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cc-eyebeam - Re: [cc-eyebeam] Quote from MLK Jr.

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Subject: Creative Commons-Eyebeam Forum 2003 November 12-19

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  • From: Joseph Pietro Riolo <riolo AT voicenet.com>
  • To: Creative Commons-Eyebeam Forum 2003 November 12-19 <cc-eyebeam AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Cc:
  • Subject: Re: [cc-eyebeam] Quote from MLK Jr.
  • Date: Sat, 15 Nov 2003 08:52:58 -0500 (EST)



On Fri, 14 Nov 2003, Neeru Paharia <neeru AT creativecommons.org> wrote:
>
> Somewhat of a different topic, but I saw this quote yesterday while
> wandering through the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial (btw, one of the
> greatest places in SF). It's etched in stone underneath a waterfall and
> very powerful. I thought it would be interesting fodder for this list in the
> context of intellectual property, art, and cultural values. Especially in
> the context of the RIAA demanding millions of dollars from twelve year old
> kids for consuming art without paying for the "property."
>
>
> "We must rapidly begin to shift from a thing-oriented society to a
> person-oriented society. When machines and computers, profit motives and
> property rights are considered more important than people, the giant
> triplets of racism, materialism and militarism are incapable of being
> conquered." Martin Luther King Jr.

I am not going into the political implications of the quotation
but we seem to forget that rights, which include property rights,
are a necessity for a democratic society to flourish. The rights
belong to people, not to the government, king, or queen. In fact,
the society in the U.S. is very individualistic. Certainly, this
is not what MLK, Jr. meant.

We have to put the quotation in a proper context. Recall that
MLK, Jr. was a pastor. He was preaching against the seven deadly
sins. It is the misuse of the property rights that he objected
to.

Here is food for your thought: Is it wrong for authors and artists
to exercise property rights in their writings and art? How is this
different from RIAA? Is it possible for authors and artists to
misuse their property rights? Do the authors and artists consider
their property rights more important than users? How does this
reconcile with the above quotation?


Joseph Pietro Riolo
<riolo AT voicenet.com>

Public domain notice: I put all of my expressions in this
post in the public domain.





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