Being under 18 shouldn't make you a slave

When I was 18 maybe 19 lol no all the way up to about 30. I thought I knew it all, I was the greatest, invincible.... then came baby, my son. I know less now then I thought I did then.

 

Child Abuse is against the law anyway. If they are being abuse they can simply turn their parents in. This is about becoming emancipated because they dont like their parents' rules.

And as I said before, If a teen is allowed to become emancipated simply because they don't want to stay with their parents, without any actual abuse from their parents, they should not be allowed to use any form of welfare. They should have to prove they are self suffientent enough to take care of themselves. They must have a perminant residence, a job, pay their own taxes, and they get no form of government aid, except for WIC, and other welfare designed to help children, if they have a child. That means no food stamps, or any other aid for them themselves, until they are at least 21.

 

​

 

It get's easier when you become a grown up.

 

Too many children are abused in orphanages and "treatment" centers in the USA

http://vodpod.com/watch/13925716-u-...venile-reform-center-florida-white-house-boys

 

There is no "magic number" age where a person suddenly become mentally competent and capable of exercising his rights. In all fairness, it has to be judged on a case-by-case basis.

We don't, after all, say that everyone over age 98 is automatically considered legally senile and incompetent to mange their own affairs. Some may be. Some may not be. So to place them all in that category for that arbitrary reason is age discrimination.

And the same holds true for 17 year olds as it does for 98 year olds.

You don't have to "draw a line in the sand," as everyone likes to insist. You can judge it on a case-by-case basis, just as you do for everyone 18 and over, despite the fact that many adults are mentally incompetent by reasons of mental disability, senility, or derangement. Or more temporarily because of such things as drunkenness or being in a coma.

Yet we somehow manage to have a legal structure that can deal with all those people case-by-case, judging their level of competence and capability to consent to various activities individually and contextually rather than with some arbitrary one-size-fits-all magic number.

 

I agree on the age thing, but ....
.. to access each case individually would be economically non-viable .
.. some generalisations need to be made, same as road speed limits. They are not designed to curb the best drivers, rather they are the speed that is safe for most drivers. Same with driving age limits. My kid grew up on a farm where they were driving around since young, but they have to wait the same as others.

Part of being a mature adult is learning that some things cannot be changed easily, some things we need to JUST LIVE WITH and manage ourselves.

There is a song based on a Biblical passage, "There is a time for .....", this really says it all. Unless there is some possibility of harm, physical or mental, then they have to LEARN to LIVE WITH IT, get on with it, because throughout their lives there will be lots of times they have to JUST GET OVER IT and GET ON WITH IT.

I feel one of the BIGGEST problems these days is that we are NOT willing to GET OVER IT and just get on with getting on.

At 18 a youth cannot have a lot of experience, some have a lot more than others, and even those that have had to learn street smarts, still cannot possibly have all the experience to undertake a lot of life's crises.

This of course does not imply that as they grow older they will be any smarter, but one would hope they do, on that note, keeping them at home into their late twenties only slows their growth. IMO

 

I disagree. You don't need absolute speed limits either. The German autobahns generally don't have them and their accidents are on par with those of other highways. They simply prosecute reckless drivers: those that drive against the flow of traffic, weave, etc.

Likewise, you can judge each case in which there is a question of mental competence individually, through the court system. If there is a legal dispute in which a question of mental competence is germane, it can be judged in the court, just as already happens when it involved anyone from 18 to 118.

Beware any law that has a magic number. For such a law is necessarily arbitrary.

 

No thank you, especially about speed limits. Even with them we get fools driving much faster then their abilities, if we left it to the police to just remove those that were determined to be driving unsafely it may be too late. It may be after a hoon has wiped out some family it would be of little consequence that they were charged with negligent driving.

Speed limits do not stop hoons speeding, but it does reduce the number of them. Then there is the non-hoons who still really do not have any idea of their own capacity.

To let everyone go open slather, to have the police then have to make a subjective decision is fool hardy and would not be cost effective. You want to drive, I have a right to drive, and I have a right to some degree of safety. What you do is out of my hands, so in some cases, I want bigger hands.

 

Then how do you explain that the German autobahns are just as safe as any other highway, in some cases even safer? Wouldn't you prefer the cops focus on going after people actually behaving recklessly instead of focusing on some meaningless number? In some cases, driving too slowly is more dangerous, if it's against the flow of traffic.

Anyway, I'm not going to pursue this line of discussion since it would highjack this thread.

 

There seems to be two directions to this thread.

One is a persons ability to take care of themselves and the age at which this is.

The second seems to be about whether the authorities have the right to determine when that age is, or if it is even the authorities business.

This is then being looked at along the lines of, do we want a nanny state, who is responsible, are we really free.

Freedom is a funny concept and in my opinion, one that we look at from the wrong perspective.

A lot of threads here talk about Freedom of Speech for example, and that is all good.
I believe in freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of sexual choice, etc etc.
I also believe in freedom itself, my freedom as well as yours. I have the RIGHT to walk down a street with my partner and not have sick twisted minds racially vilifying us.

We have the right on a Saturday afternoon, to put our grandchildren into our car and take them to the beach. I have the RIGHT to expect to be able to do so in relative safety without having to dodge or be overtaken by anyone who THINKS he can drive fast, whether or not he IS CAPABLE.

I have a right to know that my taxes are being used to support someone who NEEDS to be supported, like a youth from a damaged home, and I like to know that there is that safety net for them, but .. I do not want to support a youth who wants to move out because he
Doesn't want to empty the dish washer each night.
Doesn't want to go to school
Doesn't want to NOT play the XBOX all night.
Those youths need to GET OVER IT and their parents need to DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT.

Yes you can have your freedoms as long as they do not take away mine.

 

With respect, I think you are both generalising, and being a little judgemental here. I have been 18 for a little over six weeks, and I do consider myself more than somewhat mature. I have also lived in two different societies (three, if you count the amount of time I have spent in Germany) and I have effectively lived away from home since I was six. Street smarts or no, I think I can deal with most of life's crises as well as I would if I were 30. And I do think about a little more than just playing games on the X-Box.

 

The courts do that for people under 18, as well, in many cases.

It's about presumptions, not absolute truths. In a court, you will be presumed competant if you are over the age of consent, and presumed incompetant if you are under it. Different factors will then come into play that might rebut that presumption, for example, a 16-year-old who lives on her own and supports herself.

Pretty much every 3-year-old is incapable of making basic decisions for themselves about life-and-death issues, like for example not walking out in front of traffic. Pretty much every 33 year old is. Somewhere in between there is a number we pick to switch what we "pretty much" know about an age.

It's not perfect; government rarely is, which is why it should be limited. But some rules are necessary even if somewhat arbitrary.

 

A good bit of the autobahn these days does have a speed limit.

 

German autobahns, first, have speed limits in high traffic areas, and the amount is increasing--why? Accidents. Second, they have Germans driving on them. Germans are disciplined in driving. They only go to the left lane to pass, and slow folks are never in the slow lane. In addition, in Germany, driving is considered a privilege, and to get a driver's license takes considerable formal training. You're comparing apples to oranges.

 

This is where you're wrong. A tax is just another word for extortion and is therefore incompatible with the concept of freeedom.

I'm all for you giving your money to people because they tell you to! Hell, you can give 'em half of your income and I still wouldn't care. Just don't try to make me give away my money to people. As soon as that money starts going to violating other peoples rights, you no longer have your own. So give away your money but don't dare fund the violation of other people's rights.

 

Speed limits do not improve highway safety (see here and here). Why should they? 56 mph is no riskier than 55 mph. Dangerous driving is not about speed. Dangerous driving is about moving against the flow of traffic.

 

It's possible to be for a minor to be legally emancipated but only when the court decides it's in the minor's "best interest." That should not be the standard. The standard should be that a person is legally competent whenever a person is mentally competent.

And, again, why have a magic number for presumption of competence? There are millions of mentally disabled 18+ year olds, all of whom should be presumed competent unless it can be proven otherwise in a court of law. So why have a different standard?

It's not as though you'd have to give every person a test to determine it. Rather, these things would only come up at all in legal disputes in a court, in which a person's mental capacity was a relevant issue. They could all have legal presumption of competence unless shown otherwise. It wouldn't be any trick to show that for a 3 year old, unless it's a super-genius 3 year old.

 

Well, the Germans must think differently, as they've added speed limits to the autobahn around most cities.

 

Are you suggesting that just because a law passed, that means it must have been justified?

I'd rather trust what is both logical and empirically in evidence: that dangerous driving lies not in a magic number but in driving against the flow of traffic

 

In congested areas, a speed limit is needed for safety. that is the justification for the speed limits on the autobahn. Having ridden on the Autobahn this summer, the places that had speed limits made sense. To have driven much beyond that speed would involve driving against the flow of traffic.

 

Why?

Of course it would have been because of everyone trying to obey the speed limit. If you're going to claim that the flow of traffic would be around 55 (or whatever it was) anyway, that just means having a rule enforcing it is redundant.

 

Part of the judgment that being emancipated is in the minor's best interests is a determination that they are mentally competent. You're making a distinction without a difference.

Because, to be enforceable and valid, a law needs to be clear, and clearly understood.

Take contracts. Why does the law say any contract with a minor (person less than 18 ) can be annuled at any time by the minor? Why does it not say just any contract with any "incompetent person" (it does also, but somewhere else)? Because there are a lot of minors, and it is unreasonable and unconscionable to make everyone who offers a product or service, say like a cell phone store, run through a "competence test" with every single customer to determine whether they are someone the store can contract with. Instead, we make a bright-line rule at a particular age - anyone under 18 is presumed incompetent and therefore the store can have an easy test - drivers' license or ID - that determines if they can contract with a particular customer.

No, that's exactly what it would do. It would force everyone to consult with a psychologist or other experts before signing a contract with someone. What you're clearly not taking into account is that a person who is incompetent in regards to their ability to contract is also very likely de facto incompetent in their ability to avail themselves of the benefits of a court.

It's absurd. It's not rationally defensible. Laws regarding the ability of minors to contract are as much about drawing an easily determined bright-line rule to protect the businesses as they are about protecting the minor.

 

Excellent post, nice to see an intelligent and reasonable person here

 

no they are not.