After we had posted our response to their initial demands in this previous article, Defensores Fidei sent the following email.
Sir,
While the forum was open to the public, the event and consequently any lectures or material therein are our sole property. While we did not give due warning to anyone recording the event, we did not authorize any of them to be posted publicly either. The right to deny this permission lies solely at our discretion and not yours. Your organization was not given any permission to post them in your website. It is unfortunate that you would prefer to elevate this into a legal matter rather than accede to our demand. As such, I am writing you once again to ask you to consider your position.
Sincerely,
Ricardo Boncan
Secretary”
What follows is our official response.
Dear Sir,
After careful consideration of your demands to take down videos and transcripts from the “Women Speak: Medical and Legal Truths about the RH Bill” symposium held last 30 April 2011, we must, once again, respectfully refuse. We have consulted our legal team at length about this matter and we believe that the information we had posted on our website, with the proper attribution to its source, does not constitute copyright infringement.
Like you, we only seek to spread the “truths” about the RH bill — all versions of it and to make them available to everyone, so that they will have the tools necessary to make an independent and informed choice. We believe that this freedom of information is essential for our democracy, especially for our country, famed for the People Power Revolution that successfully overthrew the repressive Marcos regime. This freedom of information should apply to any issue of public concern, whether it be social, political, or economic, and is a necessary ingredient in our continuous quest to become a politically mature and informed citizenry.
Once again, for the reasons stated above, we cannot take down the transcripts and videos that your organization had publicly shared during the symposium, for the sake of providing said information openly and freely to the public, like you had intended.
Sincerely,
Red Tani
President, Filipino FreethinkersKenneth Keng
RH Advocacy Director, Filipino Freethinkersand
The Editorial Staff of filipino-freethinkers-22d5b3.ingress-earth.easywp.com
ibinalik na ba ang martial law nang di ko napansin? o di kaya sinakop na naman ang Pilipinas ng dayuhang bansa (aka. the Vatican) ?
tsk tsk, ang tindi ng censorship
It's what the 'Secretary' demands now, the 'Boss' might be too busy to address FF. If it were me, I'd be insulted. o.0
"The right to deny this permission lies solely at our discretion and not yours."
Be that as it may, that right was not "expressly reserved" during the forum, the only time when it was obliged of you to do so. Assuming otherwise would lay dangerous legal precedents that would allow anyone who has ever made his/her work publicly available to sue by belatedly denying the permission to distribute such works.
Let them sue you, FF. They know they won't win.
I guess the Defensores guys conveniently ignored all the legal citation on copyright issues the other readers kindly provided. No surprise there, if you had the unfortunate experience to debate these guys in a theo-philosophical argument, they'll likewise ignore all the facts as well.
Its good that the editors reminded us what the Filipino people had to fight for during the People Power revolution. Freedom of the Press is a necessary component of any democracy and that includes the freedom to criticize propaganda like this in a rational manner.
The Philippines is not yet a theocratic dictatorship yet, Mr. Defensores Fidei. Until then… you are free to spout your lies… and we are free to correct them.
They're supposed to be a think tank of their faith. Why are they still insisting on the (nonexistent) copyright issue when it's been explained in the previous article that FF's use of the material falls under the fair use clause?
Because their faith requires them to believe in something that others may classify as "non-existent" and they have to do it without doubt or question.
Surpirse! they're doing it on the other aspect of their lives too.
Guess they really do not want the world to know how insensitive and ignorant their speakers are.