Claire Curtis-Thomas MP (Labour) wants to ban teenagers from buying lads’ mags. The Department of Health wants cigarettes to be sold under the counter. According to Labour, the state knows best: you need to be protected from yourself. The state must tell you what you can eat, smoke and read.
Lads’ mags sell more copies if a scantily dressed lady occupies the cover. Less is more for the sales figures. So age restrictions are proposed. This may seem reasonable (= electorally beneficial) and this is why Lads’ Mags are targeted this time around. But think about what would happen if we extended the logic. Will Ms. Curtis-Tomas want to impose age restrictions on The Sun? Are we really saying that whenever a breast is exposed for a bathroom advert the state censor should investigate with his magnifying glass to decide whether to issue a certificate 18 or PG? House and Garden on the top shelf?
Restricting nudity is often done for the best of reasons: some individuals might get ideas into their heads and go on to rape etc. But actually, how many convictions have there been where the fact that the criminal in question bought lads’ mags was a material factor? In the unlikely event where there were a few, that still doesn’t mean that the millions of others who never went on to commit any crime of that nature should be punished? I could see the point of restricting some very extreme pornography, but lads’ mags? Some tabloids’ comments may have fuelled some deranged individuals to commit homophobic or racist crimes. But should we therefore have an age limit or a ban on tabloids?
An arbitrary age limit is a collectivist notion. Age is no guarantee for wisdom. Maturity differs for each individual. In addition, those who need to decide what age limits will be applied to publications are themselves subjective. I am not certain I would put the same age limit on the latest Batman film as the state censors would. It puts excessive power over all of us in the hands of non-elected bureaucrats.
Labour not only knows what is best for our morals, but also has our health at heart. Cigarettes are to be sold under the counter. I don’t smoke. When I was 12 I illicitly smoked a few (the thrill!), had a good cough and never smoked again. Today it’s cigarettes which are to be kept out of view as smoking kills. And tomorrow? Crisps with an age certificate? Belgian chocolates in a brown bag? A compulsory daily intake of veg? As Milton Friedman said in Free to Choose: "If the government is to try and ban private consumption of alcohol and tobacco, it must surely ban such activities as hang-gliding, skiing, rock-climbing and so on. Where should it stop? Rugby? American Football? Ice Hockey? Insofar as the government has information not generally available about the merits or demerits of the items we ingest or the activities we engage in, let it give us the information. But let it leave us free to choose what chances we want to take with our own lives.”
I object to the notion that the state needs to protect us from ourselves. The state must keep us free, not bring us chains. Today it’s breasts in lads’ mags and cigarettes; tomorrow it will be fast cars, hamburgers or BNP newsletters. In Labour’s Brave New World we are all infants who need to be protected by Nanny Big Sister. According to Labour you and I are simply too stupid to decide what we want and should read. The Enlightened Elites in Whitehall must step in where we so obviously fail.
New Labour, new tyranny. It’s time for change.
