The Medium is the Message

This blog post is for the lecture on 11/5/18.

I can appreciate Locke’s assertion that ownership of something comes from the mixing of labor. If a person donates their body and time to an object or the betterment of something, then they should in part be rewarded with the benefits from the object. This also prevents people from owning more resources than they can feasibly use. A huge issue with today’s society is that there are people that have too much and people that have nothing, and under Locke’s idea this wouldn’t be a problem. Now the issue in current society is with money and not anything truly tangible without illegally stealing, however I can imagine in the earlier times that land hoarding would be a problem. Locke’s idea would prevent people from taking an entire state that could never, and probably would never, use solely for the right to say they have it.

That being said, I can also appreciate the problem this poses with intellectual rights. In my opinion, speaking something can be considered laboring the earth. Your voice allowed the manifestation of an idea, and thus you should reap the rewards of it. Even books are physically written on paper and are owned by whoever put the words on the page.

Now the passing on to children argument: I like the idea of passing your spoils onto your children, but under Locke’s idea it shouldn’t be passed on. I still think there are some circumstances where a parent’s monetary reward or intellectual property should be passed down, especially since most children suffer or thrive when their parents thrive. For example, in the case of a medical lawsuit where a parent was deformed by a company that now has to pay for the parent’s deformity. These rewards should be passed down to their children because the children lost parts of their parents as well. It’s not intellectual property, but it’s a case where children should reap the spoils of their parents. Plus, most parents work hard so their children don’t have to work as hard and they should be allowed to ease the life of their children if they desire.

I also don’t believe anything you experience is now yours. In the case of music, just because I heard the song does not mean I spent the labor required to own the song. So, I should not be allowed to freely use a song for profit because I heard it or experienced it. Especially since, in this case, I merely enjoyed the hard work put in by another person. Therefore, an experience does not make something freely public domain but the work put in to create the experience. Which is also why I must mention that I ensure to copyright all of these posts. I don’t want another person who merely experienced my writing to be able to claim that it is now theirs. They did not participate in the lecture I attended or that the instructor gave and they did not put their fingers to a keyboard and type it. Their enjoyment, or hatred, of my writing does not give them rights to utilize it for profit. Especially since I’m not getting paid, if I were then maybe we could talk about it.