Scenes from a Moral Panic

From Craig Reinarman and Harry G. Levine (1997), The Crack Attack: Politics and Media in the Crack Scare. On September 5, 1989, President Bush, speaking from the presidential desk in the Oval Office, announced his plan for achieving “victory over drugs” in his first major prime-time address to the nation, broadcast on all three national [...]

Private Policing I Find Disturbing

Some residents of New Brighton, Christchurch are sick of the police failing to control crime and have taken to patrolling the streets. I would be all for that were these guys not a bunch of white supremacists. A “white pride” group, Right Wing Resistance (RWR), claims to be patrolling New Brighton streets that “the police and the [...]

Smoking is Gay

This video from The Onion is funny, but not too far from the reality of current campaigns (Hat tip: Balko). Many PSAs aim to stigmatize smokers rather than inform people of health risks of smoking. I’ve always hated New Zealand’s Not Our Future campaign for this reason. They’ve just started running some new ads. The [...]

Moral Monopolies of Church and State

Benito Arruñada has a fascinating post at Organizations and Markets: Moral codes can be produced and enforced through markets or through organizations. In particular, Catholic theology can be interpreted as a paradigm of the organizational production of morality. In contrast, the dominant moral codes are now produced in something resembling more a market. The organizational [...]

Live a Little, You Molly-Coddled Pantywaist

Government-funded social marketing campaigns are very common in New Zealand. We get a whole of TV ads telling us not to drink and drive, smoke, or behave like a munter. Many see this as an effort to educate the public and allow them to make informed choices. I, and other libertarians, might object to coercive [...]

Libertarian Music Friday: Throbbing Gristle Edition

Convincing People, which is about as close as Throbbing Gristle comes to a pop song:

Somebody Think of the Children!

Apparently, one third of American kids think the environmental apocalypse will destroy Earth by the time they grow up, and more than half think our evil, consumerist ways will make the planet a rather unpleasant place to live. I normally think of environmentalism as a feel-good pastime, occasionally resulting in bad policies that make us [...]

More ‘Efficient’ Methods

An example of Skrabanek’s point that when providing information fails to convince, health  promotionists use moral pressure and manipulation: The people in the ads are actors and musicians popular with the kids. Smokers in New Zealand are being forced to pay for advertising aimed at making smoking socially unacceptable.