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You are comparing apples to oranges. There is a difference between "prohibition of a substance" and "prohibition of an activity that exploits human beings". Th

You are comparing apples to oranges. There is a difference between "prohibition of a substance" and "prohibition of an activity that exploits human beings". The first is purely voluntary [e.g. both parties desire to engage in the transaction without coercion] while the second is generally due to coercion of some kind. Addiction isn't "coercion" in this sense when you are the one that voluntary took the substance with knowledge of the risks in the first place. The only truly "illegal" [as in widely agreed upon across many countries] prostitution and pornography is that of children so I assume that is what you were getting at. I don't think many people here are really in favor of criminalization of any transaction between consenting adults [as long as no coercion is involved].

Lawtonfogle 12y ago
>You are comparing apples to oranges. There is a difference between "prohibition of a substance" and "prohibition of an activity that exploits human beings". Is there that big of a difference between prohibition of drugs and prohibition of prostitution? Also, where does prohibition of a substance produced by an activity that exploits human beings fall? >Addiction isn't "coercion" in this sense when you are the one that voluntary took the substance with knowledge of the risks in the first place. I wonder how many of those addicted fully understood the risks? Especially if they first became addicted while underage and thus unable to partake voluntarily. As to what type of prostitution I'm talking about, I'm including adults because there are many places it is still illegal. >as long as no coercion is involved What counts as coercion? Does "If I don't have sex with this John, my children won't eat tonight" count? (Of course, one may also ask the same for other jobs; is "If I don't produce garments for the next 12 hours, my children won't eat tonight," slavery?)
- fweespeech 12y ago
  > Also, where does prohibition of a substance produced by an activity that exploits human beings fall? It isn't inherent to the substance that people were exploited. Labor laws cover that. You are using arguments that equally apply to sweatshops. No one goes around arguing we have to prohibit shoes because of sweat shops. > I wonder how many of those addicted fully understood the risks? If they are an adult and didn't understand the risks beforehand, that is on them. For the most part, you can't really protect adults from their own choices. It isn't practical [or frankly] possible. They just become criminals as prohibition has shown. Criminals who only break the law in regards to themselves are going to do it anyway. You can't magically protect people from risk when its clear people will do it regardless of the legality. Its commonly understood addictive substances are risky. We aren't talking about some guy in China sneaking a harmful substance into baby formula. > Of course, one may also ask the same for other jobs; is "If I don't produce garments for the next 12 hours, my children won't eat tonight," slavery? That is kind of my point. Situations like you describe are solved best by other solutions. [e.g. Welfare so people aren't that level of desperate]
  - Lawtonfogle 12y ago
    >No one goes around arguing we have to prohibit shoes because of sweat shops. But shoes from sweatshops, I know many who say we should prohibit those. >If they are an adult and didn't understand the risks beforehand, that is on them. What does turn 18 (or what ever age you set adulthood to) magically remove the need of informed consent? >Its commonly understood addictive substances are risky. At least in the US, growing up the risks of drugs were vastly blown out of proportion (as was the risks of premarital sex). If those who told you that K was dangerous cried wolf on A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, and J, why would you believe them about K?
    - fweespeech 12y ago
      > But shoes from sweatshops, I know many who say we should prohibit those. But once again, you are outlawing the labor practices of sweatshops. It is not inherent to a substance prohibition and is a different class of law. Once a good is produced, the harm to the labor is already done. Banning things "after the fact" is pointless. By the time you've identified a "sweat shop" to "ban the shoes" you can already take appropriate actions against the fact it is a sweat shop, y'know? You just keep trying to somehow link problems that are already solved in other ways that are as least as effective [if not more so] with the good itself. That isn't how it works. You aren't magically going to have the power to identify "Shoe X" as from a sweatshop without also recognizing the fact that "Shoe X" was produced by "Group Y" which is a sweatshop. You punish the sweatshop, not the person in possession of a given good. > What does turn 18 (or what ever age you set adulthood to) magically remove the need of informed consent? Informed consent is the adorable assumption that information is always going to be equal. It isn't. We hold people to legal contracts they failed to consult a lawyer on all the time. How is that any different? You are an adult. You have to take responsibility and do your own research and/or decide which sources of information you trust. You cannot somehow magically force adults to be responsible members of the population. You can only say "Hey, we aren't going to fuck you over and we will provide tons of free research about whether or not X is good or bad for you via institutions like the NIH and CDC." > At least in the US, growing up the risks of drugs were vastly blown out of proportion (as was the risks of premarital sex). If those who told you that K was dangerous cried wolf on A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, and J, why would you believe them about K? Once again, how is that different than literally any other behavior that contains risk? You are aware the same could be applied to a wide array of medication you are prescribed, the tobacco people still smoke, etc? There isn't some magical solution to the fact human beings have agendas. You can only write laws requiring research into these things, to make the information publicly available for free, and so forth. You can't somehow outlaw personal agendas that cause certain groups of people to behave irrationally in a democratic system. ------- Look, if you have an actual solution to the fact human beings have agendas [and can express those agendas via voting for people that will cater to their desire for an overblown reaction to Moral Risk X], by all means provide it. However, literally no human being of significant intellectual prowess has ever succeeded in the endeavor in the real world. This should tell you that you are either the founder of a new political movement that will solve a fundamental problem with democracy....or that you are simply wrong. You have to let people think for themselves and have faith they realize they need to learn things on their own. None of the problems you've stated with my position can actually be "solved" in a reasonable manner because the freedom for adults to make stupid choices [due to ignorance or otherwise] is a fundamental right they have [even if you think they shouldn't have it].
- saalweachter 12y ago
  > ...is "If I don't produce garments for the next 12 hours, my children won't eat tonight," slavery? I think this is often overlooked in definitions of a freedom and liberty; "the freedom to starve" is a pretty low bar for freedom. How can we structure a civilization that we're free from coercive choices like "take the only available, shitty, demeaning job left, or starve to death"?
  - fweespeech 12y ago
    Yes, but its a complete misrepresentation of what I'm talking about and a disingenuous argument. Providing for the welfare of people is a separate topic that isn't "solved" by banning prostitution. It is solved by rational welfare policies that guarantee a basic level of subsistence that no one is forced to make that decision in the first place. Otherwise, once again, you can replace "prostitution" with "any job people don't like".
  - logfromblammo 12y ago
    Nearly every incorporation law allows the corporation to have a specific purpose, rather than "any lawful activity". Incorporate for the purpose of providing food rations sufficient to prevent all malnutrition diseases to all shareholders. Then trade shares for labor which supports the food production. If your company grows large enough, the people most worried about starvation can literally work for food, using industrial capital rather than subsistence tools. That's probably as close as one person can get to "structuring civilization" without spending at least $10M on politics, lobbying, and capital investment.

Lawtonfogle 12y ago

>You are comparing apples to oranges. There is a difference between "prohibition of a substance" and "prohibition of an activity that exploits human beings". Is there that big of a difference between prohibition of drugs and prohibition of prostitution? Also, where does prohibition of a substance produced by an activity that exploits human beings fall? >Addiction isn't "coercion" in this sense when you are the one that voluntary took the substance with knowledge of the risks in the first place. I wonder how many of those addicted fully understood the risks? Especially if they first became addicted while underage and thus unable to partake voluntarily. As to what type of prostitution I'm talking about, I'm including adults because there are many places it is still illegal. >as long as no coercion is involved What counts as coercion? Does "If I don't have sex with this John, my children won't eat tonight" count? (Of course, one may also ask the same for other jobs; is "If I don't produce garments for the next 12 hours, my children won't eat tonight," slavery?)

fweespeech 12y ago
> Also, where does prohibition of a substance produced by an activity that exploits human beings fall? It isn't inherent to the substance that people were exploited. Labor laws cover that. You are using arguments that equally apply to sweatshops. No one goes around arguing we have to prohibit shoes because of sweat shops. > I wonder how many of those addicted fully understood the risks? If they are an adult and didn't understand the risks beforehand, that is on them. For the most part, you can't really protect adults from their own choices. It isn't practical [or frankly] possible. They just become criminals as prohibition has shown. Criminals who only break the law in regards to themselves are going to do it anyway. You can't magically protect people from risk when its clear people will do it regardless of the legality. Its commonly understood addictive substances are risky. We aren't talking about some guy in China sneaking a harmful substance into baby formula. > Of course, one may also ask the same for other jobs; is "If I don't produce garments for the next 12 hours, my children won't eat tonight," slavery? That is kind of my point. Situations like you describe are solved best by other solutions. [e.g. Welfare so people aren't that level of desperate]
- Lawtonfogle 12y ago
  >No one goes around arguing we have to prohibit shoes because of sweat shops. But shoes from sweatshops, I know many who say we should prohibit those. >If they are an adult and didn't understand the risks beforehand, that is on them. What does turn 18 (or what ever age you set adulthood to) magically remove the need of informed consent? >Its commonly understood addictive substances are risky. At least in the US, growing up the risks of drugs were vastly blown out of proportion (as was the risks of premarital sex). If those who told you that K was dangerous cried wolf on A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, and J, why would you believe them about K?
  - fweespeech 12y ago
    > But shoes from sweatshops, I know many who say we should prohibit those. But once again, you are outlawing the labor practices of sweatshops. It is not inherent to a substance prohibition and is a different class of law. Once a good is produced, the harm to the labor is already done. Banning things "after the fact" is pointless. By the time you've identified a "sweat shop" to "ban the shoes" you can already take appropriate actions against the fact it is a sweat shop, y'know? You just keep trying to somehow link problems that are already solved in other ways that are as least as effective [if not more so] with the good itself. That isn't how it works. You aren't magically going to have the power to identify "Shoe X" as from a sweatshop without also recognizing the fact that "Shoe X" was produced by "Group Y" which is a sweatshop. You punish the sweatshop, not the person in possession of a given good. > What does turn 18 (or what ever age you set adulthood to) magically remove the need of informed consent? Informed consent is the adorable assumption that information is always going to be equal. It isn't. We hold people to legal contracts they failed to consult a lawyer on all the time. How is that any different? You are an adult. You have to take responsibility and do your own research and/or decide which sources of information you trust. You cannot somehow magically force adults to be responsible members of the population. You can only say "Hey, we aren't going to fuck you over and we will provide tons of free research about whether or not X is good or bad for you via institutions like the NIH and CDC." > At least in the US, growing up the risks of drugs were vastly blown out of proportion (as was the risks of premarital sex). If those who told you that K was dangerous cried wolf on A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, and J, why would you believe them about K? Once again, how is that different than literally any other behavior that contains risk? You are aware the same could be applied to a wide array of medication you are prescribed, the tobacco people still smoke, etc? There isn't some magical solution to the fact human beings have agendas. You can only write laws requiring research into these things, to make the information publicly available for free, and so forth. You can't somehow outlaw personal agendas that cause certain groups of people to behave irrationally in a democratic system. ------- Look, if you have an actual solution to the fact human beings have agendas [and can express those agendas via voting for people that will cater to their desire for an overblown reaction to Moral Risk X], by all means provide it. However, literally no human being of significant intellectual prowess has ever succeeded in the endeavor in the real world. This should tell you that you are either the founder of a new political movement that will solve a fundamental problem with democracy....or that you are simply wrong. You have to let people think for themselves and have faith they realize they need to learn things on their own. None of the problems you've stated with my position can actually be "solved" in a reasonable manner because the freedom for adults to make stupid choices [due to ignorance or otherwise] is a fundamental right they have [even if you think they shouldn't have it].
saalweachter 12y ago
> ...is "If I don't produce garments for the next 12 hours, my children won't eat tonight," slavery? I think this is often overlooked in definitions of a freedom and liberty; "the freedom to starve" is a pretty low bar for freedom. How can we structure a civilization that we're free from coercive choices like "take the only available, shitty, demeaning job left, or starve to death"?
- fweespeech 12y ago
  Yes, but its a complete misrepresentation of what I'm talking about and a disingenuous argument. Providing for the welfare of people is a separate topic that isn't "solved" by banning prostitution. It is solved by rational welfare policies that guarantee a basic level of subsistence that no one is forced to make that decision in the first place. Otherwise, once again, you can replace "prostitution" with "any job people don't like".
- logfromblammo 12y ago
  Nearly every incorporation law allows the corporation to have a specific purpose, rather than "any lawful activity". Incorporate for the purpose of providing food rations sufficient to prevent all malnutrition diseases to all shareholders. Then trade shares for labor which supports the food production. If your company grows large enough, the people most worried about starvation can literally work for food, using industrial capital rather than subsistence tools. That's probably as close as one person can get to "structuring civilization" without spending at least $10M on politics, lobbying, and capital investment.