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1. Exit is important. To the degree these kids had no option to exit, I do think this poses a serious problem for libertarians in two ways. First, it challenges our notions of freedom in exactly the way you and Kerry indicate. Second, in the world of the state it would appear to be a legitimate use of the state to protect the rights of those kids (and perhaps the wives). But what about the anarchist world?
I wrote a paper as a senior in college called "Children and Choices in Nozick" that addressed exactly this sort of scenario. I think it's a very hard case for anarchist libertarians, as I really do believe a severe lack of exit for children is a problem and it's not clear what's going to protect that right of exit other than the state. (Of course whether the state can itself protect it without going overboard is an equally good question.)
2. The line between "icky" and "rights violating" is SO very hard to draw sometimes. This might be one of them. I'm okay with polygamy by itself, assuming the parties to the practice were all of sufficient age/competence. Were it legal, would it lead to these sorts of bizarre cult-type organizations? Probably not - think about the parallel argument about drug legalization.
But here we are. My great fear about the "class action" rounding up of the kids is the precedent it sets. Without clearer discussion of exactly what the problem was in this case, it's much easier to intervene in any family situation that we find "icky" without identifying exactly whose rights were violated and why.
For all the reasons classical liberals are familiar with (e.g., knowledge and incentives), I think the burden of proof rests squarely on the state when they go to intervene in families and that burden should be high and heavy. I really need to be persuaded that the situation being intervened in involves rights violations.
Abuse is the easy case. Neglect is harder. Raising kids to fear strangers and think their community is the only way to live is harder still.
I'm not yet persuaded in this case that the evidence is clear and convincing enough, but I certainly don't find the idea of intervening to protect children in situations like this to be ipso facto anti-libertarian in a world where it is the state's task to protect rights.
Couldn't they say the same of us? All of us are shaped by our environment, you just happen not to approve of theirs, as I'm sure they do not of ours. Read what Mona has to say in the thread I linked to just above, she seems to know what she's talking about.
Also, if you haven't heard yet, David Friedman has been documenting what a hoax the whole thing has been.
protecting rights are what states are for.
No. States do not originate for that purpose and if anything are more guilty of violating them than any other actor.
http://mypetjawa.mu.nu/archives/192350.php
I don't know much about the procedural details of the case. Like I said, the state's case may be screwed relative to the law. But I know enough about the practices of the community to think if they're out of the reach of the law, well-applied, then that might well be a problem with the law failing to function with respect to the protection of children's rights. They fall on the wrong side of the line, IMO. The argument ought to be where to put it, not whether to have one.
Almost everyone would agree that children shouldn't be subjected to brainwashing and (resulting) rape.
But many libertarians are skeptical of how well the state does at protecting children from such harms. Generally, the parents are likely to take better account of the child's interests than the state.
I'm sincerely curious as to what general principe we should apply to determine when the state is permitted to act in defense of children: Maybe a particularized showing of significant harm to specific children?
Perhaps such a standard would prevent a fair amount of the slide down the slippery slope, e.g. couldn't be used to justify the institution of public schools.
In any event, such a standard doesn't seem to have been applied in this case, which has resulted in infants being separated from nursing mothers and families being separated en mass.
I believe there is a role for the state in preventing child abuse, but based on my only casual following of the FLDS case, I am quite suspicious that the authorities have gone much farther than necessary in this case in part because this community was viewed as "icky."
My inclination is that the answer to the first question is that the state is doing a reasonable if slightly overzealous job; removing the kids from the compound makes sense, though denying their parents contact with them seems extreme.
The second question is where things get thorny, as I think most people would agree that the state should not be able to act all the way to the limits of its power until some sort of standard of proof has been met, procedural niceties observed, and whatnot -- certainly more than has happened here, where a false tip and unsubstantiated claims seem to be the whole of the state's case so far. This, it seems to me, is the unanswered question. As a previous commenter noted, there's a distinct smell of Nozick to it.
Of course Will is going to just parrot whatever Kerry says on this one, for obvious reasons.
See what I did there? It was rude, blatant, unwarranted ad hominem and completely failed to address your substantive and respectable argument. So why is it okay for you to dismiss DDF just as glibly?
The interesting challenge is all practical: given the existence of places like this, how should we fight them? Even when violence is morally justifiable, it is often not prudent or effective.
If they're being abused (with a reasonable standard of abuse) they should be protected.
But, there should also be compensation for the victims and punishment of the perpetrators of unwarranted, excessive, police actions.
I suspect that this action was excessive. But, some aren't.
In the state of Texas, children may marry as young as 16 (it was 14 not too long ago) if their parents give permission and once married statutory rape laws do not apply. I suppose that's only relevant to a legal argument, which we may consider irrelevant.
One thing I find strange is how many people upset by the FLDS are also pro-choice, while a number more sympathetic to them are pro-life. I am radically pro-choice, and my positions on both issues mesh.
Why aren't libertarians more interested in the role of the welfare state in enabling polygyny - and not only in this case?
Reading Friedman, I don't actually find see any substantive defense of this FLDS community's practice other than his pointing out that other religions also involve distributing teen girls to older men. So the point is: that aspect of those religions ought to be illegal too? OK!
He's probably right that the case is bunk, legally, that the state is making some stuff up, etc. But I'm interested in the idea that kids have a right to develop their moral capacities, are denied them in these kinds of conditions, and so they really are not giving meaningful consent to participate in this way of life. It's bad for all of them, but girls in particular are turned into baby-making machines without their ever becoming able to seriously considering an alternative life.
If she gives consent it's not rape. What makes consent "informed" seems an irresolvable question to me.
But I’m interested in the idea that kids have a right to develop their moral capacities
They are developing their capacities in a manner you do not approve of, as I'm sure they would not approve of how we develop ours.
meaningful consent
What is necessary to make consent meaningful? How would you prevent someone from denying that your consent is meaningful? The fact you aren't weird by the standards of most people?
What if you drugged her first? Would it still be consent? If not, what's the distinction between one shot of Rohypnol and an extremely high, potent dose of Gerinol, distributed regularly for 18 years?
The correct answer: An elaborate form of rape.
So if a teen is, say, nutritionally stunted, illiterate, and incapable performing rudimentary tasks, is that just a different way of developing capacities, or a way of not developing capacities?
You cannot prevent someone from denying something. But you can show that they are wrong to deny it by saying something intelligible about the conditions for meaningful consent and showing that they are met. I don't even think it takes that much. If any of those teen brides had lived with "not weird" folks for a year and then come back, that would be evidence of meaningful consent. Having had an education that created the possibility for contextualizing and evaluating the decision, that would be evidence consent was meaningful. Etc. Why are you interested in making the obvious intelligibility of the idea of meaningful or informed consent less than obvious?
Most people would object to being drugged if they were asked, so it would be ethically questionable to drug them. 1-year olds would not object to being brainwashed, and they never object to the brainwashing/"abuse" at any point.
Will:
Who decides whether the education is valid ("it's all true" is fine, but not all education is factual)?
If human conditions (being raped or enslaved) can possess normative values, then clearly any prior condition that prevents one from making cost-benefit decisions about those states is one that we can label "impaired". The question seems to be "where does influence transition into abuse?" rather than "can we distinguish abuse and influence at all?"
Teaching my daughter that her 'place is in the kitchen' differs from locking her in the basement in that in the prior case my daughter is exposed to multiple sources of information (media etc) regarding her 'place'. The clearest possible brightline (that I can think of) would be to insist that children not experience a monopolized flow of information.
Admittedly, this brightline seems impossible in practice- the potential for abuse by State bureaucracy is too high. It may be that a bit of child abuse now and then is the price of admission into a free society in the same way that the occasional KKK rally is the price of admission for Free Speech. This is sad, but considerably better than the alternatives.
So if a teen is, say, nutritionally stunted, illiterate, and incapable performing rudimentary tasks
I don't know what would qualify as "rudimentary tasks", but your description seems like it could fit most of humanity throughout most of history.
If any of those teen brides had lived with “not weird” folks for a year and then come back, that would be evidence of meaningful consent.
Do not-weird folks then need to spend a year with the weird?
Having had an education that created the possibility for contextualizing and evaluating the decision, that would be evidence consent was meaningful.
Most of humanity for most of history would have found our concept of "education" to be foreign. The dividing line between "education" and "brainwashing" if we are willing to accept the concept also seems vague.
Why are you interested in making the obvious intelligibility of the idea of meaningful or informed consent less than obvious?
I say it is not obvious. Here I stand, I can do no other :) I seek an objective standard that would not allow people in the FLDS or the like to deny my agency based on more than "I'm right and they're wrong", which is a basis that could of course be turned around on me.
It’s laughable to assert that one can’t make normative judgments about human conditions (rape/violence/deprivation=bad) and it should therefore be easy to develop SOME objective, working definition of moral capacity.
I deny just that. I am an emotivist or non-cognitivist, and Will in his diavlog suspects he may be as well. You cannot derive ought from is, nor can we observe moral facts, so I claim there are no normative truths, only subjective opinions. I do have a negative opinion of those things you listed, but I consider them to merely be opinions.
If human conditions (being raped or enslaved) can possess normative values, then clearly any prior condition that prevents one from making cost-benefit decisions about those states is one that we can label “impaired”.
This boils down to "I'm right, they're wrong, if being raised that way leads them to believe it such an upbringing is wrong". The problem of course is that you had an upbringing with your beliefs as a result which is just as vulnerable to that criticism from a contrary perspective.
Teaching my daughter that her ‘place is in the kitchen’ differs from locking her in the basement in that in the prior case my daughter is exposed to multiple sources of information (media etc) regarding her ‘place’
And if this is a backward country where the media perpetuates sexism and gender stereotypes?
Sorry, I meant Geriniol (or Gerin Oil) and Rohypnol. They're both mind-altering drugs.
Rohypnol: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rohypnol
Geriniol: http://www.anst.uu.se/dla05000/Gerin%20Oil.html
I don't see the difference between these two.
The whole point of brainwashing is to make the brainwashed person feel as if they're making a commitment out of their own "free will," and not because they've been brainwashed. So we can't take lack of objection as evidence that they're fine with their situation, and would stay if they had a legitimate option to leave.
How about explicitly asking them whether they want to stay? If they say they want to, they want to. Informed consent doesn't matter here either. Uninformed consent is a bit like brainwashing someone someone--most people would object to being inadequately informed if asked, but small children don't. This is fine, as long as would not object to whatever happens to them later right before it happens. ("I was brainwashed and now I object to it" doesn't count)
"Admittedly, this brightline seems impossible in practice- the potential for abuse by State bureaucracy is too high. It may be that a bit of child abuse now and then is the price of admission into a free society in the same way that the occasional KKK rally is the price of admission for Free Speech. This is sad, but considerably better than the alternatives."
To prove the point, folks might check out this story from the Detroit Free Press. A guy mistakenly gave his 7 year old son Mike's Hard Lemonade at a Tigers game (he doesn't watch TV and assumed it was regular lemonade). A security guard sees the kid drinking it and next thing you know the kid is in foster care for a couple of days until dad, who is a prof at Michigan, got a law school colleague to help him cut the red tape and get his kid back.
Whatever might be the real problems at FLDS, giving the state the power to intervene in families is like giving matches to, uh, children. The odds of it being used only wisely are very small.
I really enjoyed "The Ancestor's Tale", but after reading that I understood why Vox Day loves to mock Dawkins. Gerin Oil is not a chemical. If it was, and it had the effects that Dawkins attributed to it (including Spanish colonialism!) it would be quite different from Rohypnol, which induces passivity.
The whole point of brainwashing is to make the brainwashed person feel as if they’re making a commitment out of their own “free will,”
There is no free-will. It's an untenable idea.
and not because they’ve been brainwashed.
We are all the products of our circumstances and there is no essence-of-you that we can compare to the you shaped by your past. How will you avoid agency being denied to you as well as those in the FLDS?
So we can’t take lack of objection as evidence that they’re fine with their situation, and would stay if they had a legitimate option to leave.
What makes an option "legitimate"?
The correct answer: An elaborate form of rape."
Is the basement door locked? Is there a reasonably implied threat of violence - by the father himself - if she chooses to leave the basement or doesn't meet sexual requests. The answer to all of these questions is almost certainly 'yes', in any realistic scenario, which is why it is, of course, rape in my opinion.
Importantly, though, it is not rape for the reason you are apparently implying it is rape: information asymmetry impairing so-called "free will". This is why, e.g. we distinguish sex obtained through implied threat of harm as rape from sex obtained through false pretenses (e.g. saying you're a rock star), a common form of using information asymmetry to obtain sex.
Also contra Will's implication, judges and juries aren't generally sympathetic to claims of "brain-washing", which isn't really a scientific idea. E.g. Patti Hearst, Steve Fishman...
So to turn Will's scenario on him, what if this same hypothetical man asked this basement daughter of his to fly to Indonesia with these tickets and this money and stab a drug-dealer to death for her Daddy God. Would this be a murder she is fully accountable for: yes.
And if this man instead asked her to meet him in Indonesia with these tickets and this money and have sex with her Daddy God there would it then be rape? No, for the same reasons.
Now there could be laws against co-habiting with more than one person, and there are laws prohibiting sex with minors. Liberals and libertarians most likely don't object to the latter, but they surely object to the former.
What is the libertarian position on polygamy? Now that I think of it, it's not clear if there's a libertarian position on marriage of any kind. Why should states be giving people powers to make bonds of this kind?
CM