I spent the rest of my afternoon yesterday thinking about the rhetoric lecture I listened to. The comment about how there is no origin but only beginnings and how theft it is "better" than copying. I got to thinking about what are things in life that are stolen and what are copied.
The first thing that came to mind was music.
Copying: many many many people have copied The Rolling Stones song, You Can't Always Get What You Want. a favorite band of mine, Mark McKinney has in fact copied the song. Now, i'm not real big into The Stones, but I can master Satisfaction on karaoke, had it not been for Mark McKinney copying The Stones song, I wouldn't know the song. Which in turn made me Google the lyrics to find out that the song was in fact originally The Stones, which got me to appreciate the Stones a bit more and listen more to their music. So copying, yes it can be good, but it's a bit cliche and boring to hear two songs sung by different artists. Why? why do you copy anyways? my next example will prove that theft is better than copying.
Theft: There's a song, i do not know the artist, but it's an older song, most baby boomers will know it, called I'll be Watching You.
Our generation will know the PUFFY DADDY song with Faith Evans (yes it's that old when Sean Combs was Puff Daddy), called I'll be Missing You. Puffy Daddy, now know as P.Diddy, stole the song and made it his own. That I found at first a bit irritating when I found out that he had done that, thought it was low of him and unoriginal, thought "oh Puffy can't come up with his own music so he has to steal it from someone else." Now I look back and find it genius. Puff Daddy took a baby boomer popular song and made it popular with generation Y- us. He took something and made it his own, he recreated the past to please the future in a sense. Which in the case of Copying vs. Theft lies the argument that there are no origins only beginnings.
if you haven't read the post before this one, stop now and go read the end of it when i talk about the lecture, origins and beginnings, and theft vs copying.
Now, if you think about it, there is no origin to music, there is only a beginning. Narrow it down, a song. A musician will sit down with his, let say guitar, and filter out some new tabs, chords, sound, whatever you want to call it. But the different chords he uses, well they've been used before. probably in the exact same way, therefore it might be a beginning to him, and to his listeners, but its not the origin. One can argue, well what about when music first came about, wouldn't that be the origin of music? no, because, well for one, what is music? who defines what 'music' is. isn't it just a bunch of noise and sounds put together? yes, exactly, well before there were instruments, there were noises and sounds. Im sure the cavemen would bang some sticks together.. thats music, might not be "good" music, but nonetheless it's sound, its music. then one can argue, what about before the earth was created... well thats a tougher one to answer, and i'd say it somewhat depends on what you believe. Of course everyone knows that there isn't oxygen in space, and it's claimed that to make sound there needs to be oxygen, right. Well if you believe in the Christian God, he's capable to do ANYTHING and i'd like to bet that space wasn't exactly 'quiet' when he made the earth. And if you want to get 'realistic' about it, God SPOKE "let there be light". speaking- using your voice, making noise..... in turn, MUSIC. and if you dont believe in the Christian God, let's take the Big Bang Theory. Bang- thats an onomatopoeia, silly and an onomatopoeia is a sound word... sound=noise=music. right?! With copying and theft in mind, which ever one you chose to like best, it comes from somewhere else. copying is someone else's song, example Mark and The Stones, of theft puffy and the unknown artist. Each of those generation Y songs i will remember until the day I die did not originate themselves they were a beginning to me, but they came from somewhere else. And please dont say that The Stones and the unknown artist were the originators of those songs, because like i said they weren't. the music came from else where as i previously mentioned and the lyrics... the words have been placed in a particular order for a specific reason, but Mick Jagger was not the first person ever to say the words "you cant always get what you want, but if you try some times, youll get what you need" in that specific order.... PROVE IT. it might be logical, but it's certainly not possible.
therefore, after my lame ass argument but a sound one, (pun intended), i stand by Daniel Coffeen is saying that there are no origins, only beginnings.
And because there are no origins, only beginnings things are copied and stolen, copied to make things known, but stolen to make something their own, which is better? what do you think?
i believe i've made my point, i think theft is better than plagiarism. ahh.. thought of a good example in a literary sense... can you think of what im thinking of when it comes to plagiarism vs theft to make it your own... or PARAPHRASING. :) what would your teacher say is better? EXACTLY.
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