The principle behind what you’re saying really makes a lot of sense when we aren’t talking about law and the government. Freedom to self destruct isn’t of much help to anyone. All things being equal, we might be better off in a world where drugs just didn’t exist. The same is true when it comes to alcohol and cigarettes. It might even be true of guns.
This is a circumstance we can create as a society through disapproval and gentle encouragement towards something else. The government is more limited in its means, though: if we want to get rid of smoking with the government, for example, then we are de facto going to be putting people in jail over nothing. Maybe it starts with a fine but if a fine is big enough to hurt there will be poor people who can’t pay and they will end up with tax problems and then with jail time.
This whole concept of using the government to foster every desirable positive social outcome leads to authoritarianism and it’s a mistake. There are other organs of society we need to bring to bear, both to see the changes we want and to balance out the government itself.
This is a circumstance we can create as a society through disapproval and gentle encouragement towards something else. The government is more limited in its means, though: if we want to get rid of smoking with the government, for example, then we are de facto going to be putting people in jail over nothing. Maybe it starts with a fine but if a fine is big enough to hurt there will be poor people who can’t pay and they will end up with tax problems and then with jail time.
This whole concept of using the government to foster every desirable positive social outcome leads to authoritarianism and it’s a mistake. There are other organs of society we need to bring to bear, both to see the changes we want and to balance out the government itself.