No, Marie Claire is not my supermodel younger sister. She’s a British woman’s magazine, and a lady writing a piece for Marie Claire rang today asking about the libertarian line on incest (which she knew, either from the Libertarian Alliance website or via that from Sean Gabb’s Freelife website, that Sean had done a piece about, many years ago).
I told her (a) that you need to distinguish between morality and legality (legitimacy of social pressure, etc.), (b) that it ought to be legal if both parties consent, (c) that the consent principle meshes nicely with the fact that the police are powerless to catch people if no one is complaining – and thus telling them – about whatever it is, but that (d) the consent principle comes under severe strain as soon as a weaker party is on the receiving end of an inescapable power relationship, as is almost invariably the case where children are involved. It’s tricky to get things like this right, but she seemed sympathetic. Consent lead us on to the mass of consenting relationships (e.g. between the “Metric Martyrs” and their customers, all happy to trade in feet and inches) that are now being busily illegalised by our pathologically meddlesome government.
A nice illustration of how the willingness to assert libertarian principles, even (especially) when what follows from them is deeply disreputable, leads directly to mainstream media attention, and not just in the men’s pages.
She said she’d ring back if a piece does materialise in Marie Claire which refers to any of the above, and I’ll keep you posted.
