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by Fargren 922 days ago
I'm probably misreading your argument, because it seems inconsistent to me. You are saying that piracy is immoral because it causes harm; and that it causes harm because in some cases the downloaded would have purchased the downloaded media if not for piracy.

I'm very confident that in the majority of cases, people who download stuff would not have bought it at any price that the publisher would accept, if piracy wasn't an option. Which means that by the definition of harm I think you are using, the majority of cases would not be immoral. It seems to me the immoral cases would be the exception.

I guess it makes more sense if you also say that consuming something without paying for it is immoral even if you would never have paid to consume it. I find it hard to agree with that though, as I don't see who's harmed.

1 comments

I think your confidence is not only unfounded, but awfully convenient for someone who stands to benefit from the acceptability of piracy to consider.

Besides, "harm" here is not the core of my argument. Doing moral wrong is. It is wrong to lie to obtain something, and it is wrong to benefit from ill gotten gains.

These acts are wrong themselves, regardless of whether or not they cause pain directly. This is not a hedonist argument, the cause of pain through harm in all or even many cases is not necessary for the act to be wrong.

That's awfully convenient. "I can't be wrong because people that disagree with me just want to pirate stuff, so they're biased."

I suppose I could say everyone that disapproves of piracy is just a copyright lawyer

I didn't say I can't be wrong, I would say I'm not wrong. Big difference.

Also I didn't say I'm not wrong in the comment you replied to. So what are are you talking about?

Clearly a lot more people think you are wrong than think you're right. Multiple orders of magnitude difference.

But keep on denying reality, as it's working out so well for you... :)

It's also wrong to judge others when you know nothing about context.
Good thing that's not what's happening!