[ExI] Social right to have a living

[Kelly Anderson]

On Mon, Jul 11, 2011 at 10:25 AM, Stefano Vaj <stefano.vaj at gmail.com> wrote:
> 2011/7/9 Will Steinberg <steinberg.will at gmail.com>:
> I would not be too quick in assuming that a multicultural,
> well-defined concept of "children abuse" exists.

Clearly, this is the case. Today in America, for example, there exists
a great gulf between the older generation that was brought up with
ubiquitous corporal punishment, and the younger generation that has
been brought up in what I call the "Simpson's Age"...  The older
generation seeks the younger as "soft" and the younger sees the older
as "barbaric".

DCFS often has to "reeducate" the older generation to the new
zeitgeist of today's "child abuse". As a survivor of these modern
"reeducation camps" I can tell you that they are quite persuasive in
their techniques. The basic approach is "accept our zeitgeist, or lose
your children" and that is a LOT of leverage. I have now drunk the
cool-aid, and accept the new zeitgeist, even though I can still
remember the benefits and experiences of the old one.

> Ancient Rome was far from a libertarian (o anarco-capitalist?) regime,
> yet the pater familias had a jus vitae ac necis on its children.
> Remarkably nothing similar existed in other neighbouring, and
> sometimes more "primitive", societies/legal systems.

The surely Romans had a unique view of the rights of society over the
individual. It was no accident that Hitler called his little regime
the third reich.... meaning the third instantiation of Rome... because
I think he would have gone back to public executions and other
barbaric (by our modern reckoning) Roman practices if he had won.

> Issues such as abortion and/or cases for "wrongful life", not to
> mention  paedopornography statutes extended to ephebic individuals or
> computer-graphic images, of course complicate things.

What happens in the virtual world stays in the virtual world... ;-)

> So, no, I do not believe that protection of children is a serious
> argument against anarco-capitalism.

Are you saying you liked the Roman system?

> The nature and degree of such
> protection depends to a much larger extent on cultural factors than on
> the existence of "public" enforcement methods of the kind disliked by
> libertarians.

What the authorities go after you for is less important than the fact
that they have the power to go after you. After having dealt with DCFS
for the last three years, I can tell you for a fact that America is a
less free society than most people think. Until you've been through
the reeducation system, you think America is free, and that you are
free within her. But once you've been to the camp... there is no
turning back from the knowledge that the America of freedom is Gone
Baby Gone...

People who have dealt in depth with other aspects of the government
tell me the same thing. Spike's farming experiences... My experiences
with the health department when I wanted to put in a novel type of
sewage treatment system... It's just Government Gone Wild!!!

Anyone who believes in socialist policies of more statism just has
never had a significant interaction with the state. My girl friend,
for example, worked for DCFS for 12 years as a CPS investigator. It
was her job to remove children. Now that she has seen the system from
the other side, I think it just makes her sick what she did all those
years... even though she was acting in good faith, and worked hard to
help the individuals with whom she had to interact. She often bent the
rules within the system, by, for example, letting people get away with
stuff when teenage children were completely out of control. But many
other case workers would have thrown the book at those folks. It's
really really sad where we're going.

-Kelly