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This is the blog of Ian Rosales Casocot. Filipino writer. Sometime academic. Former backpacker. Twink bait. Hamster lover.

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Tuesday, August 31, 2010

entry arrow9:07 PM | Writing and Reading: A Rant of Sorts

I've been guilty of this. But no longer. Starting this semester, I've been telling my students to buy the original copies of books I'm requiring them to read. Absolutely no photocopies. Because I think, as teachers, we have somehow helped create a culture of disregard for books and reading by allowing our students to photocopy pages upon pages of text, with utter disregard for copyright and the authors' bottomline. It has also reduced written works produced with so much sweat and blood and research to the level of the cheap and disposable. No wonder there is a diminished regard for the writing profession in general to the level of the impractical. No wonder people keep going up to me, always asking for free copies of my book, as if they can do the same with an engineer, or a doctor, or a lawyer. Living in a third world country is no excuse. So yes books can be expensive sometimes. But that's paying premium for knowledge gained and a sense of literature found. You're already paying almost P400 a month to cable television that gives you nothing but the WoWoWee kind of stupidity. Why can't you do the same to something that can actually make you think and ponder and learn?

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