The author of the piece I responded to in “A Defense of Body-ownership and Parents” replied to my post, and I’ll be replying to his reply. First, however, I am going to write about a change of mind I had on parents’ and children’s rights before I respond to the post.
I was listening to Stephan Kinsella’s podcast during my morning walk, specifically an episode about children’s rights, and he went on to talk about the relationship between parents and children. He pointed out that when somebody gains rationality it isn’t like an on and off switch; instead, it is a spectrum. When you’re a baby you have some rationality, i.e., you have some reason-using capabilities. As you get older you gain more rationality until you have the rationality of an adult.
For this reason even babies are body-owners, i.e., owners of their body; however, parents are still the temporary trustees of the children. It is akin to a full grown adult that gets knocked out from a wreck. We can assume that they want us to take care of them and save their lives, if necessary. The rescuers become the temporary trustees of the person’s body, but the unconscious person still owns their body. In the particular case of parents and children, the parents have a natural, objective link to the the children that gives them a better claim than anybody to take care of the children.
With that in mind, on to the reply.
This change in my viewpoint resolves every question and point brought up in the reply.* I admit, I was wrong in my original post; however, I adjusted for the mistake. This might seem like an overly simple reply, but I am not sure I could say much more in light of my change of opinion.
It’s always enjoyable to have a back-and-forth between a sensible person and not one that hurls insults or addresses an argument without addressing the content of the argument, so I must thank the author for the reply.
*To be clear, I didn’t read the reply until right before I made this post, hours after I listened to the podcast.
Check out the author’s page The Liturgical Legion. It is a relatively new page, but it is putting out a considerable amount of content.
