DescentBB

Birds, the answer wouldn't be to ban rock climbing. It would be to ban rock climbing without a safety harness.

Other people not wearing a seatbelt hurts my insurance premiums. And if they happen to be riding with me (pesky NY State law says that if you're 16 you don't need a seatbelt in the backseat) I'm a bit unnerved. I've seen people come flying from the backseat up over the head of the driver and through the front windshield because they weren't wearing their seatbelts.. Not appetizing.

Banning rock climbing without a safety harness?

So much for freedom.

But who owns the rock? If the state owns the rock it's the state's prerogative to require a safety harness. If it's private property, the decision is up to the owner.

The streets belong to the state/county/town, therefore the state gets to say what you can and can not do while driving your vehicle on their roads.

So I don't buy the "yeah but you are hurting others" argument against other drugs, while we do nothing about smoking tobacco and drinking alcohol.

It would be fine and dandy if a person dug their own grave with tobacco, alcohol, or drugs and simply had to live with their decisions. But, that's often not the reality. Throw in the lawyers and their multi-billion dollar class action frenzies, all the government programs to deal with addiction and abuse, health care on the tax payer's dime for those who'd rather get buzzed than buy health insurance and the higher health care/insurance costs for the rest of us that goes with it, and suddenly their self-inflicted bad choices become everyone else's problem.

I'll favor legalizing any drug if it comes with a warning label, permitted by law, that says,

By using this product, you:
1) release the manufacturer, government and its agencies from responsibility for any negative health consequences you may experience.
2) acknowledge that this product may be addictive and that you bear sole financial responsibility for any treatment required for misusing or abusing this product.
3) acknowledge that this product may harm or kill you through sickness, overdose, over-usage or impaired judgement and that such consequences are not subject to legal recourse by you, your family or advocates on your behalf.
4) acknowledge that any harm done to others, or their property, while under the influence of this product is your sole legal and financial responsibility.
5) acknowledge that using this product is your decision and responsibility. There is no legal requirement for others to prevent you from consuming it initially or in excess.
6) acknowledge that insurance providers may not cover medical costs associated with the use of this product and that it is your responsibility to know their specific policies.
7) (whatever a real corporate lawyer would write)

I'll vote for total freedom regarding recreational drugs when there's total responsibility for using them (which isn't likely to happen). In a country where people are "free" to sue because they're fat from eating too much junk food or get cancer from habitually inhaling carcinogens, I can only imagine the litigation cash cow that legalized consumer pot, speed, coke and acid would create (all of which are very arguably unhealthy).

ok i'll start a new thread on the drugs debate.

abbra-kadabra peanut butter sandwiches

But who owns the rock? If the state owns the rock it's the state's prerogative to require a safety harness. If it's private property, the decision is up to the owner.

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Birdseye wrote:

But who owns the rock? If the state owns the rock it's the state's prerogative to require a safety harness. If it's private property, the decision is up to the owner.

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Uh... what?

I think you broke his head, DC

I'd support allowing people not to wear their seatbelts, if and only if we toss Emergency Medical Services out, that way no body else is wasting their time if you got in an accient without a belt.

In America we are so free that we only get to keep a certain portion of our incomes, while congress picks our pockets and hands it out whimsically to any counter-productive cause they can think of.

While I agree with you in part Dcrazy, I think you proved Birdseyes point. Nearly everything material is owned by the state. If, as you say "The owner gets to make the rules," then freedom can only be how the state perceives it. The state owns the very house you just purchased, the streets you walk on and the parks you sit in. Just take a fraction of this into consideration and then ask yourself, "When are you really free?"

Umm well you have to get the facts straight before you can argue that pointâ?¦

The fact is â??youâ?

If you think you own your property, then I dare you to stop paying taxes on it

Taxes are the state's way of billing you for using the services you don't own and they provide, like schools and roads. If you don't pay your taxes, don't plan on using any services you don't own, such as the telephone network, the electricity grid, the satellite phone network, the road outside your house, etc. Theoretically, if you did that, you would be able to avoid taxation. Just try not to breathe in the air if the government has done anything to make it better, like control pollution or spray insecticides.

I don't think I proved Birdseye's point; I think he believes that "public land" belongs to "all of us". It doesn't. It belongs to the state and "all of us" pay to use it.

I think I heard somewhere in the federal law there is a provision where by we really don't own the land we buy outright, that the feds retain the true deed to it....

Exactly, Will. The "real" in real estate is a spanish term for the word "royal".. aka royal estate. Simply put, it's land owned by the monarch. Nowadays, it's rented via taxes.

who owns the state? I would like to think the people.

Actually I was more just dissapointed at how much freedom is being given away by people like you

Well, think about it Birdseye, the way we own the state is by voting. At some point in time "all of us" decided to create a DMV to manage the rules of the road.

The existence of the state is "all of us" giving up the right to complete autonomy. I find it much less appalling to be required to wear a seatbelt on state-owned roads than to be told how my money shall be saved for other people's futures (social security), for example.