A Defense of the Freedom to be Left
Alone.
BAD Broadside #4
We live in an invasive society. Our
freedom to peacefully lead
our lives as we please is severely
restricted by laws, rules, and
regulations instituted by governments of
all sorts and their supporters among the
populace. We are subject to a huge
number of laws, among which are laws
that: outlaw certain forms of consensual
sex; ban public nudity; restrict the
sale or production of sexually explicit
books and films; criminalize the sale of
sexual favors; prohibit ownership of
handguns; require us to get notes from a
physician to buy certain medicines;
prevent us from seeking the assistance
of another in ending our own lives; fine
us for not wearing seatbelts; and
attempt to prevent us from using the
recreational drugs of our choice. Why do
people tolerate such a level of
government interference in their
personal lives? Because they have been
convinced that individuals and society
need to be protected from the
consequences of "bad" choices people
might make if they were left alone.
Governments presume
that they know better what is good for
others than do those people themselves.
These rulers seem to think that when
other people make choices that they
consider unwise, unhealthy, or immoral,
those people are misbehaving because
they are either uninformed, stupid, or
physically, psychologically, or morally
diseased. The state then feel justified
in stepping in to prevent the
"unenlightened" from harming themselves.
These busybodies fail to see that other
people can freely choose to engage in
activities of which they disapprove.
People like different
things and have different ideas about
how to lead their lives. Some prefer
heterosex, some homosex, some both, some
neither. Some like coffee and
cigarettes, others vodka and cocaine.
Some prefer to have physicians tell them
how to stay or get healthy and what
medicines to take, others would prefer
non-medical healers or wish to make
their own choice about what drugs they
wish to use. Some choose to engage in
sex for free, while others are willing
to pay for or sell sexual favors. These
activities are the result of freely made
choices and no one is affected by any of
them except the individuals who
voluntarily engage in them. Therefore,
they should not be the business of
anyone but the participants
and should not be interfered with by
others.
People sometimes
engage in activities that are
potentially harmful to them because the
pleasure or benefit they derive or hope
to derive from the activity is more
important to them than the actual or
potential harm the activity may cause
them. People smoke tobacco despite the
increase in lung cancer and emphysema
risk associated with it because of the
pleasure they get from smoking. Some
people engage in sexual activity, like
cocksucking without condoms, which
carries some risk of causing HIV
infection, because the sexual pleasure
they obtain is worth the small risk of
being infected and perhaps developing
AIDS. Such choices should be left
entirely up to the individual, since no
one else is harmed. We should be free to
live our lives as we please, even if we
make some decisions that turn out to
have been unwise.
Some voluntary
activities are prohibited or regulated
because they have the potential to
involve others involuntarily. Since guns
can be used to kill others, the argument
is made that gun ownership should be
regulated to prevent possible harm to
others. Some harmed by guns deserve to
be harmed, as when gun owners
are defending themselves or their
property, but sometimes innocent others
are harmed by gun owners. The fact that
non-invasive people are sometimes
injured or killed when guns are freely
available, however, does not justify
restricting their availability.
Non-coercive people are also sometimes
hurt or die in car accidents, but few,
if any, advocate banning cars
for this reason. Just because a gun or
car can be misused to hurt someone who
has not injured the owner does not
justify banning it.
Supporters of
interventionist governments would argue
that no or little risk is acceptable in
society. However, the problem with this
outlook is that lowering risk means
restricting freedom. A society
that values freedom will necessarily be
a society which allows people the
freedom to engage in risky
behavior. We must make a choice: either
a free, somewhat risky world, or a safe
and secure, but stifling and unfree one.
Politicians of all
political tendencies, rightists and
leftists alike, support government
intervention in other people's lives.
Conservatives and conventional liberals
may be more crass and open
about their interventionism,
but they hold no monopoly on it. The
socialist left is perfectly willing to
interfere with the affairs of others,
and the socialist states have an even
worse record than the united states when
it comes to restrictions on individual
freedom. Few leftists criticize the
prescription system or laws against
recreational drug use, for instance, and
the socialist states are notorious for
persecuting people who engage in
homosexual sex.
No government of any
sort, no matter what its size or
political orientation, will leave people
alone. The nature and mission of
government is to interfere with free
individuals and tell them how they
should live their lives. We will only be
truly and completely free when people
finally decide that they can live better
and more freely without any government
and begin the process of building a
stateless society.
NO COPYRIGHT
Please send two copies of any review or
reprint of all or part of this to:
Boston Anarchist Drinking Brigade
(BAD Brigade)
PO Box 1323
Cambridge,
MA 02238
Internet: bbrigade@world.std.com
November
1991
Back