The gold shirt or medals or transporter by themselves do not necessarily constitute appropriation – but in its entirety this is essentially what the movie is. It is an appropriation of Star Trek without permission or paying royalties. This is the very essence of what copyright was designed to prevent.

You know what I always say to somebody who claims to be against cultural “appropriation”, whether it be in the form of portraying/sampling everything from rap music to Japanese Kimono? It’s this: when you protest something like this, deciding what is “culturally appropriate” is the very thing you are trying to do, not them.

I don’t find it a coincidence that copyright’s core mantra dating all the way back to its conception in the 1600s has very much in common with the petty social justice warrior movements of today, plaguing the minds of the naive and turning many decent folk away from universities. And not just that. Back in the 50’s and 60’s communists like Sam Aaronovitch protested the capitalist “appropriation” of American comics seeping their way into British cultural life in place of what should have been purist socialist ideology. In other words, unauthorised forms of culture were to be resisted simply for being alien, in place of more appropriate appropriation.

There is a reason why those of us aligned with Thomas Paine, 18th century liberal radicalism and freedom of expression are good at seeing through these things. Though I do wish most on my side would see the connection with the problems of copyright’s right to decide what culture is “appropriate” too.

I also recommend you look at this article on the subject of folk deciding what is culturally appropriate supposedly in the name of fighting against it to see all the ironies: http://www.newstatesman.com/culture/art-design/2015/10/defence-cultural-appropriation . And I don’t think it’s a coincidence that it uses “intellectual property” as a metaphor for the stupidity.

It goes right back. When things like the Inquisition and the Dark Ages were afoot every bit of blasphemy could be pinpointed as an equivalent of morons killing each other based on what was culturally appropriate for Jesus and the like. I came to realise that whenever I criticised this solipsistic concept of ownership of expression instead of freedom of expression in copyright circles, I often found I would say copyright believers were in effect wanting blasphemy laws protecting their work from being defamed, wich in any other context would be seen for the transparent prior-restraint tripe that it is, which would logically extend to silencing critics of the work too since they too could sway the culture in the direction outside of the artist’s “permission”. Yet copyright squares the circle and pretends that the logic doesn’t extend that far for a reason I’ve yet to hear. I was not, and am not, wrong to make this comparison.