The ethics of sunscreen?

Seth Godin recently wrote a provocative post on consumer regulation (using deceptive sunscreen marketing as an example).  His basic thesis was this:

How can consumers look at this example and not believe that the regulation of marketing claims is the only way to insulate consumers from short-term selfish marketers in search of market share, marketers who will shade the truth, even if it kills some customers?

and

Why aren't ethical marketers (of any product) eager to have clear and well-defined regulations, creating a set of honest definitions so that they can actually do what they set out to do--make a difference and make a living at the same time? If you're busy competing against people willing to cut corners, I'd think you'd want the rules to be really aggressive, clear and obvious.

Several observations:  first (and  you should read the whole post) where are the consumers?    In Godin's world there seem to only be the corporations (who are either unethical or driven to unethical behavior) and the presumably ethical state (sigh).   Yet any parent can tell you that they don't evaluate sunscreens primarily by marketing claims but by whether they work - we go to sites we trust, we ask friends, we learn from experience.  If you assume that 315 million Americans are children who are simple and easily deceived, why allow marketing at all?

And if we can't let people choose their sunscreens without serious regulation then how can we let them choose their politicians?  After all what politicians do is potentially far more deadly and expensive than the most avaricious marketer.  And their claims are utterly unregulated.

And if politicians are chosen in such a low, dishonest, fraudulent environment by people incapable of even selecting the right sunscreen without expert help, then why do we believe that the resultant regulations reflect anything but the low, dishonest, fraudulence of the political process? In other words, why should we trust the public marketers to put our interests first any more than the private ones?

Let me offer another example.  My local farmer's market in St. Louis has many organic food providers from both Illinois and Missouri.  The Illinois dairies cannot produce or sell unpasteurized milk.  The Missouri ones can.  Illinois has regulated its market in a way that pleases the supermarkets which cannot manage the distribution of unpasteurized milk.  Missouri, being much more lassiez faire lets people who choose this type of product decide for themselves.  The result:  Walmart sells marginally less milk while small shops and markets sell more and consumers get what they want at their own risk.

Give me competitive markets where truth is fought out over public air waves.  The rise of healthy or organic foods was achieved in the face of lots of marketing puffery without extensive regulation (or regulations on behalf of entrenched competitors that prevented them from competing).  The companies like Whole Foods who have done well in it have succeeded because they earned the reputation as credible external witnesses whose business depends on making sure that the products they sell deliver their promises.  Safeway and Walgreens did the same thing before them.

Jim Buchanan at George Mason won a Nobel for explaining that public and private actors are both self seeking and that favoring one over the other doesn't make problems go away, just makes different problems.  The key in both sectors is competition and free speech so that the true experts - hundreds of millions of consumers and voters - can make their collective judgement using all the available market information.  One tube of sunscreen at a time.