Most usage of the term 'nanny-state' I've heard has been in relation to speeding, drink driving and the smoking ban, and used by people who think they should be able to do whatever they want no matter what the effect on others i.e. have zero sense of civil responsibility.
To my mind people who use the term in this way are doing so erroneously. If people want rights then they must understand that they come with responsibilities. Liberal licensing laws are not carte-blanche permission to drive drunk, or get involved in any other drink-related anti-social behaviour.
If you want your own rights to be protected you must respect the rights of others. The very opposite of a "nanny state" which seeks to abdicate all forms of personal responsibility to the jurisdiction of the government.
This is the first time I've heard it used in any other context . . I don't think the government is going to start randomly outlawing religions, stuffing your face on ice cream if you want to, or requiring everyone to be armed - we live in a democracy you know! What specific laws are you referring to which are overly restrictive on our nation full of responsible adults?
How can you be so sure? Already, the government has been tossing around the idea of additional taxes on fast food outlets. The Minister for Justice has talked of restricting the hours of off-licences and there have been calls to restrict below-cost selling of alcohol. Michael McDowell was forced to back down on a plan to further liberalise the licensed drinking market.
The trick is always to propose a certain measure - say extra taxes on fatty foods - on the basis of saving revenue on the health service. The debate then becomes one of a "balance sheet". Will say, the loss of jobs in the fast food sector outweigh the savings in the healthcare budget. This conveniently sidesteps what should be the central issue - "what right does the government have to try and control what we eat?". The debate should never be one of statistics but principles and governments that try to micromanage the lives of their citizens in the belief that they know what is best, do so in contravention of the constitution.
Schnaek, your point
>>Do children learn from being restricted and controlled until they are 18? Or do they learn by being given responsibilities, and consequences for abusing those responsibilities?<<
So how would we know what those consequences were if we didn't have law?
Look at the much lauded on this forum, attitude of continental Europe to drink. Note as well that they tend to have far more liberal laws in relation to drink.
I was listening to a spokesman from Ash on Newstalk a couple of weeks ago and he was raving on about the evils of smoking and got a lot of abuse and angry texts in. But I thought he made one excellent point. All the anti smoking ban people who go on about a nanny state while they go out and spend millions of $ on a poisonous weed which will kill a lot of them! Pretty ironic of them to be complaining about manipulation. If they're really the responsible, intelligent adults they claim to be why are they spending their cash and health on fags? Different discussion I know.
How do we know smokers are being manipulated? It's not like cigarettes are even that heavily advertised anymore. Liberty should never be dictated by
need or what (the state feels) is good, that's Marxism. Otherwise nobody would consider it preposterous if I suggested introducing a law restricting each citizen to owning no more than three pairs of shoes, on the basis that they couldn't possibly need any more than that. Or limiting the amount of airline travel they can take, or any of one hundred and one million different laws states could introduce for the so called "greater good".
You have to allow people the freedom to make bad decisions. Simple as.
