Can you cite any examples. You seem to have a highly idealized (and completely unconfirmable) view of 1800's America. The examples I can think of are Cromwell's England, the Taliban's Afghanistan, etc.
You are missing that the "choose freely" depends entirely upon fear of ostracism, upon societal coercion.
What a pathetic way to live. An adult should be capable of making decisions that his neighbors *hate* if he feels it is the right thing to do.
I'm still miffed at this deliberate misrepresentation of Szasz's views. The author of this article is essentially a liar. Lying via omission is just as bad as fabrication in my book.
What a pathetic way to live. An adult should be capable of making decisions that his neighbors *hate* if he feels it is the right thing to do.
What a romantic view of humanity. The hard truth is that most people are guided by their desire to be thought well of by the society around them. Most people follow the crowd. Always have. Always will. Do you see a world of John Galts around you ?
If the crowd is unable to enforce norms by withholding approval, people will inevitably sink to their lowest common denominator. Do you think it is coincidence that the explosion of crime on America's streets coincided directly with the across the board collapse of respect for authority that occurred in the '60's ? Khephera and Tomolak are absolutely right. Once anti-Christian forces took control of popular culture the ability of society to stigmatize and thereby control instant gratification behavior (which is seldom good) collapsed. So a society without moral consensus demanded law and order.
Libertarians seem to think that civilized behavior is rational and natural and to be expected. It is absolutely nothing of the sort. It is the product of years of inculcated impulse denying indoctrination. It is the result of a societal consensus on what conduct will or will not be tolerated. It is teaching people to Not be natural, to Not just say or do whatever they feel like at the time. Once religious values have collapsed what you have is Amsterdam and Peter Singer, not iron jawed Ayn Randian ubermensch.