# My question for Libertarians - should it be legal to masturbate in public? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 19, 2012, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785 "2012-07-19T22:53:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/41 "2012-07-21T16:36:21Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Okay, I’m sitting in my fortress of solitude and I’m getting a little hungry. I decide to drive to the local pizza place and buy a slice (paying gold naturally). Your land sits between my residence and the pizza place so I walk up to your border and give you a shout. You come over and meet me and we negotiate a fair price for me to travel across your property (and back - I’m not falling for that trick of you letting me leave my property cheaply and then raising the price for me to cross back to my home.) > > So as I’m walking across your land, I happen to see your teenage daughter and her friends sunning themselves in your backyard. Having long since abandoned political correctness as the evil that it is, I whip it out and start masturbating. > > You run up and are quite angry (although your daughter and her friends seem to be into it). You tell me I have to stop and I can’t do that on your property. But I point out that we’ve already reached a mutual agreement that I can be on your land and you didn’t include anything in it that said I couldn’t stop and have a masturbation break during my walk. > > Or if you don’t like this scenario, here’s another. We’ve made our agreement and I’m walking across your property. But when I get halfway across, you point a gun at me and tell me you want a hundred dollars more from me. I protest that we had an agreement. You inform me that our agreement was only for me to walk across your property; we made no agreement for me to breathe your air. Being as I chose to walk across your property without holding my breath, I’m now obligated to reach a new agreement with you for the additional services I took without prior agreement. > > I’m sure you see my point. Is there some objective standard of what’s reasonable or does every possibility have to be negotiated out on a case-by-case basis? Do we really have to spend hours negotiating over the terms of an agreement every time I want to go out for pizza? Okay. You made me laugh my ass off today. Thanks for that story. 🙂 Your overall argument against the purest form of libertarianism wasn’t lost on me, but I would disagree that these details would need to be ironed out in every contract. In our current society, we lease property, allow rights of ways, and other forms of access. It is implied that you have a right to breathe, for example, when you lease a piece of land. It’s also fairly understood that if I allow friends or neighbors to cut across my backyard to walk to another location that it is implicit in our contract that they cannot jerk off to my daughter or any other guests lounging in said back yard. We have centuries of case law determining what is reasonable. In your example, it is clear to any reasonable person that you negotiated access to the pizza place across the back yard. Even though the terms weren’t specified, you can breathe while walking, and you would refrain from spanking it on your traverse. Now, let’s say that as you were walking, you lit up a cigarette and the owner complained. That would be a legitimate point of contention that reasonable people argue about. He didn’t tell you his no smoking policy beforehand, so was it reasonable for you to light up? That would be a good question for the courts. Breathing and masturbation are not. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/42 "2012-07-21T17:04:55Z")
But the key point is that in our society (and pretty much every functional society that’s ever existed) we have community standards over what’s reasonable. And dissenters may grumble about society’s standards but they have to go along with them. You can’t masturbate in public because it upsets other people. But libertarianism, if it means anything at all, rejects this idea. It says individual liberty has priority over what the majority wants. So it doesn’t matter if the majority object to you masturbating; you have the right to reject their views and do what you please. And this just doesn’t work. You can’t have a functional society where every individual has first priority - the math won’t add up. That’s why libertarianism will never exist outside of theory. But every time the rest of us try to point out this problem to libertarians, they just complain we’re being unfair to them. ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/43 "2012-07-21T17:33:10Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > But libertarianism, if it means anything at all, rejects this idea. It says individual liberty has priority over what the majority wants. So it doesn’t matter if the majority object to you masturbating; you have the right to reject their views and do what you please. My understand of libertarianism is that an individual has a right to do what he wants SO LONG AS his freedoms don’t interfere with freedoms of another. Again, there are different flavors of libertarianism, but I don’t think that it is inconsistent with the general tenets of that philosophy to say that a 7 year old girl’s right to be free from watching a 50 year old man masturbating in public is greater than his right to masturbate in public. Now, that same 7 year old’s freedom to not hear criticism of President Obama is NOT outweighed by the same 50 year old man’s right to free speech is criticizing the President. I fully agree that the strict libertarian idea of do whatever in the hell you want is absurd and cannot happen in a society. But I think that the people who advocate that (no disrespect to the OP) have let their general philosophy get in the way of common sense. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/44 "2012-07-21T18:27:36Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > A lot of liber-anarch fictional utopias feature dueling as a way of deciding irreconcilable differences between individuals. If someone offends you so much that you absolutely cannot and will not accept it, then you stake your own life as the potential price of doing something about it. If you’re the one challenged to a duel, then you either agree to it, or be willing to accept the judgment of a neutral arbitrator. The thing about this system is that both people who are arrogant jerkasses and people who are intolerant control freaks tend to not have very long lifespans. > [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Unless they are good at killing, in which case they have free rein to do as they please. Maybe if you’re the quick-draw champion of the West, able to snap off a head shot in a tenth of a second while your opponent is still clearing his holster; but realistically chances are excellent that even a dying opponent can shoot you. And if some Dead-Eye Dick with thirty notches on the grip of his gun goes around bullying people, someone will probably shoot him in the back the first chance they can do it unseen. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/45 "2012-07-21T19:09:15Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > Well, yeah, that! Germs, flies, stench… > > Can we say that a libertarian society has the right to protect itself against stench? Does my really stinky outhouse, or my pig farm, constitute an offense against my neighbor? It does no actual measurable objective harm…but it is grievously unpleasant… Well, there’s also that nasty e coli stuff. That’s not exactly a barrel of laughs. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/46 "2012-07-21T19:14:40Z")
> [@jtgain](#): > > My understand of libertarianism is that an individual has a right to do what he wants SO LONG AS his freedoms don’t interfere with freedoms of another. And this brings us back to the unanswerable question: who decides when one freedom interferes with another freedom? ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/47 "2012-07-21T23:50:48Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > And this brings us back to the unanswerable question: who decides when one freedom interferes with another freedom? The legislature? Courts? But in a society with libertarian ideals these legislators and judges would have an individual’s freedom placed higher on the pole. Things like outlawing drug possession on private property and seat belt laws would never pass muster. If someone thinks that a man’s freedom to masturbate in the middle of Times Square is an inalienable right, he can elect candidates to the legislature or a Governor/President who will appoint justices who will agree with his interpretation of fundamental rights. ---
**Author:** ![coffeecat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/coffeecat/32/3405_2.png) [@coffeecat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coffeecat)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/48 "2012-07-21T23:58:53Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > And this brings us back to the unanswerable question: who decides when one freedom interferes with another freedom? Does libertarianism mean I couldn’t call the cops on someone who’s being a nuisance, say after the third time I ask you to stop jerking off to my daughter? Even in our current sorry, collectivist semi-tyranny we have freedom of speech, yet I can still stop someone from standing under my window and screaming “Asshole!” at 3 AM. Perhaps you could walk through the yard of your other neighbor, the lonesome divorcee. If you masturbate for her, she might even spring for the pizza. ---
**Author:** ![BigAppleBucky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigapplebucky/32/178_2.png) [@BigAppleBucky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigAppleBucky)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2012, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/49 "2012-07-22T00:53:06Z")
> [@Linden\_Arden](#): > > Fine, you are no Libertarian then. I have no issue with your stance. Well, certainly not in the “purest” sense. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2012, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/50 "2012-07-22T01:00:48Z")
Since entire industries are based on the premise that sexual displays are provocative, wouldn’t public masturbation qualify as an act of aggression? ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2012, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/51 "2012-07-22T01:56:38Z")
> [@jtgain](#): > > The legislature? Courts? But in a society with libertarian ideals these legislators and judges would have an individual’s freedom placed higher on the pole. Things like outlawing drug possession on private property and seat belt laws would never pass muster. Then I call bullshit. If libertarian laws are being enacted by legislatures and enforced by courts then libertarian laws are just ordinary laws. Libertarians just call them something different because they want to sound cool. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2012, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/52 "2012-07-22T02:02:30Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Libertarians just call them something different because they want to sound cool. Are you actually insinuating that Libertarians are so stupid they think that the moronic things they say sound cool? That’s really harsh dude. Yes it’s true, but it’s really, really harsh. Couldn’t we just call them ‘special’ instead? ---
**Author:** ![Linden\_Arden](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/53a042/32.png) [@Linden\_Arden](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Linden_Arden)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2012, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/53 "2012-07-22T02:09:07Z")
> [@Nars\_Glinley](#): > > **Linden Arden** , would you please define libertarian in non-masturbatory terms? And when you say masturbating, do you mean fully exposed or being covered up? I don’t think that being a libertarian means that you believe that indecent exposure is impossible. No, I am letting OTHERS define “Libertarian” since I don’t claim to be such. ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2012, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/54 "2012-07-22T02:16:42Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Then I call bullshit. > > If libertarian laws are being enacted by legislatures and enforced by courts then libertarian laws are just ordinary laws. Libertarians just call them something different because they want to sound cool. IANA Libertarian, but I don’t think that “libertarian laws” would be functionally different from conservative, liberal, Democrat, or Republican laws. They would follow the same structure as current law, but with an eye toward individual freedom. I don’t think that they advocate scrapping the Constitution and starting over. Even a law that provided that the government sell the public roads to Acme Corp. would still be done under the current structure. What did you have in mind that would be so radically different that would make them not enforced by courts or enacted by a legislature? ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2012, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/55 "2012-07-22T03:06:46Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Then I call bullshit. > > If libertarian laws are being enacted by legislatures and enforced by courts then libertarian laws are just ordinary laws. Libertarians just call them something different because they want to sound cool. And, otherwise, if libertarian legislatures and libertarian courts never blunder or succumb to corruption or become foolishly emotional, and never pass “bad” laws – then they violate nearly every precept we know of human nature. The whole “divided government” thing seems to be the best solution anyone has ever devised. (Maybe even the only solution.) ---
**Author:** ![humblebumble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5e925/32.png) [@humblebumble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/humblebumble)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2012, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/56 "2012-07-22T03:25:53Z")
If public masturbation was made legal than other acts involving indecent exposure would have to made legal. ---
**Author:** ![furt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/439d5e/32.png) [@furt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furt)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2012, 11:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/57 "2012-07-22T11:06:32Z")
> [@jtgain](#): > > My understand of libertarianism is that an individual has a right to do what he wants SO LONG AS his freedoms don’t interfere with freedoms of another. Exactly so. > [@](#): > > I fully agree that the strict libertarian idea of do whatever in the hell you want is absurd and cannot happen in a society. That’s not a strict “libertarian idea.” It’s a ridiculous and silly idea that nobody real person actually holds. > [@](#): > > IANA Libertarian, but I don’t think that “libertarian laws” would be functionally different from conservative, liberal, Democrat, or Republican laws. They would follow the same structure as current law, but with an eye toward individual freedom. I don’t think that they advocate scrapping the Constitution and starting over. > > Even a law that provided that the government sell the public roads to Acme Corp. would still be done under the current structure. What did you have in mind that would be so radically different that would make them not enforced by courts or enacted by a legislature? Thanks for demonstrating that a person can comprehend even if they don’t agree. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2012, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/58 "2012-07-22T16:24:55Z")
> [@furt](#): > > Exactly so. Exactly what? “An individual has a right to do what he wants SO LONG AS his freedoms don’t interfere with freedoms of another” doesn’t answer the question that’s been asked. It’s just a nice-sounding slogan. Every political system sounds great when you read the bumper sticker version of it. ---
**Author:** ![iamthewalrus\_3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/258eb7/32.png) [@iamthewalrus\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamthewalrus_3)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2012, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/59 "2012-07-23T23:08:56Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > So I should assume I can’t step off my property without a signed agreement in place? How do I get to court to sue the guy who didn’t honor the contract? You don’t need to imagine a libertarian society to answer this. There are already instances of this sort of thing. There is already private property that has no public access and requires crossing over someone else’s property to get to public roads. The way it works is you don’t buy the property in the first place without an easement. Similarly, you wouldn’t buy property in Libertopia without existing contracts that made sure you could get to where you wanted to (and made sure that no one could pull some bullshit like buying a 1-inch strip of land around your property and holding you hostage). ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2012, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785/60 "2012-07-24T01:00:30Z")
How can you “make sure” that nobody buys property that cuts you off from access to your own? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-question-for-libertarians-should-it-be-legal-to-masturbate-in-public/628785.md?page=4)