4 ms·

I was a libertarian, and I still have some libertarian views, but I agree that my views have changed as I've gotten older and now have kids. In theory, I'm all

I was a libertarian, and I still have some libertarian views, but I agree that my views have changed as I've gotten older and now have kids. In theory, I'm all for consenting adults doing whatever they want as long as it doesn't infringe on others, but I don't want my kids doing whatever they want or being influenced by some things. Things that were abstract to me, like drugs, because I would never consider doing them, are more concrete now. Our kids are still very young, but my wife has recently said things like, "I'm really afraid of our kids ending up on drugs someday," after hearing yet another story about the opioid crisis. And I was like, "Oh wow, yeah, it hasn't crossed my mind until now, but that's a really scary thought."

lawlessone 3y ago
I don't know if you intended it or not but: "I was a libertarian until I had children" is very funny.
- warner25 3y ago
  That's pretty much it. I've seen how market mechanisms and natural consequences don't necessarily lead to my kids making sound decisions. Before having kids I envisioned myself being a Laissez-faire parent. Now my wife tells me that I need to calm down and be less authoritarian.
  - galdosdi 3y ago
    Same experience. Everyone is a libertarian until they meet kids and realize how impressionable and gullible even the smartest of them are at a young age -- easy prey for the advertising industry, the junk food industry, the junk media industry, and worse. Giving them total freedom at too young an age doesn't really help them be free, it helps them be slaves to someone else with more ad dollars. Libertarianism and freedom, etc, rest upon a foundation of a well educated society with members who have enough understanding of themselves and their world to resist exploitative influences -- you are not born ready for freedom, in fact, you are born literally a baby, totally dependent for years. After years of good parenting which helps you develop self respect, values, and critical thinking, hopefully then you are ready to responsibly embrace that freedom. Moreover, how much my perspective was changed made me realize some problems in today's society could have to do with the fact that being a parent or at least being around and being responsible for kids, was a universal fact of life for nearly all adults until very recently, but now it's possible for a young adult to barely ever encounter a child through their entire 20s and beyond. No wonder it's easy to end up with a worldview that does not account for how children can fit into it.
    - warner25 3y ago
      I love the points you made, and how well you articulated them.
    - hotpotamus 3y ago
      Not everyone is a libertarian at any point in their lives; not all of us needed to have children to realize that people (and not just ones under whichever age of majority you subscribe to) are shaped by the systems they live in. But I ask, what about those who are unable to "responsibly embrace that freedom"? What is to be done about them?
flatline 3y ago
I have kids and recognize that they will become full grown adults and should have some agency. I want them to be informed enough to navigate the treacherous world into which they’ve been born, and given the emotional, financial, and other forms of stability so they don’t turn to drugs as a crutch. When I hear opiates I think of the medical industrial complex as the primary threat vector, not street drugs. All fully legal right now. Everyone I know who got hooked started under doctors orders. I’m not against responsible recreational drug use as they get older. I’m also not against the responsible prescription of opiates, all we’ve done to curb this is make pain treatment harder to obtain for those who need it. Either way, punishing people is not the way forward.
- warner25 3y ago
  Yeah, as parents that's all we can do. I just want to underscore the sentiment of the original comment that - as a thought experiment - if it were possible to put the non-prescription or recreational drug genie back in the bottle somehow, that would be nice. I certainly don't know what the way forward should be.
kibwen 3y ago
> I don't want my kids doing whatever they want or being influenced by some things. You're allowed to want or not want whatever for your children, but as soon as they become adults, their own wants for their own life override your wants for their life. In the meantime, plenty of people (all of whom are somebody's children) have chosen to try hard drugs despite the fact that they are already illegal and demonstrably dangerous. You can't store your children in a crystal sphere for their whole lives, so it's your job to teach them as best you can and let them go. You can do the best you can as a parent and they might still choose to throw their lives away, and if they do then that's on them, not on you. Their lives are their own.
yard2010 3y ago
Every society needs policing, it's a matter of who's doing the policing and who's making the rules.

lawlessone 3y ago

I don't know if you intended it or not but: "I was a libertarian until I had children" is very funny.

warner25 3y ago
That's pretty much it. I've seen how market mechanisms and natural consequences don't necessarily lead to my kids making sound decisions. Before having kids I envisioned myself being a Laissez-faire parent. Now my wife tells me that I need to calm down and be less authoritarian.
- galdosdi 3y ago
  Same experience. Everyone is a libertarian until they meet kids and realize how impressionable and gullible even the smartest of them are at a young age -- easy prey for the advertising industry, the junk food industry, the junk media industry, and worse. Giving them total freedom at too young an age doesn't really help them be free, it helps them be slaves to someone else with more ad dollars. Libertarianism and freedom, etc, rest upon a foundation of a well educated society with members who have enough understanding of themselves and their world to resist exploitative influences -- you are not born ready for freedom, in fact, you are born literally a baby, totally dependent for years. After years of good parenting which helps you develop self respect, values, and critical thinking, hopefully then you are ready to responsibly embrace that freedom. Moreover, how much my perspective was changed made me realize some problems in today's society could have to do with the fact that being a parent or at least being around and being responsible for kids, was a universal fact of life for nearly all adults until very recently, but now it's possible for a young adult to barely ever encounter a child through their entire 20s and beyond. No wonder it's easy to end up with a worldview that does not account for how children can fit into it.
  - warner25 3y ago
    I love the points you made, and how well you articulated them.
  - hotpotamus 3y ago
    Not everyone is a libertarian at any point in their lives; not all of us needed to have children to realize that people (and not just ones under whichever age of majority you subscribe to) are shaped by the systems they live in. But I ask, what about those who are unable to "responsibly embrace that freedom"? What is to be done about them?

flatline 3y ago

I have kids and recognize that they will become full grown adults and should have some agency. I want them to be informed enough to navigate the treacherous world into which they’ve been born, and given the emotional, financial, and other forms of stability so they don’t turn to drugs as a crutch. When I hear opiates I think of the medical industrial complex as the primary threat vector, not street drugs. All fully legal right now. Everyone I know who got hooked started under doctors orders. I’m not against responsible recreational drug use as they get older. I’m also not against the responsible prescription of opiates, all we’ve done to curb this is make pain treatment harder to obtain for those who need it. Either way, punishing people is not the way forward.

warner25 3y ago
Yeah, as parents that's all we can do. I just want to underscore the sentiment of the original comment that - as a thought experiment - if it were possible to put the non-prescription or recreational drug genie back in the bottle somehow, that would be nice. I certainly don't know what the way forward should be.

kibwen 3y ago

> I don't want my kids doing whatever they want or being influenced by some things. You're allowed to want or not want whatever for your children, but as soon as they become adults, their own wants for their own life override your wants for their life. In the meantime, plenty of people (all of whom are somebody's children) have chosen to try hard drugs despite the fact that they are already illegal and demonstrably dangerous. You can't store your children in a crystal sphere for their whole lives, so it's your job to teach them as best you can and let them go. You can do the best you can as a parent and they might still choose to throw their lives away, and if they do then that's on them, not on you. Their lives are their own.

yard2010 3y ago

Every society needs policing, it's a matter of who's doing the policing and who's making the rules.