The deep end of piracy
A shallow view of digital piracy will drown out your spiritual life
Today there are few topics that are as uncomfortable as digital piracy within the Christian communities. Many of us grew up completely oblivious to what pirating is as we copy computer games on our 3.5 diskette from friends. Parents are just as clueless as they held no value for things that appear on those monochrome monitors, who would've guessed personal computing will bring about massive new moral and ethical issues? Issues that will seriously alter the mindset of every generations afterward?
On the surface, digital piracy seems like a trivial issue. Stealing is wrong and downloading digital goods without due payment, with ease I might add, is the same. But as society and culture fancied itself with legal jargon and anti-establishment trends, its true intent became clouded and replaced with words like “sharing” and “freedom of information”. Adding to the crack pot are the failures of clear governance and enforcement within each country which gave what seem to be valid loopholes within the legal system. And let’s be honest, we all want to believe all these movies, songs, and softwares are just begging to be freed, unchained from their slave-masters; the greedy publishers, studios, and governments.
As Christians, if we truly buy into such schemes outright then we are truly lost and failed miserably as the city on a hill; As God’s chosen people who should be reflecting God’s love and justice to the world around us. Unfortunately I believe the problem maybe worst: many of us refuse to look deeper because of what we know is the truth beneath it, instead we are content with the self-centered loopholes the world has conceived.
From Clear to Murky Danger
“You shall not steal.” — Exodus 20:15
So are there loopholes within the Bible?
The commandments God gave us in the Old Testament are not meant to be difficult, it does not require lawyers and scholars to decipher its meanings. It is part of a covenant declaring the Israelite as God’s chosen people and His personal relationship with them. Their obedience was not based on legalism but a response to God’s character and redeeming love. For today’s Christians these commandments still matters and Exodus 20:15 is still relevant.
I am often amazed at God’s wisdom in foreseeing our attempt at loopholes and the clarity He dispenses His commands with so that there are no misinterpretations. There are no ifs nor buts, nothing can be added nor taken away from His words. His intention is obvious, don’t steal; not now, not on a full moon, no exceptions on undiscovered inventions, dead or alive. Most Christians will agree up to this point, you will never encounter a moral debate on the validity of grabbing a bag of Doritos from the corner store and dashing for the door or robbing a bank for that matters. The commandment is clear, unless of course you completely re-categorize an action as not stealing. And some in our society has gone down this path, arguing that digital creations, every 1s and 0s, are not goods at all, but information that should be free for all, because there shouldn’t be any owners. No owners? No victims.
A Sea of Victims
In our information age where huge percentage of our economies are dependent on digital media and content creators, to say that their work deserve no compensations is ignorant, shallow, and unbiblical. Just within the music industry a study has pegged the loss at 70,000 jobs and $2 billions in wages in the US alone. Families are being victimized you can be sure of that. (A personal shout out to the VFX artists in the film industry!)
‘You shall not oppress your neighbor, nor rob him. The wages of a hired man are not to remain with you all night until morning. — Lev. 19:13
“You shall not muzzle the ox while he is threshing. — Deut. 25:4
In estabishing His justice for the people of Israel, God demands fair and prompt compensations for those who work for our benefits. Irregardless of class, vocations, or race, God layed out a clear framework of how His people are to interact with each other economically. To those who made the electronics we used daily or held the mic for your favorite HBO show, God commands that we treat them fairly ( Exodus 20:21 ).
So as Christians, should we not be more senstive of the injustice done to those through piracy? Should we instead be champion of fair trade and compensation for any type of goods, whether they are physical or digital? The irony is that Christians do champion for justice around the globe, but often with double standards. It’s easier, and trendier I might add, to raise awareness for unfair treatments of workers who make our iPhones in China than to campaign against faceless pirates who copy and distribute copyrighted mp3s, movies, and softwares, for free. Forget stopping the pirates, its hard enough to stop ourselves from downloading them.
Deep in Double Standards
The danger of our double standards is often sweep aside by our culture; a culture whose main concern is self-centerness and where laws are meant to be circumvented or broken. Christians however are called to a higher standard and God is frank about having self-serving double standards:
“You shall not have in your bag differing weights, a large and a small. You shall not have in your house differing measures, a large and a small. You shall have a full and just weight; you shall have a full and just measure, that your days may be prolonged in the land which the Lord your God gives you. For everyone who does these things, everyone who acts unjustly is an abomination to the Lord your God. — Deut.25:13-16
God declared those who acts unjustly an abomination. In all honesty I didn’t even know it was that serious until I dig deeper. Even the Israelite didn’t get the hint after the declaration, throughout their history the people obviously were still having trouble understanding God’s heart and instructions. In Isaiah and Jeremiah, the prophets continue to confront the people on their injustice against those who worked for them. Eventhough these people still prays to God and act in piety, Isaiah and Jeremiah spoke out against their sins and explained God ain’t buying it and you all are about to get it if you don’t repent.
“So when you spread out your hands in prayer,
I will hide My eyes from you;
Yes, even though you multiply prayers,
I will not listen.
Your hands are covered with blood.“Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean;
Remove the evil of your deeds from My sight.
Cease to do evil,
Learn to do good;
Seek justice,
Reprove the ruthless,
Defend the orphan,
Plead for the widow.— Isaiah 1:15-17
The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying, “Stand in the gate of the Lord’s house and proclaim there this word and say, ‘Hear the word of the Lord, all you of Judah, who enter by these gates to worship the Lord!’” Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, “Amend your ways and your deeds, and I will let you dwell in this place. Do not trust in deceptive words, saying, ‘This is the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord.’ For if you truly amend your ways and your deeds, if you truly practice justice between a man and his neighbor, if you do not oppress the alien, the orphan, or the widow, and do not shed innocent blood in this place, nor walk after other gods to your own ruin, then I will let you dwell in this place, in the land that I gave to your fathers forever and ever.
“Behold, you are trusting in deceptive words to no avail. Will you steal, murder, and commit adultery and swear falsely, and offer sacrifices to Baal and walk after other gods that you have not known,then come and stand before Me in this house, which is called by My name, and say, ‘We are delivered!’—that you may do all these abominations? Has this house, which is called by My name, become a den of robbers in your sight? Behold, I, even I, have seen it,” declares the Lord.
— Jeremiah 7:1-11
Drowning in Entitlement
Today our excuses to pirate shrink even further as accessibility to media and softwares becomes easier and more affordable. Apple with its iTunes and app store made purchasing media a one click event, same with video-on-demand service like Netflix and other major cable companies’ online offering. Being legit has never been more easier, so what’s the issue? The issue is our warped sense of fairness after years of downloading for free, and entitlement; the cancerous growth that had rooted itself in our mind.
Entitlement only benefit our selves, it’s the self-centered worldview that we have the right to own any goods/services irregardless of any fair treatment of the one that made/served it. And when our entitlement takes charge in our heart, there is no justice nor any love for all those we interact with, only “an abomination to the Lord your God” (Deut.25:16).
Justice, and only justice, you shall pursue, that you may live and possess the land which the Lord your God is giving you. — Deut. 16:20
These are serious consequences, but we also shouldn’t forget the many blessings we lose out on when we fail to dispense justice in our lives. God promise the Israelite that if they pursue justice, they will receive and hold on to the blessings God wants them to have. There is much to gain in reflecting God’s justice in our world; in compensating joyfully to those that brings us laughters and makes our lives easier.
Float or Sink
As disciples and followers of God’s word let us strive to uphold justice in all aspect of our lives, whether it is social justice initatives to copyrighted materials. We shouldn’t have double standards in our lives and we certainly need to be wary of how the world define and redefine its ethics on new media and technologies. God’s words transcends time and culture, and its clarity demands only one thing, obedience. Not because of the law but because obedience to God is the only proper response that reflect our understanding of our sins and the undeserving grace that God has pour out unto us through Jesus Christ.
What then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? May it never be! Do you not know that when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin resulting in death, or of obedience resulting in righteousness? But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed, and having been freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness. — Romans 6:15-18
