot of people in the weightlifting community. But, we're a minority so who gives a fig if we are inconvenienced or made criminals. Right?
As long as you get to lord it over the dopers, you don't care who else, or what else, gets tossed under the bus.
“I consider myself a libertarian and I don’t consume anything stronger than alcohol. Even then in moderation.”
Then your movement has been co-opted by a bunch of folks that say they want to protect the constitution but actually just smoke pot and smell bad.
If I was a Dem and I wanted to derail the Tea Party movement I’d divide. Once again, people on FR are losing sight of our enemy and making our allies an enemy.
Yesterday was birthers. Today is libertarians. Tomorrow will be pygmy albino nyphomaniac Mormons. They are making us hate one another to stop focusing on the left.
I’m here to tell you that there is a concerted effort on the left to divide us to pass Obama’s agenda.
I'm not really part of a movement. The LP got co-opted by the 9/11 Truthers and "Anti-war at any cost" crowd. The GOP isn't the only Party that has "lost its way".
The drug issue has its roots in principle, but is a small side issue for folks like me. I'm more worried about Capitalism, private property Rights, RKBA, free speech, being left alone to worship as I see fit, and generally just live my life free from the Nanny State.
My neighbor smoking dope in his backyard does no harm to me at all. The meth-head speeding down the street at me is likely to die of a high speed lead over-dose. Same goes for his cousin trying to break in my window at night.
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