Wearing Guns, and Support for (R-douchebag) Ron Paul, on Their Hips

[DanTex]

32. It's not the principles, it's the way that they are applied that I object to.

The "harm principle" is great in theory, but can easily be taken to far. For example, strictly speaking it wouldn't allow the government to regulate who is able to perform surgery via medical licensing. It also wouldn't allow things like social security or medicare, which force people to pay into a collective insurance system even if they might prefer not to. And it wouldn't allow the government to pass laws protecting workers from, say, toxic chemicals in the workplace. And so on.

That kind of stuff might sound great in the abstract, but in reality, it's, yes, childish. You need government in these and other areas of society otherwise things simply wouldn't function.