Piracy

Is the issue of borrowing software one of ethics? What should be the Christian stance on "borrowing"?

The issue of 'borrowing' software is one based on ethics and morals. I would say that even those that consider themselves law-abiding citizens do piracy. It is something that happens so often, I would say, most do not even think about it. Say you are working at the office and are using a program that has been installed already on the computer. Well, you are not using the program thinking, "I wonder if the company bought the license to use this or if they just copied the program from computer to computer."

It makes sense tome why people are participating in piracy. When you are a student and you need a program to do one simple project, why would you want to go buy the entire program for a few hundred dollars when you can 'borrow' it from someone and use it for the one project you need it for? But...this is unethical. If a parents copies a program from a friend or co-worker they do not tell their kids, "It is okay, I just copied it from John, he said he did not mind, no one will know." What it seems to be is an unuttered undertaking of an immoral or unethical practice and a fraudulent lesson that is being taught to children as an alright thing to do.

In the Ten Commandments we are commanded not to steal. A Christian that wants to stay true to how a genuinely true Christian should live his life, should not pirate. This hardly seems realistic in today's society. It is usually software that is expensive and people can not afford in any case. When it is not affordable, you do not think twice about copying it from a friend. I think you do not think twice about it because it is so widely accepted. I think truly borrowing a program is okay. Like I stated earlier, if I needed to manipulate a photo in my Art class for a project, it is very likely I would not go buy a five hundred dollar Photoshop program to manipulate one photo for one project.

I think it is often thought that Christians are held to and should be abiding by higher morals than non-Christians. Christian teens do not hold higher morals when it comes to piracy. It is something common among teens because of a money issue. Teens often do not have a lot of money, piracy is free--unless you are caught. To me, this means that parents, spiritual leaders and others who influence the young Christian should take more time instilling basic Christian morals and values..."Thou shalt not steal".

Before coming to class I did some research:

"With regard to attitudes:

* The study shows that born again Christian teens are not much different than are non-born again teens in terms of holding an anti-piracy moral position. Just 10% of Christian teens believe that copying CDs for friends and unauthorized music downloading