We all have them….admit it or not…you to have a vice…whether it is smoking or chocolate or weed or coke or porn or….well I bet you get the idea….some of us will not admit to having a vice because it is illegal……the point of this post is that the government does not have the right to interfere with me chasing me vice if I am hurting NO one but myself ……..
Now for a little history….
The radical American individualist legal theorist and abolitionist Lysander Spooner (1808-1887) argues in a collection of essays on the prohibition of alcohol that all laws against “vice” were unjust, immoral, and counter-productive, and that practising a vice was no crime at all:
VICES are those acts by which a man harms himself or his property.
Crimes are those acts by which one man harms the person or property of another.
Vices are simply the errors which a man makes in his search after his own happiness. Unlike crimes, they imply no malice toward others, and no interference with their persons or property.
In vices, the very essence of crime—that is, the design to injure the person or property of another—is wanting.
It is a maxim of the law that there can be no crime without a criminal intent; that is, without the intent to invade the person or property of another. But no one ever practises a vice with any such criminal intent. He practises his vice for his own happiness solely, and not from any malice toward others.
Unless this clear distinction between vices and crimes be made and recognized by the laws, there can be on earth no such thing as individual right, liberty, or property; no such things as the right of one man to the control of his own person and property, and the corresponding and co-equal rights of another man to the control of his own person and property.
For a government to declare a vice to be a crime, and to punish it as such, is an attempt to falsify the very nature of things. It is as absurd as it would be to declare truth to be falsehood, or falsehood truth.
I agree with Spooner…..and sounds a lot like some of the beliefs of Libertarians…….I believe that such programs as the War on Drugs is a waste of money for it can NEVER be won and that cash would better serve the American people than flushed down some third world toilet…….and anything that effects NO one but me….should not be a crime….I am have my vices but they only harm me and NO one else.
Well, I almost agree. To be “addicted” to sex, for instance (as some claim is possible – I should be so lucky), is clearly not a crime, but a vice – but to be addicted to sex with minors obviously IS a crime and is harmful to others, but it is also a vice in the terms I understand the word – at least I’d say those who are guilty would say so… maybe not – I don’t know.
However, in general I agree wholeheartedly and I’m sure that drugs don’t need to be the problem they are – they would be much cheaper if they were legal and the government would no doubt tax them like they do everything else that people enjoy, as well as not wasting all that money on “crime” prevention.
Personally, drugs are not my bag and never have been, but I do think the problem is that the makers of civil law and religious teachers should decide to leave each other well alone for, in a secular society, laws to back up the subjective beliefs of those who, for some foolish reason, think that they have the moral high ground are, as you point out, largely doomed to failure and are in any event, like their f*cking cheek!
Sorry about the delay in my reply…Saturdays are becoming as busy as the rest of the damn week….
I have always thought that it there is no abuse of others why is it a crime…like prostitution or drug use or porn or…well you get it…..drugs…we have spent multi-billions to curb drugs and it just keeps getting bigger and bigger……people bitch about the drug crime on the border areas….but if the middle man was cut out of the equation then the crime part would disappear…..
My grandfather lived to be 96…did he do drugs? Nope but he did mind his own business….
Yes, I certainly agree with all that. There is the question of whether a drugged up society can function at all – but that’s not what the “masters” actually give a damn about – what THEY care about is the fact that they may not have enough “workers” to run their businesses and cutomers to buy their goods.
I don’t have any particular problem with that attitude, but couldn’t they for once just be open and honest about it?
Honesty is NOT the best policy in government! Sad to say…..
Of course it’s not!
If it is true…how do we change it……without a total overall of the system?
That’s the point I keep on making – even a total overhaul won’t do – scrap it completely and start again, but have a better idea before you do anything at all, or the same jerks as now will hijack it at the very beginning and twist it!
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