The Real Johnson writes:
In short, smoking in a car with a kid = bad.This is one of those issues of moral consistency. Can you really be pro choice (which I am), for example, and support smoking-in-the car bans? While in utero, the child is nothing. You can drink, smoke, or kill him if you feel like it. Totally up to you. Right to choose is paramount. But then he pops out and becomes a ward of the state. All of a sudden, you don't know what's best and your behavior is regulated for their protection. Strange.
And yet, there are people who would say it is not the government's business to tell me what I can and cannot do in my own car with my own kids.
I wonder then (but didn't bother asking), what these people's idea is for the role of government? If it's not there to enact laws that attempt to protect and improve the lives of its citizens, what is the government for?
Ok, to be fair. I don't know if this is entirely a contradiction. Progressives will likely scramble to make distinctions. Maybe they are right, but I doubt the ground will be solid. As a libertarian, 'children' occupy an ambiguous status. They are not fully formed adults yet, and so at what age to 'free to choose' principles apply. After all, a 5 year old is not exactly free to choose leave the car when his parents start smoking. He is, in other words, coerced to some degree by the structure of the family. Customarily, we assume that part of individual freedom is the 'right to raise ones children' on the assumption that parents sort of know what is best ,and that the family unit is something to be respected.
This is a flawed assumption: and kids suffer for the choices that others make. Is there a role for the state in the protection of children? Sure. Is this consistent with libertarianism? I think so. But there will always be a tension between the top-down and the bottom-up. After some meandering, I find myself in agreement with Johnson, on this one.
