Plagiarism must include intent to steal another’s work
The media love a media story. Recently, Globe and Mail columnist Margaret Wente was at the centre of a media storm created by claims that she has plagiarized. As a writer, and someone who respects Wente and her work, my heart went out to her.
Let’s be clear: plagiarism is wrong and must not be tolerated. But as, for example, the McGill Code of Student Discipline makes clear, it is an intentional offence: “No student shall, with intent to deceive, represent the work of another person as his or her own … Upon demonstration that the student has represented and submitted another person’s work as his or her own, it shall be presumed that the student intended to deceive; the student shall bear the burden of rebutting this presumption by evidence satisfying the person or body hearing the case that no such intent existed.”
So has Wente fulfilled that burden? I believe that her explanation in the Globe and Mail does so.
I know, from personal experience, how very easy it is to make the kind of mistake she has. I try to discipline myself always to note sources (if only to save time searching for them later), but occasionally, I fail to do so. Sometimes I’ve spent hours searching for a reference to a sentence, which I’ve written in my notes, when I have an uneasy feeling I might have read it somewhere else, but which might be my original composition.
And sometimes we do have the same thoughts as others, without having seen their work. I’ve had that happen in both directions.
I once picked up a book in an airport and was thrilled to see that the author had the same ideas, as I did, about what I call “human ways of knowing” being multiple and diverse, and not just limited to reason, in the sense of logical, cognitive mentation. In fact, at the time, I’d already published an article in an American academic journal in which I made a brief reference to this idea, but the author’s exegesis was much more extensive. In the next article I wrote referring to the same idea, I didn’t mention the author of the book, but then decided that was a mistake, and in all future publications I have done so.
I also had the experience of giving a speech in Alberta and suggesting a new idea about children having a fundamental human right to a mother and a father — the novelty was in the proposition that it was a human right. This idea was greeted as a new insight by senior scholars at the meeting, who were eager to discuss it with me. I then saw this concept written up on an American think-tank website by a U.S. researcher, who had heard me speak at the conference, with no reference to my work. When I challenged her, she said she had already had the same idea before I spoke, although we had spoken at the conference after my speech and she didn’t tell me that. Nevertheless, I believe her.
We don’t own ideas and we should be grateful if others think ours are worth repeating, but honesty in attribution is essential. That said, we can make honest mistakes in attribution, just as we can with facts. Sometimes, on reading one of my published articles, I’ve rushed into my office to check on a fact terrified that I might have gotten it wrong. It’s no excuse, but it’s a reality, that sometimes our work is far from meticulous.
I am deeply concerned that there is something of a “witch hunt” tone to what is happening to Margaret Wente. We have to be careful that in the name of promoting ethics, we don’t use ethics unethically. There is a major difference between being righteous and being self-righteous — which, by the way, is not my original idea.
We also need to ask ourselves whether people whose criticisms we read have political or other agendas to promote through their criticisms. As a frequent target of ad hominem attacks myself, because of some of my opinions and values, I would question the fairness and neutrality of some of those who are so absolute in their condemnation of Wente and so scathing in their comments about her. Perhaps, they might ponder that, “There but for the grace of God …” they could make a similar honest mistake.
For the record, I have exchanged occasional emails with Margaret Wente but, as far as I recall, have never met her in person.