>So, that's like a parent telling a high schooler not to drink, when they had a fake id and everything in their age...
This argument is so bizarre. If I committed murder in high school should I not be allowed to tell my high schooler not to commit murder? (Yes, that example is a ridiculous extreme but hopefully you get what I'm trying to say.)
You can put the details in to the "America did it, so we can too" argument, but it makes it sound a lot more sinister when you do. Essentially, if America did something bad and got away with it, it can be claimed that doing bad things and getting away with them is therefore a good idea, because look how successful America is and doesn't everybody want to be like them?
>Essentially, if America did something bad and got away with it, it can be claimed that doing bad things and getting away with them is therefore a good idea, because look how successful America is and doesn't everybody want to be like them?
It's rather the "don't deny the ladder you used to get up to people that came there later" argument.
And even more so, don't pretend you're somehow inherently holier than them for not using such a ladder anymore -- now that you're already on the higher level, and fiercely step on the fingers of anybody else trying to climb themselves...
The "holiness" and self-restraint in the matter would have to be judged when you're both starting from the same level.
As to whether copyright infringement is a bad thing, I'm not sure. It sure is an artificial barrier to the "free market", to which many people in favour of, pay lip service to. Especially ridiculous Disney/Sonny Bono flavoured copyright extensions...
If anything, the US good the right thing bad then, and is doing the bad thing now...
I agree with your stance on aspects of copyright specifically as you point out in the Disney vein.
For me it doesn't hold when an individual or small business invents a unique product only to have their product design stolen and sold at knock-off prices removing any chance they have at reinvesting and continuing to produce additional unique products.
The "don't deny the ladder" argument is still a bizarre mindset. There are lots of laws that come into place after a situation where someone has already made lots of money via exploiting the thing that the law now explicitly prevents. Specifically because the now illegal thing was shown to be wrong.
Some obvious extreme examples:
Child labor, legal prior to the 1900s. Should China be putting pre-teens in factories for 16 hours as well without any guilt because "The US did it while it was bootstrapping."?
Slavery, the United States used slave labor in the establishment of it's economy. Should China be allowed to use slavery?
If your counter argument is, "Well those are humanitarian issues violating individual rights where copyright isn't." then you're just attempting to divide what's considered wrong into "more or less morally acceptable shades of your own making" which doesn't have the effect of suddenly making those more morally acceptable things now acceptable within the greater opinion of humanity at large. Simply put, "Yes, there is scale but copyright infringement is still on the 'wrong' side currently within our society."
If you want to argue that copyright infringement is the right thing to do on the grounds that all copyright infringement is inherently good then I'm willing to accept that's your stance.
If your stance is still, it's "OK" for China to engage in copyright infringement (when you think copyright infringement is wrong) just because the United States did it 160 years ago, then you're holding what to me is a viewpoint based on your own bias towards wanting it to be "OK" for China to engage in copyright infringement and your rationalizing why after the fact.
Is there a question that the US profited economically earlier on from it's lax copyright on foreign IP? And that it was part of what bootstrapped its economy?
Or is that just mock outrage, despite the fact that I didn't bring up that specific analogy?
This argument is so bizarre. If I committed murder in high school should I not be allowed to tell my high schooler not to commit murder? (Yes, that example is a ridiculous extreme but hopefully you get what I'm trying to say.)
Simply put, "Two wrongs don't make a right."