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There are quite a few laws which abolishing would cause short-term harm. However, in the long term, society is better without such laws. I think this is the case for many paternalistic laws. Possibly including compulsory education. Other examples include drug prohibition, including age restrictions. The age of sexual consent MIGHT be another example. If so, it would actually mean sexual adultists are right, as abolishing the age of sexual consent would put kids at an increased risk of sexual abuse, at least short-term. But I'm not really sure if the age of sexual consent is like that. That might be giving sexual adultists too much credit. I believe that for the majority of paternalistic laws, abolition would have a neutral, or small positive or negative effect in the short-term. You know what's even more relevant than who is being oppressed? Why they're being oppressed. So I think it's best to advocate for less paternalism. This includes things like abolishing drug prohibition laws and jaywalking laws. Though most paternalistic laws are adultist. I guess you could argue that prudery is why kids are restricted from sexual relations, but I don't see prudery as such a coherent reason. Paternalism is more general. It's the most relevant motivation for age of sexual consent laws in my opinion. Prudery seems like something people do instinctively. They often cannot come up with good reasons for their prudery. Prudery is why incest is stigmatised, and NO ONE comes up with a reason for that stigma that makes the slightest bit of sense! Because incest causes genetic disorders? Can't you see that that's eugenics? Which I thought we rejected as a form of bigotry. Because incest is always abuse? Why do incest laws charge both participants then? Because it ruins the family? Are you even trying? That's what prison does! Talk about fighting fire with fire! Paternalism is at least a rational excuse. It's almost never good, but at least it's rational. It's something you can reason with. Anyway, I could understand if abolishing compulsory education caused harm in the short term, as maybe kids who had been turned off education due to adultism would choose to stop their education. However, notice WHY these kids were turned off education? Adultism. And that's why adultism must be rejected. These kids likely wouldn't have done well if compulsory education continued either. Because you can lead a donkey to water, but you can't make them drink. And to reject adultism, we must reject compulsory education. We can't make an exception for it. We can't even say that we're just accepting it as a temporary measure due to existing adultism. Even then, it would still do more harm than good. The current adultism in our society does not justify compulsory education. Because compulsory education, even as a temporary measure, promotes adultism. It teaches impressionable kids, as young as 6, to accept paternalism due to their youth. And when I say that abolishing compulsory education might cause short term harm, I mean short term! Imagine if someone is 10 when compulsory education is abolished, and leaves school. There's a good chance they'll go back to school when they're 12 or something. And while they may be a little behind compared to where they'd be if compulsory education wasn't abolished, when they return to school, they'll likely be better equipped to handle it, and the school would be better, and they'll be happier, and more likely to succeed in secondary school. I think not being in school for two years, because that's what they CHOSE, is a small price to pay. It goes to show how the autonomy-respecting approach tends to win in the end. |