01 - Why Do We Have Building Codes?

[Don_P]

http://www.doh.wa.gov/ehp/ts/ww/water_conservation_8-29-07.pdf

[MountainDon]

pages of WA State approved composting toilets....
List of Registered On-site Treatment and Distribution Products

dated Jan/2012 so that doesn't necessarily mean the Sun-Mar series (page 25) were listed a few years ago, but I'd bet they were. They have a big ol' list of assorted manufacturers listed as approved.

"Sun-Mar Composting Toilet
Excel
Centrex 2000 A/F
Centrex 2000 A/F AC/DC
Centrex 3000 A/F
Centrex 3000 A/F AC/DC
Compact
Spacesaver
Sun-Mar Mobile
Excel NE"

If yours is in that list you are legal; how about that. 

[OlJarhead]

pages of WA State approved composting toilets....
List of Registered On-site Treatment and Distribution Products

dated Jan/2012 so that doesn't necessarily mean the Sun-Mar series (page 25) were listed a few years ago, but I'd bet they were. They have a big ol' list of assorted manufacturers listed as approved.

"Sun-Mar Composting Toilet
Excel
Centrex 2000 A/F
Centrex 2000 A/F AC/DC
Centrex 3000 A/F
Centrex 3000 A/F AC/DC
Compact
Spacesaver
Sun-Mar Mobile
Excel NE"

If yours is in that list you are legal; how about that. 

I have no doubt that I'm legal -- never did.  I don't think I've made my point very well and perhaps it's not possible to do either.

I think it best to agree to disagree on the issue.  Both DonP and MD are great guys who I respect specially for their knowledge and willingness to help when it comes to building cabins. 

When it comes to liberty and the power help and wielded by bureaucrats we clearly don't agree and that's ok.  Suffice to say I'm on the side that thinks we've lost a lot of our Liberty and that it's wrong and that we ought to reverse course there for a while.

For example, while MD thinks it's ok for the state to prohibit toothpaste from being in the bathroom of a HOME daycare (as shown in an earlier post -- and not too much of a thread drift Don if you understand what I'm trying to point out about 'codes') I beleive it is none of the states business and that the parents of the children must decide if the home they have taken their children to is safe for them -- after all, do the parents have toothpaste in their bathroom?  Seriously.  Will the provider teach the children NOT to eat the toothpaste?  Will they react properly if the children DO eat the toothpaste?  All things we as parents do when raising our own children and often the reason we take them to a home daycare rather then a big box business day care.

In the end it's about choosing to take responsibility for your own life (and the lives of your children) or asking the state to do it for you.  Those who prefer the state do it are those who want a king (to use the expression of our founders) while those, like me, who think you ought to be responsible for your own life (and security therefore) don't, we instead, want Liberty.  They are not mutually compatible.

[Squirl]

A representative society has the right to protect itself from the risk of harm by bad actors.  It does not have to wait until harm has occurred and resort to criminal prosecution after the fact.

Liberty, in the sense of our founders was freedom to come together and choose the rules of their society with an equalish (without women and minorities) representation.  This was unlike a King who ruled with divine authority and was not beholden to the will of the people.  Don posted a good example, even their ideas of liberty included some of the most minute and mundane laws of what you could do with your own property as long as it was a representative government. 

Just because you don't like a representative society's decisions how to protect itself from the possibility of you doing it harm, doesn't mean it infringes on your liberty.

As far as the enforcement aspect.  Someone is always willing to take away your rights if you are not willing to stand up for them.  This can be said of code officers, game warden, border agent, law enforcement, politicians, judges, etc..  I agree that this possibility should be weighed with the priority to society when we bestow that power, but not that we should never bestow authority to anyone.

[Squirl]

I do love your definition of Freedom Jarhead. 

I would be FREE to enrich uranium on my own property.  Until someone proves my radiation or activities has harmed someone off my property, they can't bother me.
I would be FREE to make as many explosives as I want as long as I am on my own property.
I would be FREE  to build a skyscraper on my property and no one could say anything, unless it fell over on to someone else's property, and only then could they do something about it.
I would be FREE to drill for oil on my property.  Only if it leaks and renders the property of thousands of people around me can I be prosecuted. While I am out the value of my one property, I have damaged or destroyed more than I will ever own.

I hope you take that as the tongue in cheek it was meant to be. My point is society doesn't have to risk the possibility of you contaminating their water before they take action to assure themselves you won't.

[OlJarhead]

I do love your definition of Freedom Jarhead. 

I would be FREE to enrich uranium on my own property.  Until someone proves my radiation or activities has harmed someone off my property, they can't bother me.
I would be FREE to make as many explosives as I want as long as I am on my own property.
I would be FREE  to build a skyscraper on my property and no one could say anything, unless it fell over on to someone else's property, and only then could they do something about it.
I would be FREE to drill for oil on my property.  Only if it leaks and renders the property of thousands of people around me can I be prosecuted. While I am out the value of my one property, I have damaged or destroyed more than I will ever own.

I hope you take that as the tongue in cheek it was meant to be. My point is society doesn't have to risk the possibility of you contaminating their water before they take action to assure themselves you won't.

Extremes are always easy to use in cases like this, tongue and cheek or not, but rarely add any value to the discussion.

For example you could have said that I'd be free to shoot my M14 from my property......oh wait, I AM FREE to do so...interesting isn't it?

Funny that.

Oh and I am free to park a crappy trailer with 2" walls and poor insulation and plumb water into it and then dig a hole to crap in (called an outhouse or privy) and that's perfectly fine?

You see at issue isn't protecting society (that's all bull crap) but rather enforcing rules that YOU choose to enforce for whatever reason YOU (meaning those empowered to do so) have for doing so and then justifying them with nonsense like "safety of others".

it's bullcrap and you know it.

Simply put, if a trailer with 2" walls is fine then so too should 4" walls in a cabin and if a privy is ok then so too should be a composting toilet -- oh wait, it is...or not.

You see the gestapo likes to 'interpret' the rules their own way and it's up to you to go to court and fight them over it .

My hope is that you will all live blissful lives permitting and following codes....oh wait, some of you haven't permitted or followed all codes and yet argue with me on this very subject....funny that.  I call it a double standard.