Some Thoughts About Libertarian Philosophy

If you know me, you know that my political views lean toward the libertarian. I've been doing some reading and thinking lately. I still believe in the principles of personal liberty, but as I've thinking about it, I've run into a couple of practical snags. I'm open to others' thoughts, but please remember that I am not a political scientist, so if I say something dumb, please be gentle in your correction.

The first problem I've run into deals with the idea of the free market. As I understand it, in a truly free market, goods and services are traded based on consumer demand and availability. There is no government intervention. A product succeeds or fails based solely on its popularity.

The problem I have is that this system expects all participants in a transaction to be inherently "good" or at least honest. Say a for example an individual has a new food product, soylent green (I know, but let me run with it). Every body loves soylent green and demand far out paces supply. Under the free market system, there is no obligation for the company to reveal to the public the secret ingredient that makes soylent green so tasty and nutritious. Unless there is an independent investigation into soylent green, no one will ever know that it's people, a fact that would certainly curtail demand once publicized. Under this system, those of dubious ethical standing are almost enabled to profit at the expense of the well being of others. How do we get around this without some form of regulation?

Another issue I have stems from the idea that as long as an act is nonviolent and mutually consensual to all involved parties there should be no prohibition against it. As long as the parties are"competent" adults I have no problem with this. Let people make their own choices and deal with the consequences of those choices. For me this starts to get sticky when we deal with children and the mentally ill or mentally challenged.

On the face of it, the child question seems easy. Children cannot legally enter into contracts, so they cannot consent and a parent must do this for them. But as above, we have to assume altruism. Unfortunately, there are several examples of parents doing horrible things to their children. Digging deeper, we have to question the age of majority. In the US we seem to have implemented a strange arbitrary graduated scale. At 16 you can drive, at 18 you can smoke, vote, and die for your country, but you have to be 21 to drink alcohol, and your auto insurance company thinks you become a safer driver at 25. Other nations have other standards. How do we determine who is old enough to be considered an adult for our purposes?

Those who are not mentally capable have a similar problem. Who speaks for them? How do we determine competency to begin with? Do we place restrictions on the mentally challenged? If so, does that create an inequality? Are we not then violating a principle of personal liberty?

I don't have what I feel are good answers to these questions. I just needed to get them out there so that I can stop mulling them over all day. I'm open to others' thoughts if anyone cares to share.