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** They Say It Can’t Be Done Discussion Paper**
They Say It Can’t Be Done is a portrait of individuals who are passionate about what they are doing and what happens when those passions collide with the government regulatory state in society. The film highlights these aspects and how they affect and or stifle entrepreneurs. These are people who have devoted years of their lives into getting unconventional businesses off the ground, but before they can find out if their businesses will fail or succeed on the open market, they have to face many trials and tribulations that the government puts before them.
The film even illustrates how entrepreneurs motivate liberals and progressives to support regulatory reform. This documentary suggests one approach, focusing as it does on an entrepreneur culture which is regarded by some as being politically left-leaning and cooperating with “save the planet” individuals. These are people who may even think of themselves as being sympathetic to socialism, but, when it comes to bringing their products to market, they run into the same government roadblocks that every aspiring capitalist comes up against in a mixed economy. One such entrepreneur within the film even allowed that he had everything else he needed to start selling to the public which included funding and that the only thing still keeping him from doing so was the stringent government regulation. This is a story of people who have devoted their lives to innovation and creative destruction. This story also shows off everything the government does to impede and stifle the innovation of new incoming entrepreneurs. As well the film highlights four companies that work to solve the biggest threats facing humanity: Hunger. The world lacks the acreage to feed 9 billion people by 2050. San Francisco-based Eat Just, Inc. is using cell culture technology to grow real meat prospectively without hurting animals, wasting resources, or increasing emissions.
The organ transplant deficiency. Hundreds of thousands of patients are currently awaiting an organ transplant.
Climate change. Air pollution and climate change are wreaking havoc on our environment. Scientists all around the world have created a synthetic tree that would remove atmospheric carbon at one-thousand times the rate of other natural trees. This was extremely innovative and could reshape our society in new ways beyond our control.
"Our featured innovators are finding viable solutions to the globe's problems, yet their products haven't been widely adopted. We're asking why that is," said Andrea Fuller, a co-producer of the film. These inspiring technologies could revolutionize our lives and the entrepreneurs are again producing value to the market. We can be optimistic that this film can spur necessary conversations in the United States as to how we achieve the dual goals of keeping people safe and accelerating these innovations. In that, new ideas that aren’t already covered by regulations produce unclear results.
Regulatory agencies like to tout their exhaustive expertise in the areas they regulate, but agency authority is actually a patchwork quilt which allows many new products to slip through the cracks because they bring together things that no one agency has clear authority over. These same agencies are exploited by some of the very businesses they regulate as a means of protecting themselves from competition. There is no wonder that business startups have declined in recent years. They Say It Can’t Be Done definitely succeeds in painting a portrait of entrepreneurs who are passionate about innovation and the positive impact these people have already had on the lives of others in our society in the context of the challenges presented by government regulation, ultimately stifling them. While the movie gives a subtle power to it that makes it absolutely worth analyzing, it definitely raises more questions than it answers. The film suggests so much more than it shows although it certainly is possible that one was reading things into what they were seeing through the lens of their own understanding of the issue. My own personal perspective on the issue of regulation is far more radical than the perspective offered in this film.
Pointed out in the film, only ten such transplants have been allowed in the years since, speaks to the very real human cost of regulation and demands that the question be asked: which is, in fact, the bigger threat to the health and safety of the American public private industry or the government regulatory state? We are reminded of comments made by a US Supreme Court Justice a few years back that over-regulation of the market made it riskier, not safer. The same could be said of all markets.The perspective is that, if you want to change the world, you have to be willing to stand up to those who don’t want you to. Entrepreneurs who want to protect their freedom to innovate must have the courage to stand up to those who seek to criminalize the new simply for being new. In other words entrepreneurs have to be okay with being destructive with their creativity. Opposition to innovation has a well-known history that includes such figures as Galileo, Copernicus and Lister. The opposition always comes from people claiming authority and power to tell us what to do with our lives. But your life belongs to the people and the decisions regarding how you live your life are properly ours to make, not anyone else’s. To fight for anything less is to invite failure. How do you stand up to unfair regulation? The film shows us by simply proclaiming your ownership of your own life is a good place to start. Write your elected representatives. Speak out when you have a chance to do so.
They Say It Can’t Be Done is actually about innovation vs. regulation, and it’s the sort of film that leaves people arguing out in the parking lot once it’s over. The film expressed this great, persuasive, thought-provoking documentary. Lastly, They Say It Can’t Be Done illustrates, entrepreneurs and innovators are often faced with an outdated regulatory system. That’s a particular problem for entrepreneurs in our society today who work on life-or-death projects, as Dr. Atala in the film is doing it with man-made organs; regulations are also sometimes used as a cudgel by big corporations to keep others out and those interactions signify the importance of innovation.
