Freedom?
....and tonight's diatribe is about "Libertarians". I have at some points described myself as a Libertarian because I dislike being constrained by poorly considered or obsolete laws while maintaining a belief in having responsibility for hurtful actions. However I now have discovered that there are those out there that describe themselves as Libertarians who value freedom without responsibility or consideration for others.
My personal POV is that unrestrained freedom is dangerous both to the individual and to society. For reasons I can't understand and therefore name "superstition" I believe that the individual (and businesses) must be personally responsible for the harm their deeds do and that the purpose of law is to prevent harm to the society that enacts them, and no more than that. The Libertarians I disparage are opposed to actions against "Climate Change" because it restrains their freedom, never mind the damage that it is and has done to the society they live in. In that, they support Conservatives who appear to oppose the very existence of Climate Change because a) it affects their "God given rights to make profits by screwing all and sundry" and b) "only God can change the worlds climate and he loves us" (No, I'm not quoting anyone, just attacking their attitude).
Now amongst the obsolete legislations, there are two I dislike immensely. The first is copyright (No! not F'ing Royalties. COPYRIGHT) and the second is litigation.
It has been mentioned in a public forum (Harvey Awards) that copyright was originally enacted to limit a writers family ability to block or profit from their works. This is more a POV I'm afraid, from what I can find the purpose of copyright law was originally a means of stopping monopoly of written works by businesses while allowing the Authors to make a living from their works for a limited amount of time. This worked well when the limitations of written distribution in a slow transport society meant that it took time for the works to spread. As the legislations work now however, the copyright laws have been corrupted to allow businesses a monopoly over intellectual and media properties. It is time that copyright law was abolished or at least changed to account for the high speed distribution of the property in question. Rather than the current "Authors Life + 50 years" I think it should probably be down to 2 years or less given the distribution rate of the internet, because if you haven't made a decent profit from your works in 2 years then it was probably trash from the start.
Now litigation is the legal process where one entity acquires compensation from another entity for damages caused by the second entities work. The few cases I know of are most likely cases of abuse rather than common examples. They are the "Hot Coffee" Case and the "Slippery Path" suit, but give honours to the "Home Invasion" and "Car Accident" trials. In every one of them I think that the legal process actively ignores culpability on the part of the plaintiff, which is to say their personal responsibility for their own actions. Litigation because something is not right is one thing, but a lawsuit because you got hurt doing something stupid, criminal or due to inattention is quite another. The "Hot Coffee" case was an incident where a Fast Food Restaurant sold a woman a cup of Hot Coffee. She burned her lip, sued them and won. They now put the warning that the Hot Coffee is hot on their cups. The "Slippery Path" case occurred when during a summer a local council was watering the lawns using a sprinkler and a path was getting wet. A man walking along the path decided to jump over the wet part of the path, slipped when he landed and hurt himself. He sued the Council and won, never mind that if he'd walked over the wet part his shoes might not have been dry but he wouldn't have been hurt. Does anyone else think that being successfully sued because a robber hurt himself while robbing your home in the dark in stupid? Or that being successfully sued for doctors charges by a man who got whiplash because he crashed into the rear of your car is right? *sigh*
My personal POV is that unrestrained freedom is dangerous both to the individual and to society. For reasons I can't understand and therefore name "superstition" I believe that the individual (and businesses) must be personally responsible for the harm their deeds do and that the purpose of law is to prevent harm to the society that enacts them, and no more than that. The Libertarians I disparage are opposed to actions against "Climate Change" because it restrains their freedom, never mind the damage that it is and has done to the society they live in. In that, they support Conservatives who appear to oppose the very existence of Climate Change because a) it affects their "God given rights to make profits by screwing all and sundry" and b) "only God can change the worlds climate and he loves us" (No, I'm not quoting anyone, just attacking their attitude).
Now amongst the obsolete legislations, there are two I dislike immensely. The first is copyright (No! not F'ing Royalties. COPYRIGHT) and the second is litigation.
It has been mentioned in a public forum (Harvey Awards) that copyright was originally enacted to limit a writers family ability to block or profit from their works. This is more a POV I'm afraid, from what I can find the purpose of copyright law was originally a means of stopping monopoly of written works by businesses while allowing the Authors to make a living from their works for a limited amount of time. This worked well when the limitations of written distribution in a slow transport society meant that it took time for the works to spread. As the legislations work now however, the copyright laws have been corrupted to allow businesses a monopoly over intellectual and media properties. It is time that copyright law was abolished or at least changed to account for the high speed distribution of the property in question. Rather than the current "Authors Life + 50 years" I think it should probably be down to 2 years or less given the distribution rate of the internet, because if you haven't made a decent profit from your works in 2 years then it was probably trash from the start.
Now litigation is the legal process where one entity acquires compensation from another entity for damages caused by the second entities work. The few cases I know of are most likely cases of abuse rather than common examples. They are the "Hot Coffee" Case and the "Slippery Path" suit, but give honours to the "Home Invasion" and "Car Accident" trials. In every one of them I think that the legal process actively ignores culpability on the part of the plaintiff, which is to say their personal responsibility for their own actions. Litigation because something is not right is one thing, but a lawsuit because you got hurt doing something stupid, criminal or due to inattention is quite another. The "Hot Coffee" case was an incident where a Fast Food Restaurant sold a woman a cup of Hot Coffee. She burned her lip, sued them and won. They now put the warning that the Hot Coffee is hot on their cups. The "Slippery Path" case occurred when during a summer a local council was watering the lawns using a sprinkler and a path was getting wet. A man walking along the path decided to jump over the wet part of the path, slipped when he landed and hurt himself. He sued the Council and won, never mind that if he'd walked over the wet part his shoes might not have been dry but he wouldn't have been hurt. Does anyone else think that being successfully sued because a robber hurt himself while robbing your home in the dark in stupid? Or that being successfully sued for doctors charges by a man who got whiplash because he crashed into the rear of your car is right? *sigh*