[aianus]

I was born in a country where declaring people insane and involuntarily committing them to mental hospitals was standard operating procedure for the secret police to shut up dissidents.

I think America has the right idea here, frankly. You should not be imprisoned by the state unless you are openly convicted of a crime.

[M_Grey]

The evidence seems to suggest that the people the state wants out of general circulation fare no better when they're tossed in prison or otherwise hounded/destroyed.

You also require doctors acting as criminals, with weak oversight to make your fears come true, in addition to a criminal government. If a government goes really wrong, and wants you out of the way, they'll get their way. Jean Seberg for example, didn't need to be locked up to be destroyed. We didn't need to lock people in hospitals to ruin their lives, we just used a blacklist.

You shouldn't be so frightened by your personal history that you lose sight of the fact that the root cause is a government out of control, not the means they use.

[aminok]

Then America should stop throwing people in prison for refusing to hand over a share of the currency they receive in private trade to pay for the goods and services the homeless receive from government organizations.

You can't impose authoritarianism to force productive people to support the poor, and then act sanctimonious about committing the mentally ill and drug addicted who contribute nothing to the economy.

[vertex-four]

This literally only makes sense if money/the economy is the only thing you care about.

[aminok]

Refraining from throwing people who have not violated anyone's rights in prison makes sense if you care about human rights.

You seem to throw all concern for human rights out the window when the object is to take someone's money from them.

[vertex-four]

Or... y'know... I care about people as a whole more than I care about a rich minority's desire to become a bit richer.

[aminok]

The interests of 'people as a whole' can be used to justify both (compulsory treatment leads to less drug abuse and fewer homeless, compulsory income redistribution leads to more funding for the homeless, respectively), so really what you're saying is that it's okay to throw rich people in prison, but not poor people.

That's what your 'value system' comes down to. Knee-jerk judgments on moral value and rights based on whether a person is successful.

[vertex-four]

It's very easy to pay taxes. People do it all the time, and it's pretty well documented how to do it. Worst case scenario, you miss something and pay a bit more than you might otherwise have to. I don't know of anyone who's paid taxes properly and been thrown in prison for paying taxes. Hell, if you look like you might be trying to make an honest effort to pay taxes and got it wrong, you can pay them after someone catches you!

It's not very easy not to have a mental illness. It's not something you choose to do. See the difference? One is putting you in prison for something you very easily could've avoided - the other is putting you in prison (because that's what compulsory treatment really is) for being a human being.