I Didn’t Elect Them!
I’ve been seeing more hate for Americans on the internet than usual over the last few days. As if the average American likes or condones the actions of the MPAA and RIAA and their paid government stooges. Believe me Euro and other places folks, we hate those guys just as much as the rest of you. Some might argue that we vote them into office. There’s huge flaws in that assumption.
We only get to choose from a few politicians, and they’re usually awful choices. It’s like being asked to choose between having your right eye poked out or your left. There simply is no good choice available. On top of that, these people usually got to be in the position of being able to get elected by taking “campaign donations”, which are to be blunt are nothing more than bribes. TV commercials are expensive, and political careers don’t last forever, so they need funds to be afford to run their campaigns and golden parachute jobs (like Dodd with the MPAA) for when they leave office.
The will of the people means nothing to the politicians. In fact, the politicians themselves seem to make little difference, they’re just empty suits. It doesn’t matter who gets elected, they’re going to act in the way their corporate sponsors tell them to. Long gone is the illusion that politicians are supposed to be civil servants working for the public. In fact, over the last few years they’ve gotten to be more and more blatant about it, they’re not even bothering with the pretense anymore.
The conspiracy theorist in me can almost believe that voting is a complete sham. That the rich just choose figureheads and keep the battling back and forth in the media between the two political parties going as a distraction. There certainly have been more than a few stories about voter fraud, with dead people mysteriously having cast ballots and things like that.
Combine these factors with an ill informed public that is so polarized against each other politically, and we wind up with things in the US just turning into another 3rd world banana republic.
Personally, I legally own* hundreds, maybe even thousands of DVDs, Blu-rays, CDs, etc. So, all along I’ve been willingly funding the scumbags that are out to take away my freedoms. The thought of that disgusts me. I don’t feel bad about my financial support of video games, since most of those companies weren’t pro-SOPA. As far as movies go, I generally find myself buying old movies lately. Hollywood churns out maybe two or three decent movies a year now. (The most recently released movie in my collection is STAR TREK, which came out in 2009. So basically, there hasn’t been anything put out since that where I’ve considered splashing out the money to own it.) So between just naturally having less and less product that appeals to me and their general assholery, I don’t see the MPAA getting much funding from me in the future.
* Or… do I actually “own” them? In the 21st century the copyright cartel seems to believe that I simply have a license to temporarily use these items that I’ve purchased.
I’m sure there will be some people with that, “If ya don’t love America, then get out.” attitude. Between this censorship stuff and the online poker shutdown from April, as well as just how terrible things in general have become here, I’d love to. I just can’t afford it.
Some essential reading from the last few days…
White House Petitioned to Investigate MPAA Bribery
Chinese Lessons For SOPA/PIPA: The Great Firewall Of China Was Once A Way To Stop Infringement Too
Major Media Owning SOPA/PIPA Supporters Whine That They Had No Way To Have Their Message Heard
The Pirate Bay says they are like early Hollywood pirates
