including sl the policy favored by brenkert involves the interference of government (it is the government after all that through its legal system enforces sl) indeed a system in which government tax revenues compensated those injured by defective products would very probably involve less or at least less invasive interference than sl this would almost certainly be true for companies who now would have very little to do with such cases and it would probably be true for the injured customers who instead of having to go through a trial would now merely have to fill out government forms
the only other defense of requiring the relevant company to be the equal opportunity restorer suggested in brenkert discussion is the idea that such a requirement is justifiable because the harm was caused by that company(note for example his emphasis at the end of the passage setting out the soccer analogy quoted above,on the fact that harm to the consumer was a causal consequence of the company activities)but this also is plainly inadequate if brenkert is thinking of cause in the relevant normative sense according to which to say that a company caused a harm just is to say that the company is properly held liable for it then of course his argument is straightforwardly question begging whether or not companies are properly held liable in the relevant circumstances is precisely the question at issue but on any standard descriptive interpretation of cause there are many cases where a company product causes a harm and the company plainly should not be held liable includeing the absolute liability cases that brenkert himself rejects suppose for instance that harry refuses to buy or use a ladder because he regards ladders as intrinsically unsafe but that toolsinc produces a ladder with so many brilliant safety features that harry is won over but suppose further that when harry is up on his new super safe ladder he is startled by a loud noise and through no fault of the ladder falls off here harry injury is a causal consequence of toolsinc actions if that company had not made and sold such an enticingly safe product then harry would have been sitting comfortably on his couch rather than falling off the ladder but since the ladder is not defective indeed it is the most profoundly nondefective ladder on the market it would be absurd to hold toolsinc liable for harryinjury
finally brenkert game analogy has two related defects and thus aslo fails as a defense of sl first in the game case there are only two participants