You have walked through the gallery of the absurd: the 32‑year‑old “youth,” the immigrant leader labelled vulnerable, the fit grandparent treated as frail. Each case is already ridiculous. But there is a further stage – a level where the nanny state’s own logic becomes so unmoored from reality that it no longer even pretends to be about protection. This is when the absurd overshoots.
Overshoot is not merely a regulation that is slightly too broad. It is a rule that actively produces the harm it claims to prevent, or that applies to situations where the very concept of “harm” has been stretched to meaninglessness. Overshoot is the nanny state eating its own tail.
1. The Mandatory Training That No One Needs
A freelance graphic designer is required to complete a “digital safety” course before she can renew her business licence. The course covers topics such as “not sharing your password with strangers” and “avoiding phishing emails.” She has been a designer for fifteen years. She taught similar courses at a community college. She asks for an exemption. Denied. She spends four hours clicking through slides that insult her intelligence. The certificate costs €120.
The course was created because one person, once, lost money to a scam. The response was not to prosecute the scammer but to mandate training for an entire profession. The overshoot is not the cost or the time; it is the assumption that adults with proven competence need to be taught not to share their passwords.
2. The Risk Assessment That Finds Risk Everywhere
A local council introduces a “community safety” questionnaire for any public event. A neighbourhood street party – a potluck with thirty neighbours – must fill out twelve pages. Questions include: “What is your plan for preventing radicalisation?” “How will you ensure gender‑neutral access to portable toilets?” “Have you conducted a threat assessment for fireworks?” (There are no fireworks.)
The organisers abandon the event. The council notes a “lack of community engagement” and introduces a “community cohesion” programme to fix it. The overshoot has destroyed the very thing it was supposed to protect.
3. The Safeguarding Call About a 45‑Year‑Old
A man in his mid‑forties attends a therapy session for mild anxiety. The therapist, following “safeguarding” protocols, notes that the man has a teenage daughter. The system automatically flags him as a potential risk. A social worker calls him to ask if he has ever “had inappropriate thoughts” about children. He is horrified. He has never had such thoughts. But the system’s algorithm does not care; it is triggered by the combination of “adult male” and “contact with minor.”
He is not accused. He is simply “monitored.” The file stays open for three years. He cannot volunteer at his daughter’s school without a background check every six months. The overshoot has created a permanent suspicion where none existed.
4. The “Inclusive” Policy That Excludes Everyone
A university introduces a “low‑sensory” graduation ceremony for students with anxiety. The ceremony has no music, no cheering, no clapping, and no walking across the stage – students receive their degrees by post. The event is offered as an alternative, not a replacement. But then the main ceremony is cancelled due to “budget constraints” – and the low‑sensory version becomes the only option. Graduates sit in silence, receive envelopes, and leave. No families, no photographs, no celebration.
The overshoot: an accommodation designed for a tiny minority becomes the universal standard, erasing the needs of the majority. The system is not malicious; it is simply optimised for risk avoidance, not for human flourishing.
5. The Child Protection Visit That Removes a Child from Loving Parents
A toddler falls off a swing and gets a bruise on her arm. A teacher photographs the bruise and, following mandatory reporting laws, files a report. Social services visit the home. The parents are loving, stable, and financially secure. The social worker notes that the family has a dog. The dog is large. The social worker asks if the dog has ever been aggressive. The parents say no. The social worker writes: “Potential risk from large animal.”
The case stays open for six months. The parents are required to take a parenting class. The toddler is not removed, but the parents live in fear that a second report – another bruise, a comment from a neighbour – could escalate. The overshoot has turned normal childhood into a liability.
6. The Mental Health Screening That Pathologises Normal Grief
A woman loses her husband to cancer. She is sad. She takes three weeks off work. Her employer, following “wellness” protocols, refers her to an occupational health psychologist. The psychologist diagnoses “adjustment disorder” – a condition that essentially means “she is grieving.” The diagnosis is entered into a national health registry. Years later, when she applies for a life insurance policy, she is asked: “Have you ever been diagnosed with a mental disorder?” She says yes. Her premium doubles.
The overshoot: a normal, temporary human emotion has been medicalised, recorded, and weaponised by a system that cannot distinguish between illness and life.
7. The Bureaucratic Absurdity That Protects No One
A government department creates a new “vulnerable persons” register. To be on the register, you must have three professional assessments – a social worker, a psychologist, and a doctor – all confirming that you are “at risk.” To get off the register, you need the same three professionals to agree that you are no longer at risk. The assessments cost thousands of euros. No one can afford to get on or off. The register remains empty. The department celebrates its “groundbreaking protection framework” at a conference. The overshoot has produced a perfect, useless monument to itself.
Why Overshoot Is Inevitable
The nanny state expands because gatekeepers are rewarded for identifying risks, not for solving them. Each new panic adds a new rule. Rules are never removed. Over time, the accumulation creates a system that is simultaneously overbearing and ineffective. It protects no one from the real dangers – loneliness, poverty, abuse – while creating endless barriers for the competent.
Overshoot is the point where the system’s own absurdity becomes visible to everyone. Yet the gatekeepers cannot stop, because stopping would require admitting that the system is broken. So they accelerate. The overshoot becomes an overshoot of the overshoot. The absurd becomes the new normal.
The Quiet Response
You cannot fix the nanny state from within. The incentives are too misaligned. But you can opt out wherever possible. Use private contracts instead of state licences. Choose unregulated alternatives. Form mutual aid networks that do not require permission. Document your own competence, and ignore the system’s labels when they do not apply.
The gatekeepers will call you reckless. That is their script. But the history of progress is the history of people who ignored the nanny state and built something better anyway. The overshoot will not stop until the system collapses under its own weight. Until then, live your life as if the absurdity were not there – because, for you, it does not have to be.