I don't think you want a lot of "Ron Swanson types", by which I infer you mean libertarians, getting involved in child protective services.

Why not?

Well, I personally believe that the logical outcome of libertarian thought as it regards kids is that a parent does not have the right to aggress against his children, but also that the parent should not have a legal obligation to feed, clothe, or educate his children, since such obligations would entail positive acts coerced upon the parent and depriving the parent of his rights. The parent therefore may not murder or mutilate his child, and the law properly outlaws a parent from doing so. But the parent should have the legal right not to feed the child, i.e., to allow it to die.

So that's one reason you wouldn't want a libertarian CPS agent.

Your claim about the logical outcome of libertarian thought is wrong, because it fails to consider a key fact: the child is there because of the parents' choice. They chose to bring the child into the world. Or, if they adopted the child, they chose to do that. And when you make that choice, you accept the obligations that come with it. There is nothing in libertarianism that prevents people from making choices that come with obligations that they must accept. The only thing libertarianism would be against would be forcing people to raise children they did not bring into the world or did not adopt.

There are edge cases, such as a woman becoming pregnant against her will (rape, for example); but those are edge cases and don't change the basic principle.

Good luck finding a libertarian that believes parents shouldn't have to feed their children. I think you've made a straw man argument.

It's a direct quote from Murray Rothbard. So that's one at least.

While Rothbard is of course one of the major figures in libertarianism, he is also notorious for overstating things, and making claims about what "libertarianism" requires that are not endorsed by other prominent libertarians. The claim under discussion here is a case in point.

> It's a direct quote from Murray Rothbard. So that's one at least.

Ugh. That sounds ugly. Which part is the quote?

I assume not the "Well, I personally believe.." part but don't see any quotation marks so hard to tell.

I think they're referring to this from The Ethics of Liberty:

> Applying our theory to parents and children, this means that a parent does not have the right to aggress against his children, but also that the parent should not have a legal obligation to feed, clothe, or educate his children, since such obligations would entail positive acts coerced upon the parent and depriving the parent of his rights. The parent therefore may not murder or mutilate his child, and the law properly outlaws a parent from doing so. But the parent should have the legal right not to feed the child, i.e., to allow it to die. The law, therefore, may not properly compel the parent to feed a child or to keep it alive. (Again, whether or not a parent has a moral rather than a legally enforceable obligation to keep his child alive is a completely separate question.)

It's a pretty extreme view. However, he points out that parents still have a moral obligation to feed their child, and goes on to argue that removing the legal obligation would actually make things better for children. I think his argument is that bad parents who don't want their child would be able to sell their child to a nice family, and anyone who cares so little for their child that they'd let them starve would probably rather just sell the child.

I'm not a libertarian myself, so I don't agree with this. I'm just summarizing.

This is definitely sarcasm. It is sarcasm, yes?