203 Difference between illegal and immoral

An immoral act is an act that hurts another person in some way. The key concept in defining immorality is consent. All consensual acts should legal. It is not the role of the state to involve themselves in the private consensual acts of individuals (consenting adults). Selling alcohol to a person outside of the prescribed hours is an example. How come it is legal to sell a person a bottle of wine at 13h59, but illegal to do so at 14h01 on a Sunday afternoon?

What is so immoral about allowing a person to allow him/her to fill their own cars with fuel? They hurt no-one in doing so, yet it is illegal. If I own an electric generator, why is it illegal to sell electricity to my neighbour. It is quite legal to help my neighbour out - for free - but not to charge him. Surely this cannot be the law of the land. Yet it is. Why is it illegal to subdivide my farm in the Karroo without ministerial permission. If a person is prepared to work at a rate below the minimum wage or if I cannot afford the minimum rate it would be illegal for us to trade. Since when does the state have the right to prescribe to consenting adults as to hoe to arrange their affairs.

Your drug of choice is marijuana, mine is alcohol - who am I to tell you what to use?

The selling of loose cigarettes is illegal in South Africa. It is one of the best training grounds teaching people that the flaunting of a law is OK. Remove the restriction - it will make South Africans learn the difference between real crimes and victimless crimes.

I am getting the feeling that the only way to live in South Africa is to act in illegal ways.

Do you drive at 65km in a 60km zone? Illegal. Is it immoral - yes if there is a chance of you hurting someone (say past a nursery school where kids run across the road) - no, if you do not hurt someone in the act. This could be tricky do determine culpability, but that is why we have a legal system. Some may say why wait until a child is killed before setting speed limits. The answer to that is that we should learn to behave responsibly at all times and not merely obey arbitrary limits. I may be unsafe driving at 40ks in rainy conditions past the school.

Let us work towards being a moral society, not one governed by rules and regulations that cannot make provision for all the complexities of life.