The only freedom is the freedom you steal, guys. Otherwise it’s only something that you have been allowed to have in the system that you live in. So don’t buy the DVD just to try out the show, borrow your friends’ paperbacks, rip/remix/reuse. 

There are ads in front of films with some gaffer asking you not to pirate the movie. The gaffer has already been paid. Meanwhile, a Chinese immigrant and her son sell pirated DVDs on a blanket in Chinatown, get arrested for it and get released only to re-up on illegal product and get right back out there.

I’d feel bad worse about stealing if was finding anything of true artistic value in the massive pile of shit that is the majority of the things we’re told are blockbusters, trends, memes or “collectable.” 

Just because it’s wrong that I feel like I should have free access to everything doesn’t mean that it’s not the case. If it can be converted to a digital format, it can be given to everyone. 

I live in a more complex world where each theft is of different moral weight. Most of the time I’m stealing from companies, and in the case of technology, I’m stealing from companies who themselves decry the corporate world of patent trolling. 

This has never been about the artist. Bands would rather you hear their music and come to their live shows (an experience that can’t be digitized), residuals exist only after studio accounting decide they do, and the mass male population thinks it’s totally fine to illegally trade and have gigantic downloaded porn collections. If we were really worried about the artists, we’d be more worried about the poor girl who had to sink to Brazzers than JLo getting her residuals from Gigli. 

Go steal something today. And if you liked what you stole, pay for it. 

“People are taking the piss out of you everyday. They butt into your life, take a cheap shot at you and then disappear. They leer at you from tall buildings and make you feel small. They make flippant comments from buses that imply you’re not sexy enough and that all the fun is happening somewhere else. They are on TV making your girlfriend feel inadequate. They have access to the most sophisticated technology the world has ever seen and they bully you with it. They are The Advertisers and they are laughing at you. You, however, are forbidden to touch them. Trademarks, intellectual property rights and copyright law mean advertisers can say what they like wherever they like with total impunity. Fuck that. Any advert in a public space that gives you no choice whether you see it or not is yours. It’s yours to take, re-arrange and re-use. You can do whatever you like with it. Asking for permission is like asking to keep a rock someone just threw at your head. You owe the companies nothing. Less than nothing, you especially don’t owe them any courtesy. They owe you. They have re-arranged the world to put themselves in front of you. They never asked for your permission, don’t even start asking for theirs.”

― Banksy from ‘Brandalism’ in the book ‘Cut It Out’