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April 21, 2005
The morality of harm
As the debate between libertarian and moral conservatives shows no signs of abating, I thought I'd take another look at the drug issue, which is a frequent area of contention. I'll start with my remark yesterday in discussing Pope Benedict: If there's one thing worse than a conservative, it's a conservative who used to be a liberal.Might this apply equally to moral conservatives who used to be libertarians? Depends on your perspective, I guess. I try to free myself from being influenced by what people used to think. But I did enjoy the following essay by Edward Feser, and I thought it might a fruitful starting point in revisiting my own views of drugs. It is often said that libertarians can consistently favor legalizing certain “victimless” crimes while leaving it open that such things might really be immoral. A reader of my earlier post on libertarianism commented: “Libertarianism does not say whether gambling, prostitution, drug use, etc. are good or bad but whether they ought to be legal or illegal. I personally thinking (sic) smoking crack is bad, but I have no right to use the force of law to stop someone from doing it.” I used to buy this sort of argument. I don't anymore. Here's what’s wrong with it.First of all, there's an assumption that drug use is immoral. Nowhere has anyone been able to point out to me why the ingestion of a substance is rendered immoral simply because that particular substance was made the subject of a law. Drug laws in this country date from the Harrison Narcotics Act of 1914; laws against marijuana came later. Illegal does not mean immoral. Malum prohibitum is not malum in se. Now, obviously some drug use is so utterly egregious that the individual user is placing his life and health in danger. Whether self harm is immoral is of course debatable. Should I be free to amputate my own fingers? Scorch myself with hot irons? If I inject heroin to the point of becoming an addict, there is no question that I am harming myself. But unless I get in my car and plow into someone (or commit crimes to pay for the heroin), what is the harm to anyone else? Mr. Feser seems to take it for granted that: a) self harm is immoral; and b) society is therefore justified in prohibiting self harm. It goes without saying that this same argument justifies prohibition of alcohol, or any other substance, including unknown future substances, and, I suppose, anything which the government might deem harmful to the individual. Note further that in the case of drugs, we're talking necessarily about possessory offenses. There need not be any showing whatsoever that the individual ever used the substances prohibited, much less harmed himself. Thus from a moral perspective, it is not merely harm to self which is being prohibited, but potential harm to self. If possession of potentially harmful things can be prohibited, then why not guns? Because the latter can be used for good as well as for ill? Can't that be said about many drugs? And what about food? Or, (dare I ask it?) having too much money? While I happen to think drug use is stupid, I speak for myself only, and from personal experience. I haven't used a single illegal drug since 1992 and I don't intend to. That does not grant me any moral authority, and I cannot speak for other people, each of whose situations is personal. Some people might be able to use drugs as others use alcohol. Others destroy themselves. I think a legitimate moral argument can be made about punishment, though. I think that prison is harmful. It is a horrible, dangerous, often deadly punishment which should be reserved for horrible, dangerous people. I think it is patently immoral (even grotesquely so), to lock an individual in prison because he harmed himself. That is like saying that if you are demented enough to cut off some of your own fingers, why, we'll show you by cutting off the rest of them! I see Mr. Feser's point about drug use not being a "right," and I don't argue that this is a formal right, any more than there's a formal "right" for me to go out and get wasted on sugar by eating ten cream filled donuts. I guess that makes me a rather sloppy libertarian. Still, I see no right of society to punish self harm by brutal means. Nor does anything in the Constitution grant the federal government such power. (That's why prohibition of alcohol required the 18th Amendment....) I guess I failed to come up with "a coherent way to be both morally conservative and strictly libertarian." I think of myself as someone who is morally conservative in my personal life, and loosely libertarian in my political views. As I say, my standards are lower than most people's. But drug laws which do harm to an individual on the theory that he has done harm to himself -- well, they offend my low standards very deeply. MORE: John at Locusts and Honey thinks that Edward Feser is "confusing libertarianism and libertinism": I agree that prostitution and smoking crack are wrong. I also think that gorging on Twinkies all day and engaging in pre-marital sex are wrong. Furthermore, I think that worshipping gods other than the one true God revealed in Scripture is morally wrong, since it contradicts God's commandments.I agree. Morally (and logically), the person who harms himself and no one else is behaving in a less immoral manner than those who harm him. posted by Eric on 04.21.05 at 05:57 PM |
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Haven't you (or Ed Feser) read Ayn Rand? If not, shame on you! It's perfectly possible to reject drug abuse as immoral while supporting legalization; all it takes is proper understandings of rights and ethics, and the difference between the two.