There is "protecting them from themselves" and then there is "protecting them from loan sharks who predate on their stupidity".

I don't quite understand the full argument that you are trying to make. You seem to assume that it is more justified to "protect someone from themselves" than to "protect stupid people from loan sharks", and that the situation at hand resembles the latter more than the former.

To me the justifiability of these two imperatives seem to be reversed. But to the extent that "protecting stupid people from loan sharks" is unjustified, we also think that we should "protect weak people from robbers and bandits", and protect people from frauds.

> You seem to assume that it is more justified to "protect someone from themselves" than to "protect stupid people from loan sharks", and that the situation at hand resembles the latter more than the former.

I meant the opposite.

But sadly also a lot of not-stupid people who sometimes need to (or would benefit to) borrow on short notice, and it's better that they're doing that on a credit card with protections and that they can pay off. I've been both: easy credit in my youth ended up with me racking up a lot of silly debt that I had to spend several years living frugally to pay off, but also now that I'm much more financially secure, having some credit cards that work as a very cheap line of credit if I'm having a liquidity crunch is also very useful.

The main issue is forcing that protection down the throat of whomever doesn’t want to be protected. Or in other words, believing that the government knows better than you on how you should live your life.

And yet in some cases there are clear societal benefits that outweigh any hindrances on personal freedom, such as seat belts in vehicles. In any society, individuals must make personal sacrifices in order to be part of that society and to receive the benefits of society as a whole.

It's not that "the government" knows better than you how you should live your life, but it sets the ground rules that we all must adhere to in order to participate in society.

And for better or worse, because our society dictates that we won't simply leave crash victims who weren't wearing a seat belt to die in the median of the highway (whether they want to be left or not) we mandate that everyone wears a seat belt.

The only reason why making seatbelts mandatory makes sense is because a body flying at 50 mph can do a lot of damage.