Morality and reasoned justification are incompatable

[ThinkAnarchy]

And the arguments against are very compelling, but not proven. If there were a proven link between violence and the content, I would have to seriously reevaluate my position. We both simply have different default views and both have our reasons for erring on the side of what we we think is more cautious.

My justification is simply that most laws meant to do good, will usually be unintended consequences and abuses due to it. Once it starts it seems easier simply to abolish the law. It would be ideal to reform laws so they better target actual offenders, but I think it's easier to monitor the problem when it's legal. There would also be natural deterrents for partaking in behavior a lot of people find morally repulsive. Even if incest were legal, many people would still not act on it because they would be shunned by the rest of society. Even without laws, you can't stop people from shunning, being rude to, etc, individuals you disagree with.

I also understand the argument from your side because I used to hold the same views.

The research involved also wouldn't be worth getting you're I.P. adress flagged.

Sorry for not, quoting, but in regards to what you mean by sexual harassment. Molestation of an employee is obviously wrong, but with general sexual harassment laws, they get abused too. I think verbally harassing someone is wrong but don't support it being illegal.

[ThinkAnarchy]

I've been thinking about this, and similar instances of over-reach: the 6-yr old boy who got accused of sexual harassment for kissing a 6-yr old girl during recess, the high school student arrested for carrying a weapon at school (it was an x-acto knife from art class), and it seems to me that all these cases are instances of zero tolerance policies.  I will be the first person to say that zero tolerance policies are both asinine and lazy, and the authorities should just gut up and make a judgement call.  

However, that doesn't mean laws against sexual harassment or carrying a weapon are not valuable and necessary.  And altho I'm on the fence about how dangerous it is to possess nude pictures of minors (no more baby in the bath or on a bear skin rug in daddy's wallet), considering the level of damage done when sexual abuse does happen to children I just can't bring myself to take as much risk as I otherwise would and say the illegality of possession should be dropped.  More common sense needs to be used in making charges, but that's as far as I can go.

I would like to add one more thing. Simply because I don't feel verbal sexual harassment should be illegal, doesn't mean I don't think people should not have protections against such advances. I would imagine when a company received a complaint about being sexual harassed, they would likely turn to a arbitration type firm to settle the dispute.  

When I speak of no laws, I am referring to mostly criminal. People will always have disputes, but a lot of them can be handled with a simple discussion.

That may not completely solve the problem, but the current laws haven't solved it either.

[DeterminedJuliet]

My justification is simply that most laws meant to do good, will usually be unintended consequences and abuses due to it.

(my emphasis)

Really? You think that laws intended to prevent abuses usually do more harm than good? Why is that? I can understand the concern that they "could" be used in an unintended way, but "usually"?

[Sandra Craft]

I would like to add one more thing. Simply because I don't feel verbal sexual harassment should be illegal, doesn't mean I don't think people should not have protections against such advances. I would imagine when a company received a complaint about being sexual harassed, they would likely turn to a arbitration type firm to settle the dispute.  

I think that is how most harassment problems are handled, I may have simply assumed too much in thinking there were actual criminal laws about it.  In any case, I have have no problem with starting at the lowest level practical and then working up, if and when the problem escalates.

My justification is simply that most laws meant to do good, will usually be unintended consequences and abuses due to it. Once it starts it seems easier simply to abolish the law.

I think this may be where we're looking at it differently.  I think of any law as not being meant to do good, but being meant to protect (altho of course that's good).  If a law works properly most of the time, I'd rather tweak it to narrow the failure rate than abandon it at together.  The only laws I'm willing to abandon are either those that aren't working right at all (like the 3-strikes law) or something that shouldn't have been a law in the first place because it's based solely on morality or is just plain silly (like not whistling at ducks on Sunday, which I think is a real law somewhere in the Midwest).

[ThinkAnarchy]

My justification is simply that most laws meant to do good, will usually be unintended consequences and abuses due to it.

(my emphasis)

Really? You think that laws intended to prevent abuses usually do more harm than good? Why is that? I can understand the concern that they "could" be used in an unintended way, but "usually"?

Yes, most laws are useless in their nature, or deal with a non-problem. Those that do are often abused. I'm not saying most laws aren't used mostly for their intended purpose, but the majority of laws are used to harass non-violent people, protect some criminal actions, or completely evil in their very existence, to often for my tastes.

Drug laws are continuously abused,
-Cops break down doors of completely innocent home owners, who have no drugs, and are in no way liable for their mistake.
-It is common practice to shoot the families dog, regardless of it's size or threat level.
-Innocent people die to often precisely because of the drug laws, especially those of lower income.

That's not to mention general shootings at the hands of cops. They are rarely fully investigated, and no matter how outraged the public gets, it's almost always deemed justified. They are sometimes held liable for murder, while other times they get to go back on the force. Some police shootings are justified, but many that clearly appear to be unjustified go unpunished.


citizens arrested for filming cops,
children arrested for statutory rape,
DUI checkpoints to catch anyone who is slightly drunk without any consideration to the actual danger they possess,
Child kicked out of school for using pizza shaped like gun to "shot" students.
Adult photographers harassed by the cops (sometimes arrested) for taking innocent pictures of children in public; sometimes their own grandchildren.
The state using other traffic laws to raise money, like rolling through stop signs, that one was used to give me a ticket because I stopped passed the white line in order to see oncoming traffic.

That's not even mentioning laws and regulations that artificially prop up certain certain businesses or industries. Below is just one example. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/18/livery-services-use-legis_n_1101708.html

My problem is that people don't stop to think how big a problem is. Most of the U.S, especially when something happens to a child, blindly start screaming for a new law. No matter how many laws are created, people will never be completely safe.

Laws used to protect us from our food for example, typically do nothing to protect us and simply harm many.
-It used to be popular for low income farmers in my area to park their trucks on the side of the road and sell their strawberries and a few other foods they harvested. That got shut down, because the food had not been "inspected." There was nothing wrong with their food, there hadn't ever been any serious problems, yet they got screwed because we all need to be protected like children.