Do you believe that in the case of Macaques vs Slater there was an “abuse of the concept of intellectual rights” and the whole selfie case was miles away from the original intention of the legislator? Do you believe that this was an exaggeration and abuse of the copyright act, based on a distortion of the legislator’s intention?”
I do believe it was waste of both time and resources, where PETA who is a charity, used the public funds to emphasize rights over welfare. The case eventually put Slater under debts and almost ruined his career where he lost a significant potential profit that he could have earned from the monkey selfies. Purves (2017) penned a very interesting article with a perfect title “beware the inhumanity of animal charities”. The wildlife photographers are usually in favour of the conservation of wildlife and nature and rarely you would come across someone who is an entrepreneur. I disagree with PETA’s approach towards this case, it used the donations to fight its case to crush Slater just for the sake of promoting rights when its main focus should have been animal welfare, the same funds could have been used sensibly for “welfare” alone. As Purves (2017) pens down its two findings about PETA: firstly PETA is rich and to obtain more funds it uses publicity stunts. Secondly, PETA maintains that it is always right and the one in disagreement are thrown under the bad light. Purves (2017) further states “In this, one finds gloomy parallels with the recent history of our own RSPCA: a charity I once keenly supported but abandoned after a string of bullying cases and its vainglorious decision to waste money on flying a blimp above the 2002 Countryside March. Even in an age of hysterical overstatement, self-righteous rage and curdled indignation there seems to be something unusually toxic about animal causes. Not to mention a bitter willingness to crush fellow humans. I’d call it brutal, except that brutes are less spiteful.”
References:
Purves, L. (2017) Beware the inhumanity of animal charities. Available at: https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/zealous-animal-charities-have-a-human-cost-xpwtxthhv (Accessed: 7 February 2018)
