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Remember, America's chief export is its culture, and every Hollywood movie sells the idea that awesome cars, big-ass houses, and shiny gadgets are part of the good life. Piracy is part of what happens when people accept that narrative in a place where you don't get there by following the rules.

Somalis are completely conscious of the outside world, and they are pissed off about it. Imagine you live in a hut with twigs and plastic for a roof, but you can go down the street and watch TV and see exactly how much the rest of the world has, and how they've completely written off your country. Huge numbers of angry young men with no money make great pirate recruits. But they've also been the building block for every terrifying "-ism" of the last century.

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Rheumatism?

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Underneath the Jack Sparrow of it all is a country that's been a geopolitical tennis ball for decades. Right now we mostly ignore the whole mess, but it's coming back to bite us -- this is why Somalia is the next front in the war on terror. Piracy was just the canary in the mine, and now we're seeing a shitload more angry people who don't remind us of whimsical Disney characters. In the end, piracy's greatest victory was forcing us to pay attention to Somalia. Even if the movie we made about it puts the spotlight elsewhere.

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"But don't worry, a couple centuries from now you'll be played by the 23rd century version of Johnny Depp."

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Thymaya Payne is a documentarian, and his documentary Stolen Seas is available now on itunes, amazon and vimeo. You can go to Stolenseas.com as well. If you have a story to tell Robert Evans, he can be reached here.

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