On Wed, Oct 28, 2009 at 7:15 PM, David B. Shemano <[email protected]> wrote: > What if somebody doesn't want to clean up after their pets? I think that is > true of many people -- that is why in our capitalist democracy, we have rules > that "require" people to pick up the poo. So will those rules continue to > exist under socialism? If so, how will those rules be made, implemented and > enforced, and how are those rules philosophically compatible with the realm > of freedom and not necessity? >
Hi David, I think it is a mistake to stretch the concept of individual freedom to an extreme. Obviously anyone including libertarians and socialists would readily accept that there are limits to individual freedoms and there is such a thing as individual responsibilities i.e. work that the individual owes to the collective. And certainly there can be debate and compromises about where the boundaries should be. This is even true of capitalist society. We are not choosing between some extremes like individualism and collectivism, but rather what the right balance is. The real argument is over whether today we are too far along the indidualist extreme or the other way around, and which way we should go in future to achieve a reasonable balance. That's the real point of disagreement between libertarians and socialists. I also think it is a mistake to ask for simple mechanisms or solutions that'll solve the inevitable grey-area conflicts universally. I'd say let many flowers bloom. Many groups of people will no doubt choose different mechanisms, some undoubtedly will be offensive to others. That'll have to be debated on a case-by-case basis. Such is the complexity of life! -raghu. -- Never say, "Oops!"; always say, "Ah, interesting!" _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
