First Amendment

First Amendment

There were several things I found disturbing and frankly quite sad; the patents held on medical research and the Disney label. What makes these artists, companies or research’s anymore special then the ones from the past? Mr. Gillis brings up several really good points on this topic; we have always drawn inspiration from the past, building on someone else’s ideas have been what has made us stronger as a society and how is what we’re doing as artists, companies and researcher’s any different then what has been done?

One of the points I want to talk about is the patent on medical research. This is something I didn’t know and found quite disturbing. I am a cancer survivor, I’m fortunate that I didn’t need any new kinds of treatments. Surgery was what worked for me. What if this hadn’t been what worked? What if like millions of other cancer patients, the answer is in some research that’s patented?  What if another researcher can actually add to a research and come up with a cure or procedure to help these people? This system needs to be overhauled badly to make it easier for important research to continue and advance not only this field of research but others.

My father is a criminal! When I was about eight my parents bought their first home. As a child I was very messy, my room was never clean. So, my dad (he was a cartoonist who was accepted at the Disney College) as a surprise one day drew a three foot Grumpy on my wall pointing a finger with a caption that read, “Clean your room!” Under the law my dad broke the law. I loved my drawing, he even painted it with oil colors which, didn’t make my mom all that happy. Now that my dad has passed away these memories are priceless. In this case like the childcare case in the documentary the drawings were not going to be sold, they were for the enjoyment of children.

One concern I have is with this type of law and the enforcement of this law, it does push people to work outside the law. Which on one hand I’m so proud of these artists for figuring out how to do just that. On the other hand, I’m concerned for some who have amazing ideas that can be piggy backed off other ideas that are patented or have a copyright but, because of some restraint can’t bring their ideas to fruition. What are we telling our young people? To have and use their imagination or genius they have to be outlaws or criminals? To live with the constant threat of prosecution?

As a mother of four and grandmother of seven, I teach that just because you can say something doesn’t mean you should. I don’t think this concept was taught to our President, who, likes to tweet. His latest tweets to Iran and the threats he made were undignified for a president. However, he is entitled to his opinion, my response? I choose to ignore him and use his outbursts as a teaching moment.

WikiLeaks

I have very mixed feelings about WikiLeaks, I like the fact they’ve created a safe place for people to get information out to the public that truly needs to be talked about. The example given on Ted is a perfect example of the elections in Africa. These people needed to know what was going on in their government. I was encouraged by the fact they work so hard at vetting the information they receive. The one area I have real concerns with is the information about our military and their operations. I’m a military brat, my whole family at one time or another has served, I also married a military man. When we talk about these types of leaks, it’s placing my family in jeopardy, I am not okay with that. When an operation is leaked and taken out of context this not only makes our fighting men and women look bad but it gives a very wrong impression of what’s going on. The clip that was shown is a great example of this.

Does our government need more honest transparency? Yes, and I think the internet can and has done just that. With anything one needs to be careful and do the research needed to make sure the source is reliable. Limiting the use of or trying to police the internet is not only fool hardy but wrong. This is the one place people can get their ideas out there for all to see. Just like with anything there are some crackpots out there so we need to be careful and watch what our kids are doing while on the web. Our public officials need to be held accountable for their actions both seen and unseen. One example I can think of is the special counsel Robert Mueller who is investigating the possible coordination between the Kremlin and the Trump campaign. I can’t imagine the pressure this man is under. But, he continues to do his job and hold people accountable for wrong doing.