Between consenting adults

To be honest I don’t see what business this is of the law. It’s not like a guy is in a momentary state of depression and tries to kill himself – he responds to an advert for someone to eat him. That amount of planning suggests he knows full well what he is doing.

Whether or not this is grounds for going to the nut house is another matter but criminal proceedings? I don’t think so.

I think there’s room for a genuine libertarian to just accept the conclusion you’re worried about.

Well, I’m no libertarian, but isn’t the obvious answer that no valid contract was formed, because these two were obviously stark, raving nuts, and therefore not “consenting adults”?

I fully expect libertarians to be able to bite the buttock on this one. Bullet! I mean, bite the bullet.

Kieran: heh. But, seriously, do you really think they won’t? I don’t self-identify as “libertarian” and my instinct is to find this legally acceptable.

I suppose this is really the sort of issue that separates out the social conservatives who are anti-government (and thus, identify as “libertarian”) from those who are truly libertarian. While there’s a lot of the former about, there’s no shortage of the latter, either. I suspect that were the libertarian-esque blogosphere to get ahold of this topic, there would a range of opinions that roughly divide between those whose moral instincts trumps libertarian ideology, and those whose do not.

Our libertarian friends, on the other hand, may find it more difficult to come up with principled objections.

Chris, I see you objecting, but I don’t see you articulating a principle. If you’re going to
make that statement, I think you’re obliged to tell us why, in your view, this falls within the limits of acceptable paternalism while other practices (whatever you prefer: abortion, sodomy, withdrawal of a feeding tube, etc.) do not.

Keith, your comment suggests that you see “libertarian ideology” as independent (and presumably devoid) of moral judgment. Is that meant as a slur, or do you believe that of political ideologies of all stripes?

John Isbell, U.S. law generally permits a person to consent to be battered (else tattoo parlors and professional hockey would not exist), but does not permit a person to consent to be killed (which is why Kevorkian is in jail).

Historically, I believe there was a notion at least in English law that, on some fundamental level, a person’s life belonged to the community. Hence, the land and property of a man who committed suicide were forfeited to the Crown rather than passing to his heirs. Nowadays, I imagine that laws forbidding consent to one’s own murder would be justified on the sort of utilitarian, proof-related grounds that Keith cites. Rea is probably also correct that the law might infer a lack of capacity. Failed suicides often get committed to psych hospitals, after all; the desire for death is clearly perceived in some circumstances as evidence of mental instability. A desire to have a member amputated is a semi-officially recognized fetish (apotemnophila), and I imagine that it could be found to amount to mental illness in some circumstances as well.

As for your specific questions, I’ll leave them as an exercise for the reader. I don’t want to be perceived as offering legal advice to any disaffected self-mutilator who happens to find this site.

Tom: the point, I think, about libertarianism is that it elevates personal liberty above almost all other considerations. Of course libertarians are moral creatures, and of course their morality informs their ideology. But the ideology _specifically_ disdains the privileging of social conformity (which surely must include moral opinion) over individual liberty in regards to law and government.

One of the problems I have had with libertarians in the past is that, in my opinion, where most of them draw the lines are conveniently conventional. Libertarianism, when coherent with its principles, can be a truly radical ideology with a great many disturbing implications. A good number of libertarians avoid those sorts of difficulties (like this one) and thus reveal their ideology as mostly a convenient truss on which to hang their predispositions.

I have the same objection to moral and cultural relativists, as a matter of fact. They, like the libertarians, can be quite absolutist and supportive of government action when such action is in accordance with their moral intuition. In this way, libertarianism and relativism act, for these sorts of people, as nothing more than a useful rhetorical weapon, a counter-argument against policies of which they disagree…but rarely as a critique of policies they support.

I just had a _very_ long and difficult discussion with my closest friend about this issue—he and I typically are in agreement about most things. Not this. In his view, this dead individual was clearly not capable of sanely consenting to his murder. But it’s not so “clear” to me. I think that standard (of presumed insanity) should be set very, very high.

It just seems to me that the _yuck_ factor in this case is high enough that it is distorting people’s judgment.

Leo Strauss once said,

“If everything is relative, then cannibalism is just a matter of taste.”

Why is this a tough case for libertarians? Why would libertarians even want to come up with principled objections? Yes, its disturbing, yes, it violates the yuck factor, but why should any of us care what other people do if they don’t effect our lives in any meaningful way?

The only interesting issue, as I see it, is the one Nicholas mentioned: how does the legal system determine whether or not this act was consensual? It seems likely the paternalists will argue that this act was nonconsensual by definition, because only an insane person would allow himself to be eaten, and an insane person is (supposedly) unable to grant consent.

And of course, by way of reductio creep, this same argument is applied to other areas: suicide, smoking, drinking, fast food; you name it: if it’s fun, sinful, and not entirely safe, the nettling nannies are already trying to ban it.

After all, if these obviously irrational people were as rational and knowledgeable as the paternalists, they would certainly reject such sinful pleasures. In fact, they should be thanking the paternalists for taking such wonderful care of them.

Thank you, paternalists, from the bottom of my heart. Without you, I don’t know how I would keep myself from eating my own penis.

The perpetrator offered this in court yesterday (rough translation mine:)

“I felt completely alone. First my father was gone, then my brother. Later my grandmother died. I had thought that one should be with me, one that would not abandon me. Already as a young boy I dreamed of slaughtering fellow students. It was always about gutting, slitting the stomach, removing the entrails. That’s also how I did it then. … The fact that it is not normal, if someone is willing to be slaughtered, is clear. Or if someone wants to slaughter. But otherwise he was an intelligent man. We drank coffee in the winter garden. … He said ‘cut that thing off already.’ He was wide awake and animated.”

Yikes.

From an Econ and Law perspective, consider what might happen if we do punish acts of consensual cannibalism as murder: instead of going to the trouble of finding willing participans, those who have a strong desire to slaughter and eat humans will be much more likely to kill innocent people against their will.

“Morality has hardly made us better people; but it has certainly enriched our vices.” – John Gray

“The worst thing I ever saw at work? Can’t tell you the name ‘cos I don’t speak German” – from an interview with a member of the Australian Board of Film and Literature Classification (the official Oz censors).

Personally, I reckon what’s been eaten has been eaten and all we can do is savour (sorry) the implications.

Which, I might add, are being well masticated here.

I wish the nanny state would just stay out of the way when I get hungry.

Echoing what others have written above, I don’t see the conundrum for libertarians. If there was mutual consent, what’s the problem? This really seems to be a question of the validity of contract (from a libertarian standpoint anyway). Admittedly, this is not my cup o’tea, but one man’s poison ….

I think the law & econ point of what sort of incentive absolutely banning such behavior would give to potential cannibals to pursue unwilling victims. Presumably such a ban would raise the search costs of finding a willing partner thus making an unwilling one the next best alternative. Of course this also assumes that the cost cannot be set high enough to prevent the cannibal from seeking satiety.

Strangely enough, there actually is common law precedent here in the form of a Queen’s Bench case in 1800’s (IIRC). In brief, a ship was sunk at sea and only three of the crew survived — the captain, one of his mates and a cabin boy. According to the court testimony, the survivors were adrift for quite some time without any food when they finally decided that one of them would have to sacrifice themselves for the good of the other two. The survivors drew lots and, lo and behold, the cabin boy lost. He was devoured and soon thereafter the captain and his mate were rescued. For whatever reason they decided to tell their tale and they were promptly arrested on charges of murder, the grounds being that one cannot consent to the taking of their own life. IIRC the captain and his mate were convicted, but the Queen later commuted their sentences. I can’t remember the name of the case and it’s really eating me ….

“I’m trying to think of something too nasty and stupid even for them…”—Zizka

How about sodomy? I hear that only demented people engage in such activity, and the DSM III agrees. Indeed, some prominent legal theorists point out that sodomy has been intuitively understood as unacceptable throughout human history.

“A basic liberal principle is that no one can sell themselves into slavery or serfdom…”—Zizka

Let’s take a look at those military enlistment papers. Hmm.

I’m pretty sure that your barbs are aimed my way; and I must say that it is interesting to be regarded as a “counter-culturist”. I honestly don’t know if anyone has called me that before.

As I said to my friend yesterday, fifteen years ago I felt that BDSM was clearly the result of psychological maladjustment and I would have been sanguine about illegalizing whole categories of such activity. Today, I’m far less willing to judge for other people their decisions about what is healthy and unhealthy for themselves. I do still care if I’m expected to shoulder the social cost of their decisions, however. Still, this reasoning makes me more concerned about mountain climbers than cannibalist-voluntary-murder-victims.

For me, the essential human faculty is moral choice. To deny (even temporarily) that another human is in possession of that faculty is nearly equivalent to denying them their life itself. I think the standard should be set very high—a well understood biological mechanism, for example.

“Because people in their right minds don’t do such things” is, to me, a _deeply_ insufficient standard as, among many other reasons, it has been shown to be an insufficient standard in the past. I don’t think suicide is prima facie evidence of mental incapacity.

On the other hand, allowing people to take other people’s lives, even when unquestionably voluntary, may have a number of secondary social costs that are not worth bearing. But that reasoning arguably leads to the abolition of some currently allowed activities, none of which typically involve cannibalism.

I am deeply uncomfortable with a moral calculus that finds this activity intensely repugnant and deserving of extreme punishment while women exist for years, terrified, in physically and emotionally abusive relationships without ever having given explicit consent to their mistreatment. And the charges against the abusers are orders of magnitude less serious than what is being discussed here. This comparison isn’t spurious. My point is that I’m looking for a rational deciding principle, and I’m not sailing with only the barometer of my intuition. Leon Kass is full of shit.

Here’s the problem for the libertarians. Libertarianism requires either an assumption of the primacy and independence of the human mind and will, or a lack of interest in the consequences of the lack of that primacy and independence.

Humans, as an extremely social animal, take their cues on normative behavior from their environment. People with emotional, social, and mental issues, anywhere from teen hormones to depression to social anxiety, are at huge risk of being led into destructive and self-defeating behavior if its accepted by their peer group or society. I suppose a libertarian could say that that’s a nonproblem and only the strong-willed and clear of mind are eligible to live healthy lives. I’d call that inanely idealistic and anti-humanistic.

Part of our responsibility as members of society is crafting a social framework that will act as a support to people who need it. I take this as simply axiomatic, and the libertarian denial of this fact is I think an extreme reaction to the historical tendency to use the ‘social fabric’ to justify everything from bigotry to genocide. We need a middle ground, where we acknowledge the utility of enforced societal norms on rational grounds. I would expect that any such bundle of norms would exclude suicide pacts for the physically healthy and cannibalism for the well-fed.

Sidreal:

It seems to me that you’re conflating “libertarian” with “libertine”.

A “libertarian” can hold, as you do, the view that the “responsibility as members of society is crafting a social framework that will act as a support to people who need it,” and at the same time insist that government should not be involved in enforcement. This is an entirely consistent position.

A “libertine,” however, does not believe in social enforcement of norms — live and let live (or die as the case may be).

d., I do acknowledge that I’m bundling up and averaging various beliefs and labeling them as libertarian and I apologize for the oversimplification, but I think my point still stands.

First, I don’t necessarily agree with your distinction. My understanding is that one of the (few) roles of government in libertarian thinking is the enforcement of laws based on agreed-upon societal norms (like the primacy of individual will), as the alternative is might-makes-right. The argument would be which norms deserve to be enforced, but that’s different terrain.

Second, upthread you say ‘If there was mutual consent, what’s the problem?’, which indicates that either you’re a libertine or you do not think that this act qualifies as something to be excluded. Here’s the rub, and it relates to many of the things keith m ellis wrote that resonated with me. He wants a rational deciding principle, and I think it has to be cost. You have to acknowledge the degradation (in terms of personal safety, family safety, quality of life, etc) that occurs when it becomes sufficiently societally normal to engage in certain acts that typical people looking for acceptance or alternatives begin to engage in those acts.

If the cost of preventing acts forcibly (in terms of loss of personal liberty, lack of equivalent alternatives, palpable harm, etc) is less than the cost of permissiveness, then forbid it. At which point you can’t avoid figuring out the calculus to weight these costs, and I don’t know if anyone’s done that satisfactorily yet. My problem with a majority of the libertarianism that I’ve encountered is that it either sets the cost of liberty at 0, which I think is just ignorant, or it concludes that since measuring the cost is so arbitrary and complex that it’s better to pick an absolute and suffer the consequences. Unfortunately, that same argument can be flipped and equally rationally defend repressive environments like Wahabi Islam. . . you just have to pick the other absolute.

I’d much rather try to fight my way around a slippery slope than jump off the mountain.

“To my mind, it’s an assisted-suicide case.”

Keith M. Ellis

I tend to agree. I think that the job of the legal system in a case like this should be to force the killer to prove that the dead person was truly consenting (and was capable of consent.)

It’s shouldn’t be the job of the legal system to force the killer to prove that the dead person had an adequate reason to want to die.

All I have to say is that anyone willing to have their penis cutoff and then eat it with some other freak has got to be one thing, FUCKED UP!
It doesnt take a genius to see that these people are capable of incredibly hideous stuff and if they are willing to advertise that they are wanting to eat human flesh then they will do anything they have too to satisfy their incredibly desturbing desires. Call it what you want but its not only sick its WRONG!
Im sure if this guy would not have gotten what he wanted he would go out to the general public and kill someone to get it. Dahmer is a prime example!

I read the articles in the press about the German cannibal trial. I think it is the ultimate experience anyone could ever invisage. It is something which I have always found erotic. I see nothing wrong for a person to offer themselves for such deeds, who can deny anyone the right to live their lives as they so desire. The very thought that someone would derive pleasure from eating your flesh is quite sensational. I have a sort of desire in that direction. Am I alone in the modern world, when I suggest that I would like to consider being eaten.
Roberta.

It has just struck me. If anyone would like to contact me about exotic meat, please do so. I would love to hear from you.
Roberta

well…
I have only question…
did the victim (so to speak…)
consented to actually be kill,
BEFORE HE WAS ON ANY INFLUENCE FROM ANY SUBSTANCE?(sleep pill, etc…).
if yes…
was he aware of beeing killed in such a way?
I mean; by a knife in the neck?
if yes…
THERE IS NO PROBLEM….
once again, liberty is at stake.
if no to all these question…
KILL THE BASTARD…
He is very dangerous…

Hello,
I read your Web site and it is interesting, my boyfriend and I have followed the German courtcase and we have talked about it a fair bit.
I am inclined to agree with Roberta, when she said that it was up to the individual. I have to confess that my boyfriend and I both think such things are erotic. Sorry if it offends but the thought that someone has desires to eat you is macarbely erotic.
Valerie

Hello,
I read your Web site and it is interesting, my boyfriend and I have followed the German courtcase and we have talked about it a fair bit.
I am inclined to agree with Roberta, when she said that it was up to the individual. I have to confess that my boyfriend and I both think such things are erotic. Sorry if it offends but the thought that someone has desires to eat you is macarbely erotic.
Valerie