Quote from: The Script on September 06, 2011, 05:19:06 AM

I never said they were. I'm simply pointing out it's not very accurate to say "society has decided" when most of society doesn't give a fuck. I guess you could define "decided" to also mean "absence of a decision" because you could decide by not caring. I suppose.

If a majority of society actually got off their asses, thought for themselves and did some critical thinking, who knows what they would actually decide? I just don't think humanity operates that way. There's usually a powerful minority that free-rides off of the passive acceptance of the vast majority.

Excellent point. Most people are too ignorant and lazy to see and fix the political problems of the day. How would such 'sheeple' ever survive, let alone thrive, in a libertarian utopia. And I'm not spouting hyperbole, I actually like the libertarian ideal and think it *would* be a utopia in a small society. But in the global village you'd never know who to trust, unless there was, e.g., one emergent international standard (perhaps amongst many other competing standards) for food safety & quality, perhaps with different levels (e.g. 1 to 5 stars). And then, well, only restaurants that adhere to that standard would survive, and we'd be back to one standard for everyone - a standard, oooh, somehow chosen by, what's that word... *society*. And all the neo-libertarians of the day would then complain and say it's not fair that we must follow that standard.
Only problem is, the path to be *that* international standard is open to whoever has the most money & power and is willing to use it, which is unlikely to be the one with the consumer's welfare at heart. I admit the current system doesn't inspire total confidence, but at least they have to make it look like the consumer's welfare is important.