I have to admit that one of my favourite things about being a Libertarian is the fact that I can be all “that’s not my business / not my problem” about stuff that most people fret over. It’s very freeing to allow other people to live their own lives without my assistance. Since I’ve got enough garbage to worry about in my own world, I don’t mind letting smokers kill themselves with Demon Tobacco if they want. I don’t mind letting motorcyclists lose their brains on the highway if they want to ride without a helmet and I don’t particularly find myself caring about what everyone else’s kid wears to school.
Ahhhh. It’s very Zen.
Ironically, I am increasingly bothered by other people’s inability to butt out. This conversation at NiT has me puzzled. To my libertarian mind the answer is simple. If you don’t like the store, don’t shop there. If you don’t shop there, don’t whine about wanting to park in his parking lot to conduct your business elsewhere. I don’t use your toilet when I’m in Inglewood, even though it’s closer to me than my own home potty. See how that works? If you own something, you get to use it. If you don’t own it, you don’t have much say, frankly.
And that’s the real point of this rant. I’m glad to see that Hermitage (or at least a small part of it) has a new neighbourhood blog. But I’m really irritated at the purpose behind it. I think neighbourhoods can be a good thing. I like my subdivision. But when I went and got my mortgage, there were a bunch of papers for me to sign,many of which included very clear statements about exactly WHAT land I was buying. When we left that bank after three hours, there was no doubt in anyone’s mind that we owned (in collusion with the bank) a very specific piece of property. I am under no illusions that my purchase of this house and land entitles me to decide what gets done with the other pieces of land around me which are purchased by other people. I only had enough credit to borrow enough money for this house. I do not have the money to buy a large property down the street from my house. Since I don’t own that property, I have little business deciding what the owner of the property does with that land. As long as he’s not putting up a building that belches actual, factual poison into my home via the pipes, I have no say. And yes, I know the city encouraged a “Community Plan”. But did you really, honestly, think that was worth the paper it was printed on? All those things are is busy-work to keep you from feeling completely ineffectual.
Here’s the thing. If you want to have a neighbourhood with codes, you have to buy into a neighbourhood area that has codes. If you buy into a condo development across the street from an empty parcel of land owned by someone else, the only way you can truly decide what goes on that land is to buy it yourself. Otherwise you can kick and scream all you want, and fret about days of yore and how much nicer the world was before the inventions of the elevator and combustion engine. But you can’t force any real change.
I’m sorry to be brutal, but that’s just the way it is. Unless you can put your money where your mouth is, you have very little say.
*If you don’t like the store, don’t shop there. If you don’t shop there, don’t whine about wanting to park in his parking lot to conduct your business elsewhere.*
But, but, Kat! Your toddler might wander away and wind up at Rick’s Flicks, where the seedy underbelly of our society will corrupt your precious one.
If my toddler is advanced enough to understand porn, more power to the little guy.
In fact, I see a whole new niche market as I ride the coattails of Baby Einstein to fame and fortune with my Baby Boogie Nights collection.
If your toddler wanders into Rick’s Flicks, I would be more concerned about the day care across the street… letting the children run loose?
Come on people. Get DCS in there, right away!
I think the concern is based less on the fear that the kids will wander in as it is on the common (mis)perceptions of who the clientele are. I’m sure everyone is genuinely concerned that the place draws pedophiles. But most of the people who frequent porn shops are not interested in anyone’s kids.* Unless, of course, the place has a kiddie porn section, in which case it ought absolutely to be shut down based on existing anti-kiddie-porn legislation.
*Disclaimer: my observation of who frequents porn shops is based on years of walking through the old Times Square, before Rudy turned it into Newyorkworldatdisneyland Square, at least a couple of times a week, and usually a couple of times a day. It is certainly possible that porn consumers in Inglewood are gritter, edgier, and scummier than that. But I don’t think it’s likely.
But most of the people who frequent porn shops are not interested in anyone’s kids.*
Get out of my mind. I don’t like when you do that. Especially since we’re not supposed to agree on anything.
If my toddler is advanced enough to understand porn, more power to the little guy.
Exactly.
Yeah, I wonder about that. I mean, how could such an obviously bright woman, who reads most of the right books and watches most of the right TV shows, who is in touch with the world through news sources, pop culture, and the internet, who clearly has very sound moral principles, and who all indications suggest has a better than elementary ability to read critically and analyze logically, as based on her agreeing with me about every single detail, almost, end up so fundamentally wrong? Or vice versa.
Neighborhood associations?
Try living in West Meade or Belle Meade.
We throw hissy fits over, gasp! duplexes!
Amateurs…
Ok,here we go. Please do not have a knee-jerk reaction to this…
To the more general point. I was MUCH more libertarian before I became a parent. It wasn’t a conscious decision, becoming a busybody. It just kind of happened.
I say this from experience: it’s much easier to be a libertarian when you don’t have any little human beings whose future will be determined by your every move. Not only that, but you have to worry about the ENVIRONMENT beyond your sphere of influence that your kids will be immersed in.
Not that I agree with THESE busybodies; I’m speaking in a more general sense. But there are exceptions. I think Mack once said something to the effect that he had no problem when his kids were little watching movies like, say, Pulp Fiction (that’s an example; I don’t remember the specifics of the conversation, but that’s the impression I walked away with).
But, I think on the whole, the most ardent busybodies are parents, and the most dogmatic libertarians are either childless, or have grwn children and have forgotten what it’s ike to have little ones to take care of. Just an interesting study in sociology.
BTW, the typos are because I’m blogging FROM the treadmill (how weird is that?)
Please do not have a knee-jerk reaction to this…
You do know, don’t you, how offended I get by the whole “you don’t understand because you don’t have kids” argument? Kids are not some sort of IQ booster. In spite of not having my own children, I do understand the desire to ‘protect your kids’.
Unfortunately, from where I sit, it appears that many people with kids are (please don’t have a knee-jerk reaction to THIS… ;-p) not willing to do their own parenting so they cook up ways for Society to do it for them.
Here’s the thing… folks who’ve acquired kids through sex or law took on that responsibility for themselves. So they may have to go through 10 or 12 or 14 or 16 years without cable or going to certain restaurants. They may have to take the extra time to monitor the internet or whatever. They’re gonna have to have awkward conversations about “what is gay?” and “what is intercourse” and “why is he touching her boobie?” or whatever. That’s part of the whole “I’m a Mommy/Daddy” deal. It’s the job.
Now, I’m not in favour of going into a school and showing porn. Or coming into your home and swearing in front of your kids. I don’t go out in public naked. I don’t play loud rap music with swear words in my car with the windows down. I’m not an anarchist.
But I don’t think the “I have chiiiiilllldren” excuse is a reason to interfere in a legal business.
I have nieces and nephews. I was a kid, and I was an older kid with younger brothers and sisters. And I do believe in “community standards”. But I’ve been around long enough to be tired of people who use their kids as an excuse for bullying other adults.
It happens at Disney World:
“May we get in line ahead of you? She (four year old girl) is so tired!”
It happens with Beanie Babies:
“How dare you all take the Princess Bears! Don’t you know how hard it is to look at the disappointment on my little girl’s face when I have to tell her there are no more princess bears left?”
It happens at Church:
Pick any one of a dozen-umpteen picnics, programs or dinners where families with children have taken more than their share of food, etc.
I love kids. I really do. But I despise ANY excuse for favouritism. And I know you didn’t mean that and didn’t mean to get me started on that rant. But it all applies.
Especially in the case of Rick’s Flicks where parents are so worried about the danger to their child from a Porn store across the street that they don’t seem at all freaked out by the whole day-care-workers-who-are-pedophiles thing.
Real pedophiles hide in plain sight. There’s much more to fear from a gym teacher or a step-father than some skeevy porn store.
The irony in all of this is that I loathe pornography.
Yeah, I really hate those subdivisions that bitch about the color of your mailbox. If someone knocked on my door and told me that, I would tell them that they are about to have a blood-colored nose.
BTW, I used to live in Hermitage. It was the pink house at 147 (I think) Bonnafield Dr.
Everyone is an anarchist at heart.
KC? Regarding your kid rant: Thank you. I’m bored with it too.
(oh, and great “Lost” recap)
I cry Foul! Foul I say! Unfair retort toward Slarti! Of course having kids isn’t a I.Q. booster. If anything, I’d say it lowers it a bit, mostly due to lack of REM sleep.
But being a parent changes your world view. There is no getting around it, Kat. I don’t care if its mostly ego driven, its there, and one might as well ask the sun not to shine as ask people to get over it.
Let me use an example. The environment. If I am all there is in this world, I suppose I’d buy myself a Ford Expedition and head out down Route 66, throwing my Burger wrappers out of the window. I mean, looks like the planet should out-last me, right? I’m just saying that we (parents) have to find balance between fighting for whats left of the world’s resources, and understanding that no one else needs to treat our children like royalty.
For the record, I’d rather my kids wandered into Rick’s Flicks than any pawn shop, gun shop, check-cashing emporium or hell, just about any car dealership.
BTW, you are too young and good looking to be so damned cranky.
Unfair retort toward Slarti!
You’re right, I’m sure. But I need to speak up when I feel shortchanged. And I have to say that those of us without kids get this A LOT. My feelings are not uncommon, and I think it’s fair for me to express them.
I wasn’t meaning to be “cranky”, but to explain what it’s like to be childless in a world that seems to view children as little gods.
For the record, neither you nor Slarti are doing this here in this thread.
I’m just saying that we (parents) have to find balance between fighting for whats left of the world’s resources, and understanding that no one else needs to treat our children like royalty.
I’m not talking about the environment. For the record, many of those of us without children aren’t just burning through the world’s resources because we don’t give a mousefart. In fact, there are many childless people who’ve made the choice to be childfree as a response to the environmental concerns. So your argument there rings false.
The only point I’m trying to make clear here is that protecting and raising children is primarily the job of the parents of those children. The rest of the world helps out when it can by being teachers, nursery workers and playing by the parents’ rules when coming into contact with the individual children. But the expectation which some people have(again, neither you nor Slarti, I’m just venting in general)–that all the rough edges of life need sharpened in advance of their children’s approach–is both egotistical and unfair.
[...] the gun issue, motorcycle helmets, etc. But I like a post by Katherine Coble who talked about how Libertarians generally view life. To sum it up, live and let be. Wait… I think I just went there. Nevertheless, we do [...]
That’s one of the things about this political ideology that’s pretty cool. People get worked up over stupid things, and libertarians can sort of observe calmly because we don’t care about those things. That’s individual choice.