Tuesday, February 26, 2008
Glenn Lucke on illegal downloads:
My own experience in discussing this topic with students, including Christian students? Overwhelmingly they refuse to stop stealing, even when they acknowledge that they have stolen. I engaged literally hundreds of students about this topic at UVa, and after all the discussing, two root reasons would emerge from the students: 1) I can (technology enables me) and 2) I want to.
With a few exceptions, Christian students engaged in the same stealing, and deployed the same anti-Christian reasoning. One student finally became persuaded that it was stealing, so resolved to steal no more, but wouldn't pay for the 1,000+ songs she had already stolen, nor delete them.
Again, with a few exceptions, the only way to make a dent in the Christian students? Tell them of my personal friendship with Caedmons Call, and how Caedmon's band members related to me their perspective about having their hundreds of hours of hard work taken from them for free. Then the students would say, "Oh. Well, I won't download their stuff. I'll buy their stuff."
Meaning, these students were incapable of submitting themselves to abstract principle, but, if they felt some sentiment for a personal connection, then they might adjust their behavior. Effectively, the Ten Commandments only had force in their lives if they had positive sentiment for the person wronged in a violation of the Commandments.
Some reader will write in, as often happens here, and defend this state of affairs.
It happens almost every time we discuss it here, as well. In a post on lawsuits about four years ago, one commenter even suggested, should I ever be published, it'd be okay to buy a copy of my book that was illegally photocopied by someone selling his copies cheaper.
"I can" and "I (might) want to" was in full effect there, and the concerns of the artist (me!) over supporting his family with his work wasn't in play.
I'll admit that I was in that category, too, until ITunes came out. When that happened, I pretty much stopped downloading. Since then, my computer with all my songs on it went the way of the Raptors, so I don't really benefit from my years of "thievery".
I think that musical artists are often seen as overly-compensated and well-off enough to withstand one download. It's also easy to hurt someone you can't see (and who can't see you). [Exhibit B: The blogosphere]