If the US wishes to set up some anti terror coalition and get countries to willingly cooperate in a joint effort, that's great. But the US doesn't have the right to demand flight information from passangers flying between totally different countries. Sure, they can request it... they can ask really nicely. But they can't demand it.
Further, 72 hours is way too long. The nofly list should be something that can be checked by computer instantly. If my credit card can be scanned and my account adjusted then tell me why the no fly list can't be checked automatically? If the provided data doesn't match the no fly list data then let them through. Sure, bad people might lie about their information or have fake IDs but the 72 hours isn't going to help catch those people in any case. So why the delay?
I suspect the TSA's software is garbage. Set the system up for easy polling and so every registered airline can automatically file their passenger list before take off. The system should be so fast that no delay is required.
Our second amendment is not something most of the government encourages much. It is a right passed down from the founders.
We as citizens have a right to be dangerous. Just as I have a right to speak or have my own opinions. You can't be a citizen without being permitted to be dangerous.
The whole point was that the government existed to serve the people not the other way around. And the people unlike europe at the time were not to be peasants but to be free citizens.
To our ancestors that implied many of the rights and powers that nobility had would given to public at large. The nobility were dangerous. They had guns and swords and lots of goons. They'd come at you on horse back and kill you. And there was very little most people could do about it. If a noble wanted you dead you were probably a dead man.
So we have guns because we have a right to be dangerous. This is not something our government encourages. In fact, the FBI and much of the rest of the government is made very uncomfortable by it. However, that is part of the point. Governments should be made uncomfortable by their people rather then the other way around.
The chinese people are not citizens. They are peasants. They've been peasants for their whole national history going back thousands of years. So from their perspective they didn't lose anything. But if you truly think they're free and don't understand the concept of what it means to be a citizen then you're not much of a westerner.
I know the whole anti gun thing is in vogue throughout much of the west now. But who's interests does that ultimately serve? Not the people. And if not the people... who?
In any case, for your anti gun argument to make any sense, you'd have to show that the US government was actively encouraging people to exercise their second amendment rights. As an American who lives here... I can tell you the government goes out of it's way to discourage it. And the government must be taken to court with some frequency for over stepping it's authority to prohibit or regulate the use of guns.
I am a citizen and while I'm a really nice guy... I reserve the right to be dangerous and scare my government. And beyond that, should my government become too corrupt to serve the interests of the people then I also reserve the right to destroy it.
I'd love for you to try and prove that the US government is encouraging people see the government as something they can destroy. That would be priceless.
The did you now? And what percentage of the youth in china are aware of the Tiananmen square incident? It isn't taught in school. It isn't in the media.
Where would they learn of it?
And as you're claiming to be a professor, do you honestly think 85 percent of chinese want their internet censored for political speech?
Come now Mr educated... what does 85 percent sound like to you? Compare that to other countries and think upon what issues you could get 85 percent of the US or any european country to agree.
Actually process it.
What public forum do the chinese people have in which they are free to express ideas that are controversial?
There will be exceptions but consider how many of your beliefs were formed by listening to someone else or getting information from someone else. Imagine if you lived in an environment where it was considered taboo to say anything against the state.
Imagine if it were like admitting racism or some extreme sexual perversion to proclaim disharmony with the state. Consider all the homosexuals in our society that are so indoctrinated against homosexuality that they try really hard to be heterosexual. And that's not even an opinion, that's a genetic sexual attraction.
If our culture which isn't even that strong on condemning gay people anymore and in which there are no real laws against homosexuality anymore (yes there are stupid sodomy laws still but who actually enforces them?)... if our society is still able to get many gay people to try and be heterosexual or otherwise feel shame for their orientation then imagine how strong a compulsion could be if it came with the full backing of the state and it was just against an opinion and not something genetic?
Your belief that the opinions still exist is correct but they don't matter because the compulsion is stronger and for every one person you can find that believes otherwise you'll find 20 that were groupthinked into calling anyone that disagrees a heretic.
This is how religions work as well. Nothing against religion or pervasive state indoctrination. These are tools... and like all tools have no intrinsic moral character. It is how they are used that makes them good or evil.
In any case, an opinion poll from the chinese on a political issue the state has an established opinion on is meaningless.
An actual opinion would require the state to stop interfering in the discussion or simply asking questions for which the state has no opinion.
Why do people think strawmen are valid arguments? It's really quiet odd. They just make up an opinion, impose it on someone else, and then argue against that as if the first person said that.
Why are you supporting child molestation by the way? That's disgusting.
As to humans and opinions, no humans don't necessarily have opinions. It depends on the intellectual and social environment they exist in. Imagine you live in a religious cult... do you have lots of opinions that are at odds with the cult? Probably not because the whole cult is designed to control what you believe and to use various social pressures to make sure you have those opinions. They're not yours... they are socially imposed.
For example, you have lots of opinions that you never came up with yourself and have never honestly considered. This is true of everyone. We are social creatures and mostly adopt the opinions of our society.
Consider all the counter culture people that tell everyone they're against conforming. Notice now that they all dress like each other. Notice they all tend to use the same vocabulary. Notice that they all tend to have the same opinions about just about everything as each other. Notice that they in fact do conform if anything more rigidly then the masses only to a counter culture.
This is the norm.
what are you thoughts on cannibalism, marrying girls as young as eight years old, or slavery? All socially imposed taboos. My point is not that you should or shouldn't like these things but that it is something not considered acceptable for you to have a varying opinion on the matter. The society has said that Canadianism is wrong. PERIOD. It is not open for debate. Marrying people as young as eight is wrong. Period. Slavery is wrong. Period. We start drilling this into children at around two years old when children ask lots of questions. And we answer most of them. The children pay attention not only to the answers by to the way they are answered. A strong YES or NO is imprinted on their minds in ways a "maybe" or "that's up to you" are not.
This sort of thing continues throughout our lives though of course at a certain point our personalities become more fixed and while we'll outwardly conform we'll remain internally more flexible.
So, in that context do the chinese people have opinions?
They have the opinions they're allowed to have which don't include questioning the power, divine right, or moral clarity of the state.
The public has no opinion. You might as well point out how many people voted for Saddam Hussein... I think it was over 98 percent.
How likely do you think it is that 83 percent of Chinese people actually agree with internet censorship? And what does that even mean? That something should be censored? I mean, most people are not found of horse-porn or whatever horrible mind searing abomination could conceivably be dredged up by the folks at 4chan. But there is a world of difference between not wanting to see child porn everywhere and agreeing with the systematic domination of all public discourse.
That domination is complete in China. Everything is censored, controlled, tweaked, threatened, bullied, or groupthinked into "order"...
The chinese neither like nor dislike it. They have no right to an opinion either way.
That is what your fine is backed with... violence. You can acknowledge that obvious point even if you feel it is unavoidable or you'll so damage your own integrity that the discussion will end for lack of an opponent with credibility.
You're right, a traffic ticket can go there but then that's YOUR system. I'm arguing against your casual use of violence. It's wrong. It's casual brutality.
The resort to violence is only required to stop violence or harm to other people. In all other instances the escalation should be capped at actions that are no worse then whatever the other person is doing. Your actions should be reciprocal and not disproportionate.
For example, would you send the police to collect library late fees? It makes a great deal more sense to just cancel the card and forbid them to check out books in the future until the debt is paid. And the debt should never exceed the replacement/purchase cost of the book.
I'll just add to this, remember that our ancestors didn't live as long as we do. So returning to nature might help some things but over all we were OLD at 30 10,000 years ago. We were having our first children at around 13. And you were a very wise old man if you made it to 40.
Just keep that in perspective. Our modern life style has costs but remember what we bought.
You have to take into consideration that back in the day people with autism were simply called "simple" and lumped in with just about anyone else with obvious brain disorders.
Many people with less obvious disorders that mostly effected behavior were thought to just have bad personalities. And of course, if you started uncontrollably spewing profanity then you might have been "diagnosed" with demonic possession.
The overwhelming majority of afflictions we have today are quiet old. If there's anything new possibly we've new issues resulting from sitting on our asses most of the time. Our ancestors spent most of their day walking...
how many peasants were even checked for it. the nobility would have been the only ones to get formal medical care in the first place.
Everyone else would have had a collection of midwives and old home remedies.
Further, in that specific case there is evidence that living in a cleaner environment tends to make those sorts of illnesses more common. So that could be a recent issue but something you could easily distance yourself from by living like a pig especially as a young child.
True but without a history of such studies all conducted in the same way there's no way to plot a trend line.
If you're just saying "we found this in this year" that's fine. If you try and connect that to some sort of temporal context to imply a trend then it's not.
That's a good question. The right answer is of course 1973 since you were born with it. However, the statistics they're talking about might easily put that on 2010.
The issue with statistics is that you have to be somewhat educated to understand them in the first place. And as evidenced by most journalists reporting on statistics... it seems most people are pretty ignorant on the subject.
Another issue that always makes me nuts on statistics is correlation and causation... they always confuse correlation with causation... its maddening.
Autism isn't a new issue. It's been around for hundreds of thousands of years. It's just it wouldn't be diagnosed before.
How many cases of appendicitis were there 10,000 years ago? Would be rational to look at existing reported cases and conclude that all of this just started in the modern era?
I'm not saying autism isn't a problem. It's just one of many old problems.
My example is obvious. If you don't have to have a discussion in good faith, that's fine. Just know that you're conceding the argument by default.
It's quiet obvious that if regulation is ignored a fine is levied. If that fine is not paid then then possibly a license or further fines will be levied. If those are not paid or complied with things will escalate eventually leading to the forced closing of the company and ceasure of property. If this is resisted then obviously there will be violence.
The above is obvious to you. If you want to be obtuse that is your choice but your obtuse responses are not a rebuttal or a reply to my argument. It's merely obstruction and I have to take that as your intent to leave the discussion without making a counter argument. As such, you concede unless you've realized that being obtuse and officious is not a winning strategy.
You are being obtuse. If the regulations are not followed and subsequent action is ignored then eventually the people or company will be stopped by force. If that is resisted then things will escalate.
At no point will the government simply say "oh, well since you don't want to comply we'll just leave you alone then"... no, the press the point and it goes through a series of escalations.
Finally, they won't claim that they shot people for not following a regulation. What they'll do is say they shot people for resisting arrest or obstructing officers. But all of that results from the non-compliance with the regulation.
You know all this... so If you're not going to discuss this in good faith we're done here. I have no patience for people's silly stupid obvious little games.
Just because companies nearly always comply rather then suffer total destruction doesn't mean that they're not being threatened with total destruction.
For example, I could mug people for my whole life... make a career out of it and yet never kill anyone because everyone simply submits. Does that mean I'm not threatening them with violence?
According to you for the threat to be real my victim needs to refuse to comply and I need to execute them.
Play devil's advocate with your argument a little before commenting again please. This fisherprice crap is beneath people that don't spend a good portion of each day eating elmer's glue.
True. But I'm not suggesting no regulation. I'm merely saying that if you do it, you have to have proper respect for what you're doing.
For example, if a guy wants to dump toxic waste in a lake people drink from and the result will be thousands of people die... will you be willing to put a gun against his head to make him stop? Yes. Those are circumstances where regulation is appropriate. But any situation where it would be wildly inappropriate to threaten someone's life or livelihood over the matter simply shouldn't enforced in that way.
Now you can have additional layers of regulation for less extreme circumstances but the consequences and nature of the relationship has to be proportionately less hostile. So for example, maybe you make something a quid pro quo? By making it a voluntary exchange of one thing for another you avoid much the stigma. It is important that it truly be voluntary. You can't say "if you want to breath, give me 40 dollars"... that's just mugging someone. If you want this "service" it costs X... and they don't have to buy and ideally you shouldn't monopolize the service. So if it's a vital service but one that you're charging an unreasonable price for a competitor can come in to make a better deal... or if they're a large entity they might just provide that service themselves.
I have no problem with regulation. It's just that it isn't a casual exercise of power. Most of it is backed with violence. Do this or men with guns will come and make you sorry. That is appropriate for life and death regulations where people will DIE or come to great harm if the regulation isn't obeyed. But in any situation where it wouldn't be reasonable to threaten someone with violence such regulations are heavy handed, brutal, immoral, and uncivilized. Part of being civilized means not using a sledge hammer when a gentle pat on the shoulder will do. Many people seem to just like the power. Love of power for it's own sake is savage. It's like the love of sex for it's own sake. We expect such from primitives but more civilized societies realize it is more complicated then that. You don't jam guns in people's faces simply because you think it's funny or cool or you enjoy the power or it's easy.
It eats away at the very fabric of the community by enshrining the absolute power of the state above any interconnected communal responsibility.
Slashdot Mirror
It would be hard not to have one at this point given everyone's insistence on a trial.
You can try someone for anything. I could try you for child molestation... doesn't mean you're guilty of it or that there is even a case for it.
So bring the trial on. And if he's acquitted... by the rules of double jeopardy he can never be tried for that again.
So go for it. If you think you have a case.
Lets just suspend our opinions until the trial please. I have no idea what happened here and neither does anyone else.
Well, I don't like the 72 hour aspect...
If the US wishes to set up some anti terror coalition and get countries to willingly cooperate in a joint effort, that's great. But the US doesn't have the right to demand flight information from passangers flying between totally different countries. Sure, they can request it... they can ask really nicely. But they can't demand it.
Further, 72 hours is way too long. The nofly list should be something that can be checked by computer instantly. If my credit card can be scanned and my account adjusted then tell me why the no fly list can't be checked automatically? If the provided data doesn't match the no fly list data then let them through. Sure, bad people might lie about their information or have fake IDs but the 72 hours isn't going to help catch those people in any case. So why the delay?
I suspect the TSA's software is garbage. Set the system up for easy polling and so every registered airline can automatically file their passenger list before take off. The system should be so fast that no delay is required.
Our second amendment is not something most of the government encourages much. It is a right passed down from the founders.
We as citizens have a right to be dangerous. Just as I have a right to speak or have my own opinions. You can't be a citizen without being permitted to be dangerous.
The whole point was that the government existed to serve the people not the other way around. And the people unlike europe at the time were not to be peasants but to be free citizens.
To our ancestors that implied many of the rights and powers that nobility had would given to public at large. The nobility were dangerous. They had guns and swords and lots of goons. They'd come at you on horse back and kill you. And there was very little most people could do about it. If a noble wanted you dead you were probably a dead man.
So we have guns because we have a right to be dangerous. This is not something our government encourages. In fact, the FBI and much of the rest of the government is made very uncomfortable by it. However, that is part of the point. Governments should be made uncomfortable by their people rather then the other way around.
The chinese people are not citizens. They are peasants. They've been peasants for their whole national history going back thousands of years. So from their perspective they didn't lose anything. But if you truly think they're free and don't understand the concept of what it means to be a citizen then you're not much of a westerner.
I know the whole anti gun thing is in vogue throughout much of the west now. But who's interests does that ultimately serve? Not the people. And if not the people... who?
In any case, for your anti gun argument to make any sense, you'd have to show that the US government was actively encouraging people to exercise their second amendment rights. As an American who lives here... I can tell you the government goes out of it's way to discourage it. And the government must be taken to court with some frequency for over stepping it's authority to prohibit or regulate the use of guns.
I am a citizen and while I'm a really nice guy... I reserve the right to be dangerous and scare my government. And beyond that, should my government become too corrupt to serve the interests of the people then I also reserve the right to destroy it.
I'd love for you to try and prove that the US government is encouraging people see the government as something they can destroy. That would be priceless.
The did you now? And what percentage of the youth in china are aware of the Tiananmen square incident? It isn't taught in school. It isn't in the media.
Where would they learn of it?
And as you're claiming to be a professor, do you honestly think 85 percent of chinese want their internet censored for political speech?
Come now Mr educated... what does 85 percent sound like to you? Compare that to other countries and think upon what issues you could get 85 percent of the US or any european country to agree.
Actually process it.
What public forum do the chinese people have in which they are free to express ideas that are controversial?
very little is worth backing up. That which is gets uploaded.
There will be exceptions but consider how many of your beliefs were formed by listening to someone else or getting information from someone else. Imagine if you lived in an environment where it was considered taboo to say anything against the state.
Imagine if it were like admitting racism or some extreme sexual perversion to proclaim disharmony with the state. Consider all the homosexuals in our society that are so indoctrinated against homosexuality that they try really hard to be heterosexual. And that's not even an opinion, that's a genetic sexual attraction.
If our culture which isn't even that strong on condemning gay people anymore and in which there are no real laws against homosexuality anymore (yes there are stupid sodomy laws still but who actually enforces them?)... if our society is still able to get many gay people to try and be heterosexual or otherwise feel shame for their orientation then imagine how strong a compulsion could be if it came with the full backing of the state and it was just against an opinion and not something genetic?
Your belief that the opinions still exist is correct but they don't matter because the compulsion is stronger and for every one person you can find that believes otherwise you'll find 20 that were groupthinked into calling anyone that disagrees a heretic.
This is how religions work as well. Nothing against religion or pervasive state indoctrination. These are tools... and like all tools have no intrinsic moral character. It is how they are used that makes them good or evil.
In any case, an opinion poll from the chinese on a political issue the state has an established opinion on is meaningless.
An actual opinion would require the state to stop interfering in the discussion or simply asking questions for which the state has no opinion.
Drats... foiled by spell check yet again!
cannibalism obviously.
Why do people think strawmen are valid arguments? It's really quiet odd. They just make up an opinion, impose it on someone else, and then argue against that as if the first person said that.
Why are you supporting child molestation by the way? That's disgusting.
As to humans and opinions, no humans don't necessarily have opinions. It depends on the intellectual and social environment they exist in. Imagine you live in a religious cult... do you have lots of opinions that are at odds with the cult? Probably not because the whole cult is designed to control what you believe and to use various social pressures to make sure you have those opinions. They're not yours... they are socially imposed.
For example, you have lots of opinions that you never came up with yourself and have never honestly considered. This is true of everyone. We are social creatures and mostly adopt the opinions of our society.
Consider all the counter culture people that tell everyone they're against conforming. Notice now that they all dress like each other. Notice they all tend to use the same vocabulary. Notice that they all tend to have the same opinions about just about everything as each other. Notice that they in fact do conform if anything more rigidly then the masses only to a counter culture.
This is the norm.
what are you thoughts on cannibalism, marrying girls as young as eight years old, or slavery? All socially imposed taboos. My point is not that you should or shouldn't like these things but that it is something not considered acceptable for you to have a varying opinion on the matter. The society has said that Canadianism is wrong. PERIOD. It is not open for debate. Marrying people as young as eight is wrong. Period. Slavery is wrong. Period. We start drilling this into children at around two years old when children ask lots of questions. And we answer most of them. The children pay attention not only to the answers by to the way they are answered. A strong YES or NO is imprinted on their minds in ways a "maybe" or "that's up to you" are not.
This sort of thing continues throughout our lives though of course at a certain point our personalities become more fixed and while we'll outwardly conform we'll remain internally more flexible.
So, in that context do the chinese people have opinions?
They have the opinions they're allowed to have which don't include questioning the power, divine right, or moral clarity of the state.
The public has no opinion. You might as well point out how many people voted for Saddam Hussein... I think it was over 98 percent.
How likely do you think it is that 83 percent of Chinese people actually agree with internet censorship? And what does that even mean? That something should be censored? I mean, most people are not found of horse-porn or whatever horrible mind searing abomination could conceivably be dredged up by the folks at 4chan. But there is a world of difference between not wanting to see child porn everywhere and agreeing with the systematic domination of all public discourse.
That domination is complete in China. Everything is censored, controlled, tweaked, threatened, bullied, or groupthinked into "order"...
The chinese neither like nor dislike it. They have no right to an opinion either way.
Nasty letters are generally meaningless.
The fines are only a request for money.
The threat is what happens if you don't pay.
That is what your fine is backed with... violence. You can acknowledge that obvious point even if you feel it is unavoidable or you'll so damage your own integrity that the discussion will end for lack of an opponent with credibility.
You're right, a traffic ticket can go there but then that's YOUR system. I'm arguing against your casual use of violence. It's wrong. It's casual brutality.
The resort to violence is only required to stop violence or harm to other people. In all other instances the escalation should be capped at actions that are no worse then whatever the other person is doing. Your actions should be reciprocal and not disproportionate.
For example, would you send the police to collect library late fees? It makes a great deal more sense to just cancel the card and forbid them to check out books in the future until the debt is paid. And the debt should never exceed the replacement/purchase cost of the book.
I'll just add to this, remember that our ancestors didn't live as long as we do. So returning to nature might help some things but over all we were OLD at 30 10,000 years ago. We were having our first children at around 13. And you were a very wise old man if you made it to 40.
Just keep that in perspective. Our modern life style has costs but remember what we bought.
You have to take into consideration that back in the day people with autism were simply called "simple" and lumped in with just about anyone else with obvious brain disorders.
Many people with less obvious disorders that mostly effected behavior were thought to just have bad personalities. And of course, if you started uncontrollably spewing profanity then you might have been "diagnosed" with demonic possession.
The overwhelming majority of afflictions we have today are quiet old. If there's anything new possibly we've new issues resulting from sitting on our asses most of the time. Our ancestors spent most of their day walking...
how many peasants were even checked for it. the nobility would have been the only ones to get formal medical care in the first place.
Everyone else would have had a collection of midwives and old home remedies.
Further, in that specific case there is evidence that living in a cleaner environment tends to make those sorts of illnesses more common. So that could be a recent issue but something you could easily distance yourself from by living like a pig especially as a young child.
True but without a history of such studies all conducted in the same way there's no way to plot a trend line.
If you're just saying "we found this in this year" that's fine. If you try and connect that to some sort of temporal context to imply a trend then it's not.
That's a good question. The right answer is of course 1973 since you were born with it. However, the statistics they're talking about might easily put that on 2010.
The issue with statistics is that you have to be somewhat educated to understand them in the first place. And as evidenced by most journalists reporting on statistics... it seems most people are pretty ignorant on the subject.
Another issue that always makes me nuts on statistics is correlation and causation... they always confuse correlation with causation... its maddening.
Autism isn't a new issue. It's been around for hundreds of thousands of years. It's just it wouldn't be diagnosed before.
How many cases of appendicitis were there 10,000 years ago? Would be rational to look at existing reported cases and conclude that all of this just started in the modern era?
I'm not saying autism isn't a problem. It's just one of many old problems.
My example is obvious. If you don't have to have a discussion in good faith, that's fine. Just know that you're conceding the argument by default.
It's quiet obvious that if regulation is ignored a fine is levied. If that fine is not paid then then possibly a license or further fines will be levied. If those are not paid or complied with things will escalate eventually leading to the forced closing of the company and ceasure of property. If this is resisted then obviously there will be violence.
The above is obvious to you. If you want to be obtuse that is your choice but your obtuse responses are not a rebuttal or a reply to my argument. It's merely obstruction and I have to take that as your intent to leave the discussion without making a counter argument. As such, you concede unless you've realized that being obtuse and officious is not a winning strategy.
You are being obtuse. If the regulations are not followed and subsequent action is ignored then eventually the people or company will be stopped by force. If that is resisted then things will escalate.
At no point will the government simply say "oh, well since you don't want to comply we'll just leave you alone then"... no, the press the point and it goes through a series of escalations.
Finally, they won't claim that they shot people for not following a regulation. What they'll do is say they shot people for resisting arrest or obstructing officers. But all of that results from the non-compliance with the regulation.
You know all this... so If you're not going to discuss this in good faith we're done here. I have no patience for people's silly stupid obvious little games.
Again, that's obtuse.
Just because companies nearly always comply rather then suffer total destruction doesn't mean that they're not being threatened with total destruction.
For example, I could mug people for my whole life... make a career out of it and yet never kill anyone because everyone simply submits. Does that mean I'm not threatening them with violence?
According to you for the threat to be real my victim needs to refuse to comply and I need to execute them.
Play devil's advocate with your argument a little before commenting again please. This fisherprice crap is beneath people that don't spend a good portion of each day eating elmer's glue.
Don't be obtuse.
Come now.
The regulation requires you do X or something happens... right?
So you say that something that happens isn't violence right? Well, what happens if you don't do what they asked and you don't comply with the penalty?
What is the final "or ELSE" on such regulations?
Violence. Men show up and make you pay. Resist them and they'll try and put you in jail. Try to resist that and they'll kill you.
So the basis of your regulation is a death threat. You cannot disobey on pain of death.
True. But I'm not suggesting no regulation. I'm merely saying that if you do it, you have to have proper respect for what you're doing.
For example, if a guy wants to dump toxic waste in a lake people drink from and the result will be thousands of people die... will you be willing to put a gun against his head to make him stop? Yes. Those are circumstances where regulation is appropriate. But any situation where it would be wildly inappropriate to threaten someone's life or livelihood over the matter simply shouldn't enforced in that way.
Now you can have additional layers of regulation for less extreme circumstances but the consequences and nature of the relationship has to be proportionately less hostile. So for example, maybe you make something a quid pro quo? By making it a voluntary exchange of one thing for another you avoid much the stigma. It is important that it truly be voluntary. You can't say "if you want to breath, give me 40 dollars"... that's just mugging someone. If you want this "service" it costs X... and they don't have to buy and ideally you shouldn't monopolize the service. So if it's a vital service but one that you're charging an unreasonable price for a competitor can come in to make a better deal... or if they're a large entity they might just provide that service themselves.
I have no problem with regulation. It's just that it isn't a casual exercise of power. Most of it is backed with violence. Do this or men with guns will come and make you sorry. That is appropriate for life and death regulations where people will DIE or come to great harm if the regulation isn't obeyed. But in any situation where it wouldn't be reasonable to threaten someone with violence such regulations are heavy handed, brutal, immoral, and uncivilized. Part of being civilized means not using a sledge hammer when a gentle pat on the shoulder will do. Many people seem to just like the power. Love of power for it's own sake is savage. It's like the love of sex for it's own sake. We expect such from primitives but more civilized societies realize it is more complicated then that. You don't jam guns in people's faces simply because you think it's funny or cool or you enjoy the power or it's easy.
It eats away at the very fabric of the community by enshrining the absolute power of the state above any interconnected communal responsibility.