Page 181 - 4188

179

8. Why is it appropriate for parents to guide their children’s reading,
television viewing, and exposure to media as they see fit?
9. What do you think about censoring books for kids?
10. Summarize the text.

Text 8

WHY NOT CENSOR?
40
By Robin Hanson
An important kind of regulation is paternalism regarding individual
behavior – we often prohibit or require certain choices, and say this is

because people can make mistakes. The story told is that expert
regulators can carefully consider the mistakes we are likely to make, and
adjust our sets of available choices with an eye to reducing those

mistakes. Paternalistic regulations now limit, for example, the
investments you can make, the food and drugs you can consume, the
professionals you can employ, the cars you can drive, etc.

When considering any particular regulation, officials should
consider hoped-for gains from fewer mistakes on the one hand, and then
on the other hand subtract expected losses from frustrating preferences,

reducing innovation, and enforcement costs. When considering whether
to allow regulation in some area, voters should also consider the
possibility of incompetent, corrupt, or partisan regulatiors.
While public and elite opinion supports many kinds of regulation,

there also appears to be a widely-held consensus against one kind of
regulation: censorship. While we accept some limits on what kids can
hear, and a few limits on extreme adult expressions, the standard view is

that ordinary adults should mostly be allowed to speak and hear
whatevever they want.
Yet the same human flaws that lead us to mistakenly consume
investments, drugs, cars, or professionals can lead us to mistakenly

consume claims, arguments, and opinions. And expert regulators have
an apparently similar potential to help people by identifying and
removing poor choices from their available consumption options. Why

are we so eager to regulate so much individual behavior, yet so reluctant
to endorse censorship?

40
Hanson R. Why Not Censor?/ Robin Hanson. – Available at:
http://www.overcomingbias.com/2011/01/why-not-censor.html.