8 ms·
Another way to frame it (IMHO) might be not to think of laws as a deterrent - especially because people break them anyway. The law codifies what circumstances t
by strangattractor 3y ago
Another way to frame it (IMHO) might be not to think of laws as a deterrent - especially because people break them anyway. The law codifies what circumstances the government can and cannot restrict your rights. Codifying this serves 2 primary purposes. It informs people in advance what is allowable so people cannot be arbitrarily arrested for doing things they don't know is illegal. Secondly it prescribes the penalty for that behavior so that in extreme cases we can remove a person that insists on that behavior. If there is no law prohibiting a behavior the gov't effectively cannot do anything about it. I see laws as only being useful after the crime has occurred.
Yes this system gets gamed and abused. Curbing that requires constant effort just as deciding what laws need to be codified is a ongoing process.
- petsfed 3y agoAnd one of the core questions to be answered when prescribing how and when the government can restrict your rights is "which is the worse outcome for society as a whole?" The question of abortion really crystallizes this question perfectly for me: Which is worse? That a small number of people use infanticide in lieu of pro-active birth control? Or that a small number of people are forced to carry a nonviable pregnancy to term (even at the cost of their own life), or carry and raise a reminder of their rape (up to and including providing visitation/custody to their rapist)? There's a reason this is so controversial, and its because people (rightly) can't agree on which outcome society must necessarily be an accessory to.