CerealKiller wrote:Finn dAbuzz wrote:
The next question is whether or not we believe the judgment of the State is ever more reliable and accurate than that of The Reasonable Man (or woman)?
Who exactly is this "Reasonable Man?"
Is this some idea from a book or something, because I'm lost.
Regardless, I have yet to see a law meant to protect children that is largely harmful to society. If there is one you would like to pick out, please do so.
The Reasonable Man is a legal fiction used in Common Law as a standard against which to judge individuals. It presumes that most members of society more times than not act reasonably and that such reasonable actions are just.
The Reasonable Man knows that driving his vehicle 100mph on a neighborhood street is reckless and very likely to cause someone harm.
The Reasonable Man knows that giving his baby a bottle of gin to drink each morning is more than likely to cause considerable harm to the baby.
The Reasonable Man knows that setting fireworks off inside a small place of business is likely to lead to the harm of his patrons.
The question I asked is whether or not legislators are more reliable than The Reasonable Man in determing what is good or not good for society.
The Reasonable Man, for instance, does not believe that it benefits society that someone who is drunk and harms himself due to his drunken actions should be able to hold the party providing him with drink responsible for his injuries.Legislators have, however, thought otherwise and enacted Dram Shop statutes that hold the provider of the drink responsible for harm caused by the drunk.
Your question as to whether or not any law passed to protect children has been "largely" harmful to society is essentially imprecise and decidedly loaded.
It also depends, largely, on your definition of "largely."
The test of the justice and efficacy of a law is not whether or not it has immediate and cataclysmic repercusions.
Here is the essence of the debate: Before the State imposes a law on its citizens should it be required to prove it's benefits outweigh its harms, or should the citizens be forced to react to a State imposed law in demonstrating that the harms outweighs the benefit?
It depends upon who you believe is more capable of and reliable in determining what benefits and harms us and our children --- the average Joe (The Common Man, The Reasonable Man) or the Emperors and Mandarins of the State.