Analogy Imposing a Law Restricting

¶ … Analogy Imposing a law restricting smoking in personal cars is an infringement of the state on the individual's privacy and an intrusion on his private property. The legislation comes as a continuance of previous legislations aimed at reducing the potential negative effect of smokers on non-smokers.

Several pillars of discussion The relationship child - parent and the right of the state to intervene in it The right of the individual to privacy and to non-regulated actions on his own property The morality of such a law, usually perceived as a persecution of smokers. Counterarguments: the right and necessity of the state to protect its citizens, even by restricting the activity and life of others. Conclusion - this law is too restrictive and brings too many infringements on the individual privacy.

In this sense, it cannot be accepted in this form. This type of legislation is obviously very similar to other legislations that attempts to protect passive smokers by passing laws by which smoking is limited in different public places. However, this takes things one step further, because the ban is not for smoking in a public place, but in a private place, the individual's car.

Further more, this is not a legislative act to protect regular individuals who may happen to be in a public place at some point: this is a legislative act that is aimed directly at the individual's family and at the protection of his children. In my opinion, this type of legislative act is an infringement in the individual's right to privacy and I don't believe that the state has a right to interfere to that degree in the relationship that is formed between the parent and the child.

We will assume here from the very beginning that the parent has the child's best interest at heart. In this sense, it will be his decision to smoke or not to smoke in the car, but, in making that decision, he will consider whether or not this is affecting his child's health or whether this is the proper thing to do. Again, this is not the right methodology by which the state can intervene.

The state will be able to intervene only in the case when the child is taken to the possible, perhaps for regular investigations or for a checkup, and the doctors discover that his health has been affected. In this case, the parent can be accused of irresponsible behavior towards the child and can be sanctioned in this sense. The argumentation here is based on two main pillars.

First of all, we have the pillar of the relationship child - parent and the degree to which legislative acts are allowed to regulate this. On the other hand, we have the pillar of the individual's private space and the degree to which legislative acts can intervene to regulate that. We have already touched on the first, let's take some time to discuss the second, since the analogies here are numerous and important.

In the beginning of the argumentation, we have referred to the legislative acts that regulate smoking in public places. According to these, smoking is banned in restaurants, bars, usually all closed places, including governmental buildings etc. This type of legislative act regulates activity in a public space, so the state intervention can be logically explained through the necessity for the state to create rules in the spaces it has under its jurisdiction, to ensure that those are respected and to ensure that al individuals are protected by these.

However, here we are discussing a private space: the individual's car. Is the state allowed to intervene in this manner and regulate a private space? Let's consider this analogy: in a continuous need to ensure the security of its citizens and to create the appropriate law enforcement measures to limit criminality and decrease its trend, the state is likely to have cameras that will monitor the activity of citizens in public spaces. This will allow for any criminal acts to be noticed and even prevented.

With the same justification, can state propose to install cameras in the individuals' homes and monitor the activity there? Obviously not, and the main argumentation that refutes this is the fact that the individual's home is a private place and, additionally, a place where the individual likes to enjoy his privacy. Continuing with analogies in this area, it would be similar to the state imposing a ban on smoking inside the individual's own home.

If we consider the case of smoking in a car with the child, it isn't so far off in fact. Something like this can lead to a dangerous trend that can encourage the state to increase and continue its involvement in regulating the individual lives.

Can we afford this type of intervention? In my opinion, we cannot and the argumentation against such a legislative act is based, as mentioned, not necessarily only on this particular case that the legislation is attempting to regulate, but also on a bigger perspective, a wider framework, which does not encourage state interference in private individual matters. There is also an ethical perspective we can look into.

No doubt that this constant support towards protecting non-smokers and potential passive smokers is a positive trend that has been going on for the past decade or more. However, we may have the feeling, at some point, that this crusade has already crossed some barriers and that we are almost dealing with a witch hunt against smokers, a concentrated campaign to decrease the sale of cigarettes and simply deter people from smoking.

While this might be an excellent thing for health related issues, it is again the matter of individual choice that we need to refer to. Forcing people into giving up their habit is not the right answer: they will have to realize themselves that smoking is bad for them and for the people around them and the campaigns should rather be targeted in that sense rather in reducing to almost none the places where smoking is still.