"Nannyism" Running Rampant

Nannyism - "Policies such as mandatory helmet laws and bans on smoking in public places, high taxes on junk food, recreational drug use, gun control, a legal drinking age or legal smoking age that is higher than the age of majority, censorship, seat belt legislation, and content regulation are criticized as nanny state actions. Such actions result from the belief that the state (or, more often, one of its local authorities) has a comprehensive duty to protect the citizenry from their own harmful behaviors, and assumes that the state knows best what constitutes harmful behavior."



There are many people - including those within government - who wish to ban anything they see as potentially harmful to citizens. This includes banning the game of tag because it "encourages fights." The same goes for any kind of "chasing games" - even touch football (Source: Nanny State: How Food Fascists, Teetotaling Do-Gooders, Priggish Moralists, and Other Boneheaded Bureaucrats Are Turning America into a Nation of Children, by David Harsanyi, pages 152-153) in many elementary schools.

Attempted bans on smoking, the drinking of alcohol - even things that a "normal" [yes, I'm saying these people are not 'normal'] person would think is insane to ban. The book Nanny State claims that the state of New York has even enacted bans on riding a bicycle without having your feet on the peddles, putting a plastic frame around your license plate, smoking in a bar, feeding pigeons, and even placing a bag next to you on a subway seat (Source: Nanny State, page 6).

I agree with the author, David Harsanyi, who continuously says how this country was set up as free and all this policing is needless and violates our freedoms and even privacy in some instances. It shouldn't matter what we do as long as one does no harm to another (I think this is the author's basic stance - though he does make it clear he feels some things should be banned for safety). When talking about the ban on smoking in many places around the country (page 110) Harsanyi says, "Who exactly asked for anyone's help? And what responsibility, if any, does government have to impel people to be healthy?....Sure, millions of people choose [emphasis in original] to smoke. They may be killing themselves. And as a public-policy matter, it's none of my business. Those are the risks, rewards, and choices associated with being free. With self-determination, we have to be prepared to accept that some people will make choices that fly in the face of reason" [emphasis mine].

This has been my entire point with the idea of anarchism - this is what anarchism entails! While I agree with the author and anyone else who advocates freedom, I don't agree with the fact that they sanction government intervention at least at some minimal level, while the anarchist feels that no government is needed whatsoever, and any infringement upon the human beings' natural rights should be abolished, including any and all taxation.

Again, as with another post I did about the hypocrisy of many atheists, some people make statements that - taken to their logical conclusion - would favor the concept of anarchism. That of allowing people to have true freedom to do what they want as long as they don't infringe upon other peoples' freedoms and rights.

This book, Nanny State, is truly a good book and I agree with 99.9% of everything the author has to say. I just don't agree that we need any form of government whatsoever. As I've argued elsewhere, power often corrupts individuals so to allow anyone to have power over you would be a bad decision.




"...a grant of liberties, no mater how extensive, is not full recognition of the fact of individual liberty."

- Rose Wilder Lane