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My father used to do this. Taught me libertarianism, and then, as soon as I tried to use the principles to argue my own case, swung right around and tried to use the same principles to justify his absolute authority because he was feeding me.
My hatred of rationalization and distrust of authority... I can't say it was born at that moment, but it was certainly a watershed moment. It probably did more to make me libertarian than a hundred political arguments - seeing how easily power corrupted (humans), even ones who espoused libertarianism.
Indeed, "children" is the world's most oppressed minority group...
Exactly! Think of all those cases of Child Labour! Wait, we only consider 'child labour' oppression because they are children and that violates one of the many rights we grant children due to their age.
I'm serious.
People who are under a certain age have the most restricted set of rights of any group in the United States, with the possible exception of convicted felons.
They can't vote.
They can't sign contracts.
They can't serve on a jury.
They are restricted in the ways they can earn an income. Even if they do earn an income, it is rarely enough to be self-sufficient, and they have limited ability to control how the money is spent.
They can't consent to sexual relations.
They can't purchase certain legal substances.
They can't hold political office.
They can't drive cars.
They can't travel freely, instead needing permission from someone else.
They can't direct their own education.
They can be forced to attend religious services against their will.
They can't control their own medical treatment, and can be forced to take psychoactive medications against their will.
They can't choose where to live.
They can have their genitals modified without their consent.
Do I really need to continue?
The worst is probably the social environment they're forced to be in. The rest aren't that bad, in comparison.
That was an extremely interesting article, thanks for posting a link to it.
I more or less agree with you. But just for the sake of the exercise:
I'd let them vote. It isn't going to make the decision making process all that much less rational.
An interesting one. I'd almost appreciate paternalism on that one. Contracts are more useful for the party with the power to see them enforced.
Innocent until the jury finds out they're missing the Simpsons by dragging things out! (Just how different is that to current practice?)
Being incapable of producing significant economic value isn't 'oppression'. The obligation of parents to support the economically weak is more credibly a violation of liberties here.
The most obvious restriction on the ways children can earn an income, the one cutting the most value from their income earning potential is of course child prostitution prohibitions.
Yeah, that sucks.
That's seriously harsh. Not just the parents but the law deciding when you're allowed to have sex? No surprise that teenager's gain a reputation for rebelliousness.
Don't even get me started on the legality of substance purchases. They treat the rest of the population like children and the children even worse!
That would be a pleasant change.
While we're at it, I just read that there is a new law here that children under 8 must be booster seats whenever in the car, for safety purposes. I hope at least that rule stays if the driving age limit is lifted! More seriously, a skill based regulation replacing the age one could be ok.
Permission sucks.
Another pet peeve. I did a postgraduate degree in teaching and have been left with an altogether cynical view of the entire system. I consider the whole thing blatant abuse. I would quite seriously prefer intermittent beatings by my parents.
School. Religious services. Very little difference from what I can see.
That one is scary. I don't trust either parents or the pharmaceutical industry to make that sort of judgement.
Well, 'My House, My Rules' makes a certain amount of sense in this case.
OUCH! That's serious oppression.
Yes, the US is one of the more puritan "Christian" countries. In the US, two teenagers cannot have consensual sex together, by law. If they do have sex, they are both punished. (Some states have recently passed exceptions that tend to start at age 16-17, for couples that are of the same age. Even then, two 17 year old can have sex but an 18 year old can't have sex with a 17 year old because one's a major and the other one's a minor. Choose your mate's birthday carefully.)
As an aside, many US teens who took nude photos of themselves and gave them to their boy- or girlfriend have been charged with the high crime of distribution of child porn. Here is a report on one such Florida couple, aged 16 and 17, who were convicted (on the appeal, too). They kept the photos for themselves, but someone tipped off the police, the court record doesn't say who - possibly the parents. The appeal judge wrote in his opinion that one reason he wanted to punish them was that if left alone they might in the future sell their photos to child pornographers to make money.
The CNET article doesn't say what their punishment was, and anyway it was a random Google result out of at least dozens of similar cases, but I would imagine registration on the sex offender list for many years - which takes away a lot of rights no matter what your age - and jail time and/or probation and/or whatever they tend to give to 17 year old felons in Florida.
It is scary that that judge is allowed to vote, let alone pass sentences.
It is not the fault of the judiciary that the people consistently elect profoundly stupid legislators.
You know how bad the media is when it reports science? Well, it doesn't get much better for law, sadly.
The defendant's appeal claimed that her right of privacy was being violated by this prosecution. An essential part of that is whether she had a reasonable expectation of privacy. The conclusion was she did not: if teens take naked pictures of each other, there's a meaningful chance that those pictures will be shared with third parties. This same reasoning has been used to break the privacy defense for photographs of prisoner abuse. This doesn't help her:
The opinion is interesting, though I say that from a law-oriented background. The law being idiotic does not necessarily make the judge idiotic, and there's at least a very good argument that the majority applied the law correctly. No expectation of privacy, no right to privacy defense.
They may have erred when they ruled this prosecution counts as the "least intrusive method" to uphold state interests, but I just don't know the case law on that.
It is scary that many judges and public prosecutors in different states agree on charging such young people and declaring them guilty. I don't know the percentage of charges and of convictions out of all proposed cases or reports and accusations made to the police, but the actual count is apparently in the dozens (google tells me).
It is not, however, surprising, considering common (and legal) attitudes to morality, sexuality and young people's rights in the U.S.
Given the context it seems ironic to let them off based off youth. No, I'll let them off because the crime itself is absurd.
It's a pity you didn't extend the logic further.
The logic being that I disapprove of the judge's ruling and wish to undermine his credibility with mockery?
The logic that it is frightening that this man's decisions have power over us, whether in his capacities as judge or as voter. Hence it is frightening that a great many people in whom we would not entrust our lives also have votes.
Old South African government didn't really "work" for anyone who wasn't white.
Some black south africans disagree.
Just to be fair, although the child pornography laws are ridiculous (you want to make its production illegal, fine, but not its possession and distribution), some states have laws that make a little more sense when it comes to age of consent for sexual relations. In Florida (which I know only because I live there), a person under the age of 24 can have sex with a person who is at least 16 years of age legally. Of course, this still isn't that great because the law considers anyone under the age of 16 unable to consent (not listed in this statute), but at least it opens up a wide "grey area" that eliminates the majority of silly "rape" cases.
Sweet Jesus, I hate the media. If you check out that article, note the "..." in the summary of the majority opinion. Here's how it reads as quoted:
Here's that "...:"
In other words, the article is deliberately constructed to make the concern that the photos be disseminated seem absurd. But the defendant herself expressed a concern that they would be disseminated!.
Also, fun fact: it wasn't a picture. It was 117 pictures. Might that increase the odds that one or more gets distributed? Story doesn't bother with that little fact.
This just in: don't believe everything you read.
She "expressed a concern"? When it wasn't her idea to talk to the police in the first place, and when the police's job is to make her look as bad as possible so she can be convicted? For all I know it went like this:
Police interviewer: did you intend for your boyfriend to spread those photos? Defendant: no I didn't. And he hasn't. Police: but it's possible he'll do it one day, right? If you break up, say. Defendant: I don't believe he'll do it, but I suppose it's possible. Police: imagine he has done so. And all your class has got nude photos of you. Doesn't that scenario concern you? Defendant: yeah, that would concern me if it happened...
Bottom line: the majority opinion says "he statute was intended to protect minors like appellant and her co-defendant from their own lack of judgment". How do they protect them? Not, say, by having the police destroy the photos and telling them to go home and be smarter next time. They protect them by putting them through court and a conviction.
Here's a relevant part of the majority appellate opinion:
Least intrusive? Really? It must have taken some creative law-writing to make it so, when ordinarily the state has so many ways of interfering in a teenager's life.
Oh, fun! I get to advocate for the Devil.
How much of a deterrent effect do you think this has? "OK, kids, you're creating a thing that is a complete abomination to the people of this state, a form of speech so vulgar that even the first amendment won't touch it, and that mere possession of it carries a prison sentence. And if you do it, you're going to get the worst talking-to you can imagine! We'll tell you that what you did was wrong! And that you shouldn't do it again! And we'll delete all the digital copies! Well, all the ones we can find, anyhow! That will teach you to manufacture child pornography! And you can bet we'll be devoting serious police and prosecutorial resources to ensure that we gently slap you on the wrist!"
It has to be the least intrusive means of furthering the state's compelling interest. Giving kids a lecture and telling them "don't do it again" does not effectively further those interests. The legislature has determined it should be criminal, and it's not in the power of the courts to say, "Well, it's a second degree felony, but screw the voters, we think it should be a fourth degree felony!" The state has a compelling interest, and any reasonable action short of criminalization will not effectively further that interest. It's not the place of the courts to be fine-tuning criminal punishments because they think the ones the legislature came up with are too easy (or too harsh).
As far as the summary of her talking to the cops, that's pure conjecture. We don't even know if she was interrogated; they certainly didn't need to talk to her once they had that evidence. For all we know, they found about the pictures because she called them out of fear her boyfriend would distribute them. I also doubt that the police were sophisticated enough to be prying into her grounds for a constitutional defense at the appellate level. And such an interrogation certainly isn't mentioned in the dissenting opinion (which is right below the majority one). And it's somewhat irrelevant; if she genuinely believed her boyfriend had a realistic chance of distributing them, she did not have a reasonable expectation of privacy. And if she didn't think there was any such realistic chance, she shouldn't have told the cops she was actually worried he'd distribute them.
This is a law governing the existence of a thing so abhorrent, mere possession of it is a felony. The state has a compelling interest, not merely in punishing those who create it, but in ensuring that it is never created in the first place. You may take issue with this, and say, "Well, it ain't so bad," but that's simply not what the law says, and you don't get to rewrite the law.
I'm not going to argue with the devil :-)
Merely to reiterate that the law on child porn doesn't care what the age of the creator (photographer) or the possessor is. It only cares what the age of the photographed minor is, for the purposes of defining child porn. But the two teenagers were found guilty in part because they were teenagers. If they had been adults, in possession of the same child porn (photos made of themselves years ago at age 16), then privacy protections would have applied. And so this is a small part of the relevance of this whole story to the original discussion on youth rights.
As a matter of record: most states set the age of consent at 16 not 18.
Who would you trust ? The state ? The child himself ? I don't think either of those would make better choices than the parents.
It sucks when parents make bad decisions about their children's medication, but I don't see any easy way out of that. Better information for the parents could help some cases.
Myself as a child, absolutely.
In those rare cases child-wedrifid rejected the will of authorities he had a damn good reason to. If he was (counterfactually) forced to take psychoactive medications against his will it suggests that neither the parents nor the doctor were able to supply any semi-plausible evidence that the medication would benefit him. I would trust his judgement and denounce the coercion.
Among cases where parents and their child disagree as to whether the child should take psychoactive medication, do you think that there are more where the child is right, or more where the parents are right ? ("right" meaning more or less "better for the long term health and happiness of the child)
An answer to this question would be more a comment on the efficacy of popular pharmaceutical interventions than a comment on human judgement.
More generally, I do not consider the possible stupidity of other people to be a good justification for the abuse (pharmaceutical or otherwise) of me, or people like me. I feel absolutely no obligation to support mores that would be bad for me or an entire class of people that I empathise with.
But how do you know that giving the children (instead of the parents) the last word on whether or not they take psychoactive medications will actualy result in better results for the children ?
Or is it that you only emphathise with smart children, not with stupid children ?
I'm not convinced that the policy you propose (children get the last word) will result in the result you describe (it will be better for the children), or I'm misunderstanding you.
We would have to enforce each of these below some age. It's never going to be a good idea to let two year olds hold political office and drive cars, and I think this holds for every one of the items you've mentioned. The debate is only which age is the correct cutoff, and I agree that this parameter may need re-evaluating.
Religious services? medically unnecessary genital mutilation? I'm not sure you need an age cutoff at all for those two.
"and can be forced to take psychoactive medications against their will." is one I had... opinions... about. And yes, while I was being forced to do so. (to this day, I'm not sure my parents ever managed to really comprehend what it was that I objected to)
Seconded. <shudder>
Even if 'right to make medical decisions' is an unrealistic solution to the problem, I think 'right to refuse care' would fix this problem without too many repercussions. It would've done the job perfectly in my case (and did, when I turned 17 and gained the right to refuse).
Or at least, there ought be rather strict rules about when medical care can be forced. I guess forcing a kid to take an antibiotic in the case of them having a nasty bacterial illness that doesn't go away on its own, etc etc... is one thing. ie, if there's a clear unambiguous no one could reasonably dispute it "you're unhealthy now, you'll be better off with this" thing, then okay.
But "well, kids are teasing you, you're a bit different, we're not even really going to diagnose you with anything, but it's just easier for the teachers and everyone if we make you take ritalin 'to make you focus' and supposedly 'help you cope'", well... zah? (excuse me? You want to forcibly chemically hack my mind, that which makes me, well, me... and without even a really compelling justification?) (yeah, they did mean well, but...)
But yeah. I do admit though that, like most things in this world, pretty much any rule we adopt is going to probably have nontrivial downsides.
I suspect that your suggestion wouldn't've helped in my case. I did fine on the ritalin; it was when I decided that I wanted to learn how to function without it that the problems started: They decided I was being oppositional because I was depressed, and forced antidepressants on me. I had bad reactions to every single one, and wasn't believed when I told them about the issues. (It turns out the 'my thoughts feel fuzzy' issue I had on the prozac was probably a result of me being unable to code things into long-term memory - my memory is pretty sharp for events before and after that two-year stretch, but nearly nonexistant for events during it. I'm still horrified.) I actually became depressed while on the antidepressants, because of how poorly I was being treated, so even an objective evaluation of whether I was having a problem 'worth forcing treatment of' wouldn't've helped at that point.
Limiting the situations where treatment can be forced to physical issues would be safer for the kind of situation I'm concerned with, but there's also the issue of kids with, say, cancer, where the parents may want to signal 'being a good parent' by doing everything possible, and the kid knows from experience that the treatment is worse than the disease. I don't want to screw them over, either.
Well, my suggestion is more along the lines of "the justification for forcing a psych medication against the consent of the patient/victim had better be really strong. Not just 'you do okay' with it but that + 'the situation is really absolutely unambiguously no question about it vastly worse in a reasonable objective sense without it, so much worse that the extreme level of violation of forcibly hacking someone's mind is actually not as bad as letting the situation continue'"
So that rule would have probably taken care of your situation, I think.
As far as the last, tricky... hrm...
You know, I agree with the general thrust here about the suboptimal treatment of children, but my reaction to this particular sub-thread is to be somewhat envious of those whose parents were actually informed enough to have them put on psychiatric medication for these types of issues. Myself, I was in graduate school before I found out that I needed this sort of treatment. My parents, I think, always viewed my difficulties as character flaws, blamed me (and themselves) for them, and attempted to correct the problem mainly through shaming and punishments of various sorts.
In contrast to the experiences of a lot of other people, I tend to think that if I had been given something like Ritalin from an early age (say middle school), I might not have nearly flunked out of high school (which resulted in my having to attend a run-of-the-mill state university, and so on).
Wow, I just read about Ritalin on wikipedia... ugh. I would be nearly as worried by doctors prescribing ritalin for gullible adults as for children.
I was on it for quite a number of years actually. I forget exactly. Actually, for a while, they started throwing other things into the mix, for a bit had me also on meleril(a depressant, IIRC) at the same time. but yeah.
You assume that age is the correct parameter. There are others that are perhaps more relevant.
More relevant, maybe, but age seems to be the simplest and the easiest to put into law.
Other viable conditions could be some academic achievments, or financial independance ... these would be good, but age is just simpler.
In the case of political office, how about simply the ability to get the suckers to vote for you?
That one's easy, it's self-correcting. Others - alcohol, sex, voting - are not.
alexflint: We would have to enforce each of these below some age. It's never going to be a good idea to let two year olds hold political office and drive cars, and I think this holds for every one of the items you've mentioned. The debate is only which age is the correct cutoff, and I agree that this parameter may need re-evaluating.
When I saw this my answer was, "No, age is not how we should decide this. Skill and comprehension is. But these two made me rethink the matter. . .
wedrifid: In the case of political office, how about simply the ability to get the suckers to vote for you?
Emile: That one's easy, it's self-correcting. Others - alcohol, sex, voting - are not.
If we had a tests to see if we were ready to assume the responsibilities involved then the tests might be flawed, or even deliberately sabotaged to prevent or mislead the thought processes of those taking it.
Maybe this is why they rely on age instead. It will block those already prepared to handle whats involved, but reduces mistaken or malicious meddling .
A few of these are a bit hyperbolic, particularly consent. There is never a situation where they are the criminal but an adult wouldn't be, as opposed to, for example, buying alcohol. So the harm falls on their lovers, not them. Also, these laws are quite poorly enforced.
Non-consensual genital modification generally occurs at birth, and in all Western countries is strictly limited to male circumcision. I am not sure, but I don't think you could have your 12 year old circumsized against his wishes. So this bullet point is a bit exaggerated.
More generally, and more importantly, minors have substantial privileges. People are legally obliged to care for them and ensure they have a certain standard of health. Schools are obliged to educate them for free. Crimes against them are punished far more severely. Their own crimes a punished (usually) far less severely, and they are in many cases not legally responsible for their own actions.
You certainly have a point, but it's a bit unbalanced to simply list the downsides. Minors may be among the most restricted groups, but they're also amongst the most heavily protected by the law.
It may be worthwhile to separate general goods and evils from specific opportunities. The protections you list make children safer from things that are bad for everyone - violence, poor health, inability to get educated. These are, arguably, things that everyone should be more protected from. Saying that children have more of these protections than adults says something about the inadequacy of protection for adults - this sort of intuition drives the affection many people have for universal health care, for instance. Meanwhile, what adults have that children don't are opportunities to pursue things that they specifically find good and desirable. A child gets an education, but can't choose its content except in fairly trivial ways - apart from picking a foreign language and a music class, and testing into certain higher-level academic courses, I didn't get real course selection until college, where I was treated as an adult and had much more loose requirements to fill. As adults, we might or might not have access to education, but if we do, we can pick what kind.
So basically, the protections children get are nice and well-motivated, but they're one-size-fits-all and poorly suited as a substitute for adult freedom to children with personalities.
A well made argument. Particularly agree to the one-size-fits-all argument.
Our evolution as mammals has forced us to protect our young ones for the survival of our species. The concerns CronoDAS has made are from the perspective of a modern society, especially that of western countries. Even now, millions of kids in third-world countries do not have the option to choose most of the things in that list. In such a situation, more responsible adults need to make a decision on behalf of the children and make available whatever they can for their own benefit.
There is another circumstance in which this applies. Intersex infants with ambiguous genitalia are often surgically modified to better match one of the two standard genders. (But, yes, I admit that the bullet point is exaggerated.)
But in most places, sex between two minors is illegal (edit: below a certain age, not just below the age of majority), and both are liable. And while court cases are rare, punishment at school and at home is common, and most teenagers have to vet their romantic partners with their parents.
Like Alicorn said, these are privileges that should be extended to adults. In many countries, a standard of free health care is guaranteed to all. In some countries, university education is free to all citizens. I'd like to see more of that.
But this is only necessary because they're prevented from defending themselves the way adults would. Most crimes against young people (it's silly to call 16 year olds "children") are done by someone the law forces them to be in daily contact with, even if they hate that person. Such as parents and family and schoolyard bullies. (Most people aren't allowed to veto their K12 school, class, or teachers.)
If we're taking the US as a reference point, I would argue that adults should be punished a lot less for most crimes...
I have to correct myself after reading your answer. I think in reality, counting parents, relatives, and schoolteachers, people really aren't punished more severely when they commit crimes against children. Particularly parents. It's only strangers who commit crimes against children, or people who commit sexually based offenses against them, that we really bother punishing.
On the other hand, it would be really interesting to see a workable alternative system proposed. This is all, "Kids don't have these rights!" as opposed to, "Here's the rights we should give them, how we'd enforce those rights, and how it would work out for the better!"
Googling it says otherwise. In 27 states, there's a "grace period" in which minors can consent within a certain age range, and in 10 states the defendant must explicitly be an adult. Facts are fun!
I stand corrected... So, although the age limit varies by state and is not the same as the age of majority (gaining full legal rights), every state has an age limit below which sex is illegal in all circumstances; usually around 14, but 17 or 18 in a few states. The separately stated age above which all intercourse is valid (i.e., with much older people) is 16 in most states, never lower.
Wikipedia also has an interesting map of worldwide age of consent by country (not representing rules for age differentials or categories). Oh, and quite a few Western countries have laws against specific sexual acts or against certain numbers or sexes of participants.
Could you elaborate?
"Non-consensual genital modification generally occurs at birth, and in all Western countries is strictly limited to male circumcision. I am not sure, but I don't think you could have your 12 year old circumsized against his wishes. So this bullet point is a bit exaggerated."
a major controversial choice with extremely opposing opinions and no medically correct answer is non-consensually taken away from the child before he has the ability decide for him self.
"People are legally obliged to care for them and ensure they have a certain standard of health."
the child is forced to live with a adult who choses to have em and can chose to give him up for adoption at any time.
"Schools are obliged to educate them for free."
the child is forced to be educated with or without there will so the will hopefully profit society in the future
"Crimes against them are punished far more severely."
unlike other laws the laws that only affect children are not decided by those the laws will affect. (laws that "protect children" are made for them with out there input)
"Their own crimes a punished (usually) far less severely, and they are in many cases not legally responsible for their own actions."
this shows the most that they are thought of as lesser children are not thought of as having the ability to be a threat to society but only the pawns of adults.
Point one: you write this as if you've thought of a better way. I'd imagine many six year olds would love to never go to school and eat nothing but candy. That it is decided for them that this is not an acceptable option is a net good thing, unless your sole terminal value is freedom of choice.
Point two: Your objection seems almost entirely directed at bad parents, not the nature of the parent/child relationship. The vast majority of children are actually quite happy about this arrangement, and for some strange reason show distress when you attempt to free them from these terrible, terrible adults. And the claim that adults can choose to give them up for adoption at any time is both misleading and absurd. Legally, yes, but this doesn't actually happen much, for many social and personal reasons. Comparably, anyone who was willing to go to jail could torture and murder you pretty easily. I hardly think that's a serious infringement on your freedom, because that subset of people is incredibly tiny. I also must live in constant fear of being slain by a meteorite, but somehow this does not make my life much worse.
Point three: Your final point rather clearly indicates that your mind has filled in the bottom line and is filling in everything above it. This is an unequivocal benefit - I cannot imagine any situation in which someone would prefer to be tried as an adult than as a child (though a tiny number may exist). When you're at the point of taking clear benefits and saying, "But really, it's a bad thing," it's unlikely that you're seeking truth.
I voted you up for 2(!) points. Bugs like children.
I find this reduced set of rights particularly problematic as children are quite unbiased by popular political opinion and are able to come up with very novel solutions to hard problems.
Except that same scenario could be read as "unequal power makes humans abusive, and economic inequality can be leveraged into power", a contra-libertarian lesson.
It isn't just that there is economic inequality between the parent and the child -- it's that the child is economically dependent on the parent. How much each has matters more than the gap between them.
A billionaire can exercise some leverage over a millionaire, but not nearly as much as a parent over a child.
I wasn't aware that socialist-leaning countries didn't have companies with bosses who were bastards.
First, find me a socialist country without unequal power. Or heck, without economic inequality. Even Soviet Russia had the "nomenklatura" and the dollar black market.
Are you assuming I'm reversing stupidity? I think there might be pain inherent in libertarianism but that doesn't mean I'll go running to whatever defines itself as an opposite.
What I'm trying to say is that corporate abuse of power doesn't automatically go away because you give power to the government. The end result may just be even more power sloshing around in the system. But now we're degenerating into mere politics...
Nope, a degeneration into politics would be marked by one or the other of us switching to "arguments are soldiers". I don't think we have.
I'll put my cards on the table here. I have a lot of respect for libertarian abstract pure capitalism. Its particular advantages that I don't think are equaled elsewhere are: a local update rule (making it embarrassingly parallel), by agents who are self-motivated (without external force) by monotonically increasing expected utility, producing coordinated activity without coordinated preferences, and typically producing compounding reinvestment that grows the technological and wealth base for everyone. I think capitalism is the fixed-point an economy will fall into if you have scarcity, enforce property, and don't do much else. It's the only system that can operate in the presence of scarcity without needing coercion.
I just don't necessarily think those advantages mean it's nice.
Sane libertarians don't say it is nice. They just say that the problems are not automagically fixed by saying, "Let's have the government pass a law against..."
For one thing, politics is basically the rules governing conduct between people who are treating each other as members of different tribes. In this environment "nice" isn't really a likely outcome, given human moral sentiments.
Politics is primarily a within tribe tool.
The definition of "tribe" is very flexible, at least as how it applies to human moral sentiments. I'm talking about psychological tribes, not literal ones (hence the slightly awkward phrasing in the passage of mine you quoted)
The law is principally about how you deal with people you don't really care about. You generally don't look to the law to work out how to treat your family or friends (and when one does, its generally considered a bad thing). The law's primary purpose is to control how you treat people you have no strong affiliation with. Humanity does not have a happy history when it comes to dealing equitably with strangers or near-strangers.
I agree with Julian completely but I would add the observation that there are no countries today with anything remotely resembling pure capitalism. Europe, the US, and the remainder of the traditional "west" are particularly far away from such an ideal.
Agreed. Really free markets were regulated away in the early 20th century, it what has always felt to me like a case of trying to trade stability for growth by preventing whatever caused massive volatility in the past from happening again.
All the worst company abuse stories come from countries with largest inequalities. Abuse by bosses in socialist continental Europe is really mild by historical standards.
Citation needed. I flat out don't believe you.
For those who have played the game, this is much of the premise of Bioshock, where the antagonist to which the player is introduced at the beginning of the game (Andrew Ryan) essentially claims complete authority over the city of Rapture in defense of, rather than in spite of his alleged libertarian ideals.