Submitted by Wayne G. Sayles, Nov 23, 2006 13:02

The cultural property war is only now becoming front page news, but it has been going on for decades. There is a second page to every story and the shocking but ignored aspect of this one is that those who would deny the right of private individuals to collect objects of antiquity are denying the right to self-educate. The provisions of the highly touted UNESCO convention of 1970 are so strident that virtually anything created or touched by man more than 100 years ago can be construed as needing "protection" from the ravages of ordinary people. The elitist attitude of those who espouse cultural property nationalism is so pervasive that even the most common of objects, produced in the millions and traded internationally for thousands of years, are now being targeted for import restrictions and repatriation to their country of origin. The implications of this short sighted view are staggering. Anti-collecting advocates offer "shotgun" solutions to specific problems and find no shame in the blatant trampling of individual rights. While the media revels in the scandal of looting, theft and marketing of national treasures, the reactive controls of government are being applied even to incidental utilitarian objects. Common sense is not on the table. In our haste to be politically correct, we are on the verge of destroying everything of value in man's personal quest for knowledge about the past.

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