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THE VENUE: Caffè Nero
It's not quite spring yet so we will continue to meet indoors for the next few weeks.
When we meet indoors, we run the same event in two locations: Caffè Nero and Starbucks, so as to provide capacity for as many people who would like to attend, without overwhelming any one venue. Thus, there will be two events published, and you can choose which one to attend. Please don't sign up for both. This event is for the Nero location.
We meet upstairs at Caffè Nero. An organiser will be present from 10.45. We are not charged for use of the space so it would be good if everyone bought at least one drink.
An attendee limit has been set so as not to overwhelm the venue.
Etiquette
Our discussions are friendly and open. We are a discussion group, not a for-and-against debating society. But it helps if we try to stay on topic. And we should not talk over others, interrupt them, or try to dominate the conversation.
There is often a waiting list for places, so please cancel your attendance as soon as possible if you subsequently find you can't come.
WhatsApp groups
We have two WhatsApp groups. One is to notify events, including extra events such as meeting for a meal or a drink during the week which we don't normally put on the Meetup site. The other is for open discussion of whatever topics occur to people. If you would like to join either or both groups, please send a note of the phone number you would like to use to Richard Baron on: website.audible238@passmail.net. (This is an alias that can be discarded if it attracts spam, hence the odd words.)
THE TOPIC: Are people's vices their own business?
This week's topic has been prepared by Richard.
In 1859, John Stuart Mill published On Liberty, acknowledging in the dedication to his late wife Harriet Taylor Mill that the book was as much her work as his.
A central tenet was his harm principle. If people are adult and of sound mind, you should not restrict their liberty unless their actions would harm other people. If only they would be harmed, you may advise and warn them, but must ultimately accept that they are the best judges of their own interests. And this even applies to vices.
We are not so ready to identify vices as the Victorians were. But some people still regard some conduct as wicked, even when it does not harm anyone else. Here are some possibilities.
Drinking too much alcohol
Smoking
Gambling
Wild extravagance
Pleasure in shocking and offending people
Unusual practices in intimate relationships, even when everybody is a consenting adult and nobody is harmed
In chapter 4, Mill allowed us to speak against vices, and to warn others from associating with people who practised them. But he held back from prohibition. Unnecessary interference in people's lives would know no limits. The Puritans would take away all our pleasures, given the chance.
Prohibition would only be acceptable when someone else was harmed or would probably be harmed, not when harm was merely possible. And if the harm could be separated from the vice, we could deal with it then. For example, if someone's extravagance meant that they could not pay their debts, they could be punished for non-payment, while other extravagant people could be left to carry on.
We can draw on what Mill said about lifestyles in chapter 3 to find another argument against prohibition. We have to let people try different ways of life in order to find the good ones. Indeed, openness to different lifestyles would promote confident individuality, which benefits society. It is not that the practice of vices would have much chance of being a good way of life. Rather, if we interfere with vices, we breach the principle of non-interference more generally.
Mill was however more open to action against vices in two areas.
The first was when someone had already shown the harm to which a vice led them. Someone who had got drunk and turned violent might reasonably be penalised simply for getting drunk again.
The second was when someone promoted a vice in order to make a profit for themselves. Someone who ran a gambling den might be condemned because they were inciting a vice and harming their customers and society. But Mill thought this a borderline case.
So what do we think?
Should we leave people to their vices when only they are harmed?
What probability of harm to others would justify preventing the practice of a vice?
Are some vices addictive? If so, after the first few tries, are people no longer in charge of themselves so that we should save them from themselves?
Should we be concerned that too liberal an attitude to vice will lead to the corruption of society and a loss of moral fibre?
Please come along on Sunday. Confession of your own vices is not required.
