Let’s see : do you believe that an eight-years-old is as “retarded” as somebody who has Downs syndrome ?
Just another example of arbitrary legislation. Lost on you it seems.
I am not making a priori presumptions as to whether an 8 year old is or is not in possession of a rational capacity (it might be, or in all likelihood, it might not be.) What I asked was, whether you’d consider a person who has this mental defect as capable of giving consent to any activities it might engage in? If not, then why not extend this reasoning to children, who likewise lack this capacity at their current stage of development?
It’s about the only genuine example of arbitrariness you’ve come up with so far.
-Jon
Poisoning the well. “Unable to form consent” is “unable to form consent.” There can be lots of reason one can’t consent. One might be a parrot. Or brain-dead. Or comatose. Or asleep. Or insane. Or developmentally unable. Or carved from marble. Everything in the universe that can’t form consent is equivalent to anything else in the universe that can’t form consent in one respect: they can’t form consent. In that respect, and that respect only, a child is a retard is a vegetable is a parrot is a rock.
This isn’t really that difficult to understand.
–Len
Your bragging really bothers me because I know full well why you think you’re armed. Americans are armed to defend themselves from the aggresions of government. But, so far, armed Americans have not lifted a finger against their government. On the other hand some other armed Americans belong to a body known as the military wich routinely massacres defenceless people all over the world. While the portion of civilian armed Americans watch TV or/and provide moral support for those crimes.
So far, you’ve not provided a coherent explanation why the rights of children should be violated. Instead of that you’re bragging about a freedom you utterly lack. As I already said to you someplace else, assert your freedom to smoke in a pub and see where you end up, if you really try to defend your natural rights.
Do you feel that you’re under a moral obligation to commit suicide? You seem to think I am. But that subject is OT for this thread. I have lots of reasons for having firearms, including hunting and defense of self or others. That latter is the bit that’s relevant to this thread.
You haven’t provided one example of a child clamoring for his right to make out with you. I asked you to provide one example. Until then, I’ll remind you that this isn’t a “right” any kid wants; the kids want to be defended from sexual predators.
–Len.
So this is that last iteration.
Children can’t form consent. Because they are children, wich means they can’t form consent, because…you get the picture.
Yeah. And who introduced the off-topic topic ?
Maybe you should leave the Ad Hominem to Niccolo. He’s better at it.
Not considering the irrelevant personal remark, I’ll repeat what I said a couple of pages ago. According to you the reason children are interesed in sex is
“They’re usually keenly interested after they’re introduced to the subject, through some combination of delinquent older kids, criminal adults and negligent parents with big-screen TVs.”
So, really, I don’t think you are to be taken seriously. Go hang some ‘delinquent’ kids or ‘negligent’ parents.
Don’t. Just come up with ONE SINGLE, SOLITARY EXAMPLE OF ANY DOCUMENTED CASE ANYWHERE, ANY TIME IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD. In which a child sought sexual intercourse with an adult without ever having first been taught about sexual intercourse by an adult (including young adults, teenagers, TV or magazines).
As for my personal remark, I partially apologize. Frankly, I find it hard to believe you’d have come this far without ever clarifying your stance on pedophilia, so I sincerely suspect that your views on pedophilia would not be well received. That’s a long step from actually committing indecent acts, but to me it’s scary as hell.
–Len.
Everything in the universe that can’t form consent is equivalent to anything else in the universe that can’t form consent in one respect: they can’t form consent. In that respect, and that respect only, a child is a retard is a vegetable is a parrot is a rock.
I’ve been following this thread with some amusement. It seems the trolls are out in force. I’ll try to bring things back around to something useful…
It seems like the only thing we need to agree on is a method to judge what can form consent. I believe that Juan is saying that you cannot simply state that “children” cannot form consent. I think all of you would agree that putting arbitrary age limits on this is a bad idea.
So how do we judge when something is capable of giving consent? As it was said before, it cannot simply be the ability to utter verbal communication. So what real-world, logical test can we use to determine this?
Using the earlier example, how do I determine if that drunk wants to kill himself or not? How do I determine if that 10 year old really wants to have sex with that 30 year old man? This is the root of the problem, and we will go around and around in circles until we can answer it.
Always a great way to start a conversation. “I’m WAAAAAY smarter than you guys, and now that I’ve done laughing at your inferiority, I’ll set y’all straight…” Also useful at cocktail parties and when lunching with your boss and his boss.
Those aren’t all the same question. Whether or not I really want to hit my toe with a hammer, it’s none of your business if I do. You don’t need to figure out what I really want. Likewise the suicidal drunken man or the slutty drunken sorority girl.
In the case of the child, it’s also less clearcut than that: if my seven-year-old actually did “really want” to join NAMBLA and find a trucker boyfriend, I still wouldn’t let him. Nevertheless, for the sake of argument, you do raise a fair question.
The answer is that it’s impossible to tell. Even for the child himself. The child’s psyche is sufficiently plastic that you can not only get him to pass whatever test you might devise to determine what he “really wants”; you can also convince the child himself that he “really wants” whatever you want him to want. Parents use this Jedi mind trick all the time to make kids play with the available toy, or eat the available food, or go where you’re taking him, when he’d really prefer something else and probably throw a tantrum about the available choices.
The consequences of being born aren’t just geographic. They include (initially) total helplessness, which makes the child pretty fricking suggestible to the people he regards as his sole hope for survival.
–Len.
Len,
Re: Your email, I am quite sure I have not made your acquantaince before.
Always a great way to start a conversation.
Whoa, easy there. I’m refering to people who aren’t contributing anything to the debate.
Those aren’t all the same question. Whether or not I really want to hit my toe with a hammer, it’s none of your business if I do. You don’t need to figure out what I really want. Likewise the suicidal drunken man or the slutty drunken sorority girl.
No, that’s the whole point. You need to explain why a suicidal drunk isn’t the same as a rock or parrot. The whole “give consent” thing. If, as you are saying, a “child” cannot give consent then why can a drunk? Just because of the age?
In the case of the child, it’s also less clearcut than that: if my seven-year-old actually did “really want” to join NAMBLA and find a trucker boyfriend, I still wouldn’t let him.
You wouldn’t let him, so either you are preventing the abuse of a being that cannot understand what it is getting into (giving consent) or are acting against the NAP towards your child. Which is it?
Please note that I am in your camp on this…that there are certain humans who do not have the ability to understand the decisions they are making. Humans with severely diminished brain capacity fall into this group. As do young humans.
The problem is how to determine what humans are in this group by using a consistent set of rules and procedures.
How am I supposed to document that ? I would grant that it’s not common but I’m pretty sure that there are a lot of stories out there - stories wich people would never document because people do not want to go to jail.
What do you expect me to say ? ‘Pedophiles’ should be hanged ? Clearly I don’t think they should.
But the point I’m interested in making is that there’s no rational basis for the way children are treated. If their choices are to be treated as carrying no value because children are mentally defective, fine. If their choices are to be respected because of this rights-thing, then I do not see why sex is so thorny a subject, or carries some special status.
Sorry if this is personal, but, have you taught your son how to shoot ? Or in a more general note, are children taught how to shoot ? At what age ?
My last reply is held up. This seems to be rather random…
If you’re going to restrict the rights of some individual It falls to you to prove beyond reasonable doubt that the restrictions of their actions is just, or that their actions violate your rights. It falls upon the parent, then, to prove their child is incapable of rational thought. You would have to prove that your two year old isn’t capable of independantly formulating or enacting volition in attempt of meeting ends.
I use the two year old analogy because such measures should be the case reguardless of age. If the two year old can refute my claim that it is incapable of acting voluntarily to attain it’s greatest preferences in any way, there is reason to suspect any claim that someone can make in claiming control over its actions. This is the only evidence emancipation should require in a libertarian society.
Hi Austrian folks,
Just like “liberty student”, I’ve been following this thread, without being able to arrive to a 100% valid “logical” conclusion.
I’m a father of three - one 14-year old boy and a couple of 6-1/2 year old twins, and I sincerely wouldn’t be very pleased to meet personally some of the contributors to this thread… It kind of scares me to think that some would-be libertarian would try to have “consented sex” with my kids, in the name of personal freedom.
Even though my ideas evolved quite a bit in the field of economics and towards embracing the libertarian thinking, after almost 4 years visiting the Mises website and reading enlightening texts from Mises, Hayek, Rothbard & others, I still feel that the non-aggression axiom (and its logical derivations, as much as possible), are simply not enough to build a whole new philosophical structure for human organization, which answers each and every possible question, be it economical, legal or whatever else.
The present discussion reminds me – to a certain extent – about the surrealistic debate on the Clinton-Monica affair, with lawyers deeply debating (sorry, no pun intended) whether oral sex is or not a sexual relationship.
Just to keep on-topic, I’d like to recall the fact – any psychologist or related specialist here?, please help me in this matter – that children below a certain age (between 6 and 8, most scientists accept) are still in a so-called “pre-logical” stage of mind development, where they are not fully capable to derive the possible consequences of their actions – for instance: “wow, if I play with this match, I may cause a fire which will destroy my house and kill my whole family” or similar. Or, in some case, they may even be able to foresee the consequences but they do not evaluate their degree of criticality.
That said, it’s logic to understand that before the referred evolution of their logical capabilities, kids are NOT expected to “consent” on having sex with an adult or with other children of whichever age, while fully understanding the consequences thereof.
Even though it’s a fact that children do have interest in sex, they do not actively pursue sexual activity like an adult, as they have lots of interesting things to play with and learn and live happily their childhood undisturbed by adult-age concerns. They will have the rest of their lives to think about sex, how to get it, etc. etc. and everything we all adults learned and – if measured by the number of answers in this thread – surely is one of the highest priorities in adult life…
My personal opinion: supplementary sources of knowledge and inspiration such as religion, the study of ethics and philosophy etc, may be a valuable aid in finding the (personal) answers to questions discussed here, such as the “suitable” age to initiate sexual life.
I’m aware that there are religions that view as “normal” an old man marrying a 10-year old girl and others that don’t approve of such procedures, as well as religions that view as an immoral act to eat a beef made of cow meat etc., but that’s another subject…
Best regards from Rio,
R. Halevy.
It falls upon the parent, then, to prove their child is incapable of rational thought.
I guess a series of psychological and physiological tests could be created to act as an unbiased and consistent means to test this. There are plenty of examples we can draw on from existing law.
I use the two year old analogy because such measures should be the case reguardless of age. If the two year old can refute my claim that it is incapable of acting voluntarily to attain it’s greatest preferences in any way, there is reason to suspect any claim that someone can make in claiming control over its actions. This is the only evidence emancipation should require in a libertarian society.
So we assume that all human beings, regardless of age, are capable of rational thought until someone proves otherwise? Interesting.
I wonder if we could flip it around. Perhaps we could say that all human beings, regardless of age, are incapable of consent unless they prove otherwise. I could see something like a “test of manhood”…at any time a human can choose to prove they are capable of consent and it is accepted that they have all their rights.
This sort of plays on the “when they move out, they are an adult” idea from the first few pages.
I have not read one person here say they would have sex with someone’s kids.
That simply isn’t true. You haven’t been active around a lot of today’s youth if you hold that position.