Thanks for your feedback on my little essay.
I was wondering if you would be kind enough to expound on the following from your article (no "gotcha"/set up behind it - just curious enough to need more info to understand your point):
There is no such thing as a social contract.
I'm referring to my uninformed concept of the social contract, something that supposedly authorizes the government to do things which none of the individuals who supposedly grant it authority may do. I suppose I should read the actual theory of the Social Contract by Jean Jacques Rousseau:
http://www.constitution.org/jjr/socon.htmPrior restraint is plumb out. Though hitting a child with your car may rightly be considered a crime, driving down Main Street past a grade school at 90 mph and not hitting anybody is not a crime, since it has no victim, hence it may not be forbidden.
This one mostly comes from reductio ad absurdum. If you allow prior restraint for anything, you open yourself to prior restraint for everything. I suppose it's possible to separate actual endangerment from set limits, but that's not what current statutes do. They make it easy for the enforcers to fine or arrest people, but have very little to do with actual safety. I still prefer severe penalties for actual harm to limitations on perceived precursors to harm.
But the speed limit example is exactly that. Prior restraint of ANYTHING is the problem. If you can drive safely while drunk or stoned, more power to you. If you use LSD as a spiritual aid, or for recreation, go for it. If you safely use guns for hunting, fun, or an emergency tool, I applaud you. Until you actually harm a non-consenting person, it's all good.
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Topic: What I Believe (Read 13239 times)