There’s A Right Way, And A Wrong Way...

To Do Things

I’m a BIG supporter of SMALL government.

Unfortunately, there are a bunch of people out there that are quick to utter the words “there aught to be a law restricting blaa, blaa, blaa (pick your topic.)”

I say that they’re WRONG, and that we already have plenty of laws—many of them quite unnecessary. The government has no business involving itself in at least half the things they’re involved in today. Besides, the government is so prone to doing a crappy job—no matter how much cash they confiscate from our wallets to fund their endeavors.

For instance, take this latest brouhaha over some “offensive” T-shirts produced by Abercrombie & Fitch:

With a few words on their T-shirts, Abercrombie & Fitch lets young women send a message: "Who needs a brain when you have these?"

A group of female high school students have a message for A&F: Stop degrading us.

The Allegheny County (Pa.) Girls have started a boycott--or girlcott, as they're calling it--of the retailer. The campaign, conceived three weeks ago during the group's monthly meeting, went national Tuesday morning on NBC's "Today" show.

"We're telling [girls] to think about the fact that they're being degraded," Emma Blackman-Mathis, the 16-year-old co-chair of the group, told RedEye on Tuesday. "We're all going to come together in this one effort to fight this message that we're getting from pop culture."

Abercrombie has become famous for their poor taste in their product lines and advertising, their target market being mainly teenagers. The important thing to remember here is that the teens, and more importantly, their parents, have the opportunity to make a DECISION to not buy the products if they have a problem with them. They don’t need to be protected from the products by the government.

Of course there are idiots running around out there in public that will wear anything, no matter how offensive. There are even bigger idiots wandering around that believe that they have a government guaranteed “right” to not ever be offended.

Protection from “offence” is not written into the constitution…YET.

I’m offended by the appearance of an overweight woman wandering around the grocery store in a flowered spandex body suit. I’m offended by the 300 pound guy with a hairy back wearing a tank top sitting in the adjacent seat on an airplane, but I don’t expect the government to step in next year and remedy these situations.

Unfortunately there is an Indiana state Senator that thinks the government should be involved in this T-Shirt issue:

State Senator Steve Rauschenberger says he plans to introduce a resolution in the state Senate this week, calling on trendy retailer Abercrombie and Fitch to stop selling a line of racy t-shirts.

The Republican, who is a GOP candidate for governor, says the $24.50 t-shirts are "offensive" and "degrading." He says if the Senate resolution doesn't stop Abercrombie from selling its shirts - he'll lead a boycott of the stores.

No Senator Rauschenberger, you’ve got the process backwards in your pointy little graying political head. Busybody politicians like you should step out of the way and let the citizens take care of themselves. You should only step into the process if someone or something threatens our life, our liberty, or our pursuit of happiness.

Protecting our private property rights would be a pretty good idea too.

You Got That, Sir?