[pp.int.general] "Natural" law

[Carlos Ayala Vargas]

Reinier Bakels wrote:
> Perhaps the essence of the human rights argument is that it is not 
> entirely nonsensical to advocate a strong copyright and tough 
> enforcement sacrificing privacy - i.e. objectives 180 degrees contrary 
> to "pirate" objectives, based on human rights. Why not? Respected 
> writers voice such opinions in the professional liteture.
If those respected writers voice such opinions, then those respected 
writers, first of all, are giving twisted interpretations from what 
human rights are -as you say, interpretations 180º contrary to PPI 
goals-; and thus, are not respected by me anymore.
> And there are different human rights sets: the UNDR, the US 
> Constitution, the ECHR, and national constitutions. What provision 
> takes precedence in a particular situation is not straightforward. And 
> perhaps more importantly, there are - apparently - different views on 
> works and authors: compare the American constitution and the UNDR, 
> both respected regulations.
> So I would favour *direct* arguments. If opponents argue with human 
> rights arguments, face them with a "reality check". Examples are very 
> helpful in politics.
When I face twisted human rights /arguments/ -and I use to face them, 
though not usually from /respected/ writers (I have though faced through 
Internet even PSOE MPs like Lourdes Muñoz)-, I usually employ a 
combination of UDHR and Spanish Constitution. The Spanish Constitution's 
article 20.5 -about seizure of publications only allowed to be made 
through legal warrant- is a classic, not only mine; and actually SC's 
article 10 directly refers to UDHR -as well as other treaties signed by 
Spain, though only UDHR is explicitly mentioned- as the light which has 
to be used to interprete SC's Title I.

Of course I don't use only SC & UDHR: LISI law -allowing censorship in 
the Internet without legal warrant in certain cases- parallels quite 
much the Francoist 1966's press law -i.e., new dog but same collar-; 
SGAE's lack of inner democracy parallels the /caciqueism/ phenomenom of 
Spanish XIXth century countryside areas, usually also associated with 
census suffrage -actually it is census suffrage, as only SGAE members 
with highest incomes have right to vote (being able to concentrate up to 
20 rights to vote), what provokes that only a 33 % of members have right 
to vote and only 1 % of members concentrates more than 51 % of rights to 
vote-.

I don't know if you enjoy these examples, there are many more.

The problem is that currently doesn't matter how effective (i.e., 
convincing) are my arguments with the people aware of such clashes, as 
long as there aren't quite much people aware of such clashes -they 
haven't been on prime time TV shows, but on blogs and forums with 
relatively little audience-.
> An example. the Dutch parliament questioned the competence of the EU 
> in the field of criminal measures against intellectual property 
> infringement (IPRED2, for insiders). It engaged some specialised 
> attorneys who wrote a thorough and watertight argument. European 
> Commisioner Frattini decided to fight tjhis firght on his own 
> battlefield, and responded by a tearjerking letter referring to child 
> labour, terrorism and casualties due to fake medicines. Dreadful, but 
> first class typical political rhetoric.
Child labour -used with /authentic/ works by brands which manufacture 
their products in third world countries-, terrorism -not avoided (think 
of 11-M, London and Madrid's T-4 bombings) by measures like data 
retention which, instead, brings us closer to the Big Brother state- and 
casualties due to fake medicines -lower than casualties due to lack of 
medicines (due to defective patent systems)-. Anything else?

Those are nothing but feeble /arguments/ from traditional politicians, 
so easy to counter if and only if given the chance to do it ... simply 
what happens is that there aren't that much chances to do it. Spanish 
Prime Minister is a verified liar -he was able to state one thing and 
the opposite (while denying having said the former) within few minutes- 
and, however, obtained last march even more votes than 4 years ago, how 
can it be? Easy: there are quite few media repeating his lies, thus many 
people is unaware; add people who, while being unaware, thinks "/I 
prefer PSOE rather than PP/" (I prefer none of them, actually; if I 
preferred any of traditional parties I wouldn't have joined PIRATA) 
and/or "/if I vote for PIRATA I'll waste my vote and PP will win/" (the 
classic /un/useful or /crack/tical voting). It is so easy to rule when 
you have mass media on your side ... however, we still must do our work, 
anyway.
> Isn't the conclusion that it would have been better to start with 
> politcal arguments? Human rights arguments are legal by definition, as 
> soon as it comes to any level of detail.
SC's 20.5, specific mentions to UDHR, and such, are pretty effective, at 
least, when used in the Internet; if I ever have the chance to use my 
rhetoric in a TV debate, I'll comment you about the results or even I'll 
pass here a link of videos of such debate.
> Of course, everybody is in favour of human rights. But interpretations 
> differ - even among respected people!
Yes, they differ: there are accurate, inaccurate and even twisted 
interpretations; and finally, there are Franco Frattini's.

 
                                                                        
                Carlos Ayala
                                                                        
                ( Aiarakoa )
 
                                                                Partido 
Pirata National Board's Chairman