crime in mexico

I am fed up with news stories about crime in Mexico.

If you read newspapers or watch television news, you know what I mean. If the name "Mexico" is in the story, you do not need to travel very few words until you crash into "crime" or "drugs" or "murder" -- or all three if it is a particularly lurid tale.

Don't get me wrong. There is plenty of crime here. Even in my idyllic village that some visitors naively call "paradise."

But Mexico is far more than that. There are daily accomplishments here that are news-worthy.

The Economist, my favorite newspaper (as it likes to style itself) is rather good at running stories that are not crime-oriented. In-depth election analysis. Mexico's place in the world petroleum market. The challenges Mexico faces in resuscitating its ossified public education system.

That is why I was a bit startled when I started reading a story in last week's edition. The story led off as a crime tale, but it quickly morphed into an intellectual property dispute.

You probably have already heard the story from other sources. Isabel Marant, one of France's most popular designers, is accused of copying a shirt design used by Tzeltal women in Aguacatenango, Chiapas, and then trying to register her design as intellectual property before another designer could steal what she herself had lifted. My family would call that chutzpah.

Because we have entered an era where every problem is the moral equivalent of the bombing of Pearl Harbor, the immediate reaction was hysteria -- followed by repeatedly running in circles while dousing hair with kerosene while playing with a Bic lighter.

This drama has all of the elements of a modern passion play. Wealthy white European woman. Oppressed Mexican mothers. That new jargon bugaboo "culture appropriation." Theft. Imperialism. They were all there.

It is very easy to empathize with the Tzeltal women. It takes one woman 36 hours to make, embroider, and sew a dress with the village's flower and wheat design. She will then sell it for the equivalent of $6 (US). You have probably already done the math. That is about $.16 an hour.

Marant is not alone in trying to make a euro off of the needle-pricked fingers of the Tzeltal. Zara, an online Spanish store, has been selling similar knock-offs for the past year. There are at least ten other merchants who are selling Mexican Indian designs without credit, permission, or payment.

I do agree with the critics in their more rational moments. It is morally wrong that designs associated with a region do not require some sort of payment for copies. Morally wrong, but legal.

There is no law to cover the intellectual property in regional designs -- even though there is a conference of nations that has been working on devising protections for indigenous art. Even with such a narrow focus, they have come up with nothing after 17 years of talking.

Crafting a rule is not easy. Most intellectual property cannot be passed from one generation to the next. That is why there are no rules covering the work of the Tzeltals. And it is devilishly hard to define what is authentically indigenous. Anthropologists tell us the current designs of the Tzeltals are not the same as their pre-columbian ancestors. The debate then turns on what is truly authentic.

And, if a rule is written, it will not cover what Marant and Zara did. Even though the designs are quite similar to what the Tzeltals make, they have distinct differences. All intellectual property laws have exceptions. This one will, as well.

The big exception is "fair use." That exception allows reviewers to quote sections of books, satirists to poke fun at Broadway musicals, and artists to use the works of others to create their own pieces. Without the exception, every artist would be an intellectual property criminal.

Andrew Lloyd Webber worked a musical thread from another composer into "Don't Cry for Me, Argentina." Stephen Sondheim claimed he was not lifting the first line of "I'll be Home for Christmas" when he wrote "Goodbye for Now." And, in "Las Meninas," Pablo Picasso just outright copied Diego Velázquez's original -- in his own style, of course.

By that standard, the designer pieces most likely would never be considered as copies. But, copies of the Tzeltals' work are being made. In Asia.

And here is the irony. The fakes are sold 29 miles from Aguacatenango in San Cristóbal de las Casas. The Asian knock-offs sit on shelves side-by-side with the real deal. And the Mexican government does nothing to stop it.

That would be a good start. Mexico alone can do nothing about Spanish and French designers lifting ideas. But it could outlaw the sale of fake goods that depress the prices of the genuine handicraft.

The Economist had a second idea. Globalization and the internet may be the best solution to protect the income of the Tzeltals. By putting their genuine creations on line, they can sell to a world-wide audience.

It will not affect the designer-mad customers who must have a genuine Marant. But, it will allow people of conscience to do something positive with their opinions -- by using their wallets to support their convictions.

A Mexican senator was quoted as describing what Marant and Zara are doing is an unconscionable act of theft that violates the very spirit of Mexico. You are correct, senator.

But, I found that to be a bit ironic because Mexico is the poster child for intellectual property theft. Software. CDs. DVDs. Handbags. Clothing. All of them sold without one centavo going back to the people who created them. Yes, senator, it is unconscionable theft. All of it.

And there is the rub with both of my proposed solutions. I have several friends here who know the DVDs they buy are not only stolen property, but that the local cartel is the source. That does not keep them from tucking their morality in their wallet between the pesos they saved by buying fenced goods. The same people who would be indignant if someone purchased their stolen computer.

At least, the market solution may give the women of Aguacatenango some breathing space while our world leaders try to come up with a simple intellectual property rule to protect them. Right after they figure out that pesky world peace thing.

My advice? Focus that moral indignation by buying an authentic design. It will make you feel better -- and pretty.