Dead writers and socially acceptable crime. A Christian struggling with copyright.

The Bible was not written recently. Well, if we measure time from the beginning, it was written quite recently, but measuring it in human historical terms, it was not written very recently at all. Occasionally, I struggle with something which would likely be made far clearer if the Bible was written after the invention of the internet.

For instance, the book of Romans has come up a lot recently (and I am measuring time as a person, not from the start, so recently means the last year or so.) It has come up as part of multiple discussions about whether Christian’s have to follow all laws or not. Specifically, in my conversations, the topic of piracy has come up. Not high sea piracy, but the more modern ‘media’ kind. You know… movies, TV, music, books and all that jazz.

Let’s preface this with some scripture.

Rom 13:1 -  Let every soul be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and the authorities that exist are appointed by God.

Which is Bible talk for “don’t break the law, you moron!” The commonly accepted wisdom here is that we obey the laws of the land, except where the laws contradict Scripture, then we follow the higher authority, which is God’s word.

I don’t actually believe for a moment that anyone can read that, then shrug and rob a bank. Christians, especially nerdy ones, however, do rationalise this point in a microcosm, in a way which allows them to sail the digital high sea’s and virtually plunder all the episodes of “Friend’s” they want.

There are some commonly used attitudes and arguments around this, such as the old ‘piracy is not theft’ argument. I think many of them are a psychological coping mechanisms rather than obedience to God. Specifically, there are two of these copes which I have struggled with, I will now unpack them.

The media I want is not available to purchase.

Okay, this really is one of the things which I find the most challenging. For example, there is this show called ‘Galavant’ which is a pretty rubbish musical adventure that ran for two seasons back in 2015. I adore it.

I checked and it’s literally not available. I can’t buy it, I can’t rent it, and I can’t stream it. Outside of piracy, there is no way to watch it online.

If I want to watch it and I can’t buy it, am I stealing if I download it? Remember, I cannot give anyone any amount of money to watch this show via the internet.

That’s not the conversation, though, is it. It? The question is, am I following God’s will by ignoring the law of the land?

Oh, and if you are interested, you can get a DVD from a region I can’t play back, on eBay, for £114 at the time of writing… for two DVDs. Also, I don’t have a DVD player.

I could get a pirate copy for free in three minutes. And, I don’t need a DVD player to watch an MKV file.

What about dead authors?

A lot of the authors I read are dead. It feels strange to have to pay for a book by a dead guy who will not get any money for it. But, the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 doesn’t make an exception for this. Legally, you should pay, dead or alive. Doesn’t matter. Feels odd, but until a book drops into the Public Domain, you can’t have it for free. To be honest, though, I have noticed that the comparatively low cost of books (in print and digitally) that no one seems to argue for this. Maybe it is about cost after all.

There is also the argument that if you purchased something from the Kindle store and want it on your Kobo, you should be allowed to rip and transfer it. You are not. This is still illegal… I think… perhaps I should check that one, now I think about it.

I was going to imagine a hypothetical scenario here where I asked about someone who could not afford a Bible but could pirate one. Would that be wrong? — well, you see, the reason I didn’t waste very many words here is because you can install a Bible app, for free, on any device that you would have read that illegal download on… I mean, if someone has a phone for piracy, they have a phone for a Bible app. I think the scenario of someone who literally only has a Kindle would be pushing the bounds of believability, which is not useful for a thoughtful hypothetical.

The top result for ‘read bible for free’ on Google lands you here: https://www.bible.com/bible/111/JHN.1.NIV - And, the BSB version is free to download directly as PDF.

God’s rules

How sure are we that God cares about this? Well, we’re not really sure at all. When God said obey your leaders did He also want to add, ‘including all copyright laws what are fluid, regional and ultimately temporary.’

The reality here, I think, is the spirit of the words, not the legalistic loopholing of them. I think God wants us to obey the law because we are less likely to get in a pickle if we are good citizens. I think while God isn’t likely concerned about Mickey Mouse’s cut of the profits, He does care about how it looks when Christians are ignoring laws that they, and secular people, are expected to follow. Do you want to see a Christian in trouble for downloading ‘The Big Bang Theory’ when they could be spending their time learning, reading, praying and spreading the Gospel?

As Christians, we should be examples to the world. We should strive to be better every day and, sadly, that means we should buy that copy of Zootopia, and when a friend asks, we can say we are living the principles of the Bible which we hold so dear. Let us not be hypocrites when we know we should drive for better, especially over something so vapid.

If we break the law, it should be for living in a Christ like way and standing up for that. Not for downloading things we shouldn’t.

This topic is in no way to be taken as an admission of piracy on my part. It is a theological, and philosophical musing, not a recounting of my guilt.