RangerDave wrote:
How is it not a sense of entitlement? He's engaging in an activity that involves using fertilizer and toxic chemicals that run off his fields into other people's water and apparently kicks up a bunch of dust and noise, but he feels that if those other people want to limit (or further limit, if you prefer) these effects of his activity, then the burden should be on them to make it as easy as possible for him. That sure sounds like a sense of entitlement to me. Now, as a matter of good government, I absolutely think regulatory compliance should be made as easy and transparent as possible, but at the end of the day, he's the one engaging in an activity that negatively impacts other people without their consent; so in my opinion, it takes some serious chutzpah for him to act like the aggrieved party here.
There already ARE limits on him. Just showing that it "negatively impacts" other people doesn't automatically show that regulation is justifiable. How much does it negatively impact them? Why are existing regulations inadequate? How do we really know tht it does negatively impact anyone to any meaningful degree? So far I haven't seen any discussion whatsoever of what the rumored regulations would entail?
Yes, the burden should be on them. You should have to show not just that something negatively impacts you, but that it
meaningfully negatively impacts you, and that the regulations produce a reduction in that impact that is meaningful, and outweighs the burden it imposes. I haven't seen any of this established in this case. Doubly so if there are already regulations in place and all you want to do is tighten them; why can you suddenly not live with it? Again, doubly so if he was already doing what he was doing when you arrived; you should not be able to build a subdivision next to an existing farm and then try to regulate his cows away as a noise nuisance.
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Why do you assume the additional standards "reflect nothing more than a particular political desire to regulate"? I came across a quote from
G.K. Chesterton the other day that I really liked and seems to apply here:
In the matter of reforming things, as distinct from deforming them, there is one plain and simple principle; a principle which will probably be called a paradox. There exists in such a case a certain institution or law; let us say, for the sake of simplicity, a fence or gate erected across a road. The more modern type of reformer goes gaily up to it and says, "I don't see the use of this; let us clear it away." To which the more intelligent type of reformer will do well to answer: "If you don't see the use of it, I certainly won't let you clear it away. Go away and think. Then, when you can come back and tell me that you do see the use of it, I may allow you to destroy it."
U?h, ok so someone said a quote you like. So what? This quote does not pertain; Chesterton is discussing the wisdom of removing existing regulations, not of adding new ones.
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This paradox rests on the most elementary common sense. The gate or fence did not grow there. It was not set up by somnambulists who built it in their sleep. It is highly improbable that it was put there by escaped lunatics who were for some reason loose in the street. Some person had some reason for thinking it would be a good thing for somebody. And until we know what the reason was, we really cannot judge whether the reason was reasonable. It is extremely probable that we have overlooked some whole aspect of the question, if something set up by human beings like ourselves seems to be entirely meaningless and mysterious. There are reformers who get over this difficulty by assuming that all their fathers were fools; but if that be so, we can only say that folly appears to be a hereditary disease. But the truth is that nobody has any business to destroy a social institution until he has really seen it as an historical institution. If he knows how it arose, and what purposes it was supposed to serve, he may really be able to say that they were bad purposes, that they have since become bad purposes, or that they are purposes which are no longer served. But if he simply stares at the thing as a senseless monstrosity that has somehow sprung up in his path, it is he and not the traditionalist who is suffering from an illusion.
This quote, while somewhat clever, is irrelevant. It refers to the repeal or retention of existing regulations, not the creation of new ones.
The analogy is also incorrect. One erects a gate on one's own land to keep one's livestock in or intruders out. It pertains only to onesself. Regulations, on the other hand, pertain to everyone; the "reformer" is not asking to clear away a gate, but rather a traffic light in the town square which is poorly adjusted and slows the travel of everyone. It does not require "assuming one's fathers were fools" but rather evaluating the regulation in light of empirical data the creators did not have. Your quote readily observes this, with the reference to "seeing it as a historical institution" while ignoring the fact that
In other words, he is bent on assuming that regulations are, by default, well-advised when imposed, and any attempt to remove them is ill-advised until proven otherwise, despite the fact that the later observers
have more data than the earlier. Mr. Chesterton appears, from this quote, to be a colossally silly man who, in an attempt to justify regulations simply because they exist, claims that anyone wanting to repeal a regulation not only needs to observe it as a historical institution but must then convince everyone else, but that the person imposing it must have been well advised, despite necessarily having less empirical data on it than the later person wanting to dispense with it! He is simply engaging in blatant favoritism towards regulation on the assumption that because our predecessors were not total fools, that everything they did was therefore well-advised.
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This adage certainly applies both ways - if something is unregulated or regulated only to some extent, then advocates of additional regulation should consider why those earlier regulations were not more extensive - but in reply to your comment, DE, I think it's a mistake to assume that a proposed regulation is driven by a naked desire to regulate rather than some substantive reason.
I don't see how it is a mistake, especially in light of the naked desire to regulate in order to force society in general into a "progressive" model that has been displayed by much of the left.
No substantive reason for these regulations (if they exist at all) whatsoever. Simply saying "well there must be a good reason" is inadequate.
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