Thursday, July 29, 2010

Walter Block, Double Agent?

From Francois Tremblay



Suppose that there is a starvation situation, and the parent of the four year old child (who is not an adult) does not have enough money to keep him alive. A wealthy NAMBLA man offers this parent enough money to keep him and his family alive – if he will consent to his having sex with the child. We assume, further, that this is the only way to preserve the life of this four year old boy. Would it be criminal child abuse for the parent to accept this offer?

Not on libertarian grounds. For surely it is better for the child to be a live victim of sexual abuse rather than unsullied and dead. Rather, it is the parent who consents to the death of his child, when he could have kept him alive by such extreme measures, who is the real abuser.
-Walter Block

4 comments:

  1. Way to take it out of context...

    Here is the Paragraph immediately before that one.

    Suppose, now, with an age of consent law of seventeen years old, which we for argument’s sake stipulate as legitimate, a NAMBLA member
    accosts a four year old boy. As far as I am concerned, this should be considered illegal. Any parent who allows this to happen should be found guilty of child abuse, which implies not only losing charge of his son, but also a jail sentence. However, there is one exception to this rule. This, presumably, will drive Schwartz to apoplexy, but I persevere nonetheless.

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  2. So, Anon., you appove of selling your child to a rapist for money under some circumstances? That's what's at issue. It's that "one exception" that Block is being taken to task for. You don't think there would be any other alternative under those conditions?

    How about stealing money for food? That would far more justified than allowing your child to be abused (and there are dozens of other solutions I could come up with).

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  3. Talk about incentives... pedophile Libtertarians eliminating social safety nets as children starve, so they can fuck them.

    Oh wait, we already have that. It's called the Catholic Church.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Damn Libtertarians! Thank goodness I'm a libertarian (people are always getting the two movements confused).

    ReplyDelete

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