At the behest of Jane Smith at How Publishing Really Works , bloggers around the world are using today to bring attention to the problem of plagiarism. Although I have been lucky enough never to have been a victim of somebody stealing my work, I feel that it is important for me to join in on this global conversation.

Plagiarism is something you learn about in school. If you cheat and copy off of somebody else’s test, you fail. Later on, when the stakes are higher and you are supposed to have developed your own moral compass, copying someone else’s work can lead to expulsion from school. And rightly so. Plagiarism in the academic world, from kindergarten through university, is taken very very seriously. At least, that has been my experience.
And yet, out in the “real world,” plagiarism seems to take on the role of misdemeanor. People can steal other writers’ works, put their names on it, and then go on to get published and even win prizes with little repercussion. It doesn’t happen often, I’m happy to say, but it does indeed happen and has happened to several writers that I myself know. The fact that someone can steal another writer’s words or thoughts and claim them to be their own is inconceivable to me. But I have always been naive. But when it does happen, the fact that the people who publish these forgeries often do nothing about it, and often have to be brow-beaten by the victim into acknowledging the theft at all is infuriating.
But although I want to speak out against plagiarism and lend my moral support, if nothing else, to my friends who have been its victims, I don’t want to just use this space to rant. So I’ll throw out this comparison that I haven’t yet heard…..Bernie Madoff. I don’t think there is anyone in the world who doesn’t now know that name and associate it with crimes of the greatest betrayal and villainy. In the most simplistic terms, his crime worked like this — people created wealth by their own hard work. They then offered that wealth to Madoff in the understanding that he would use it to create greater wealth for the original creator and for himself. Instead, he pretended it was all his own, got richer off of other people’s money, draining the resources of his investors and leaving them bankrupt. Of course, the world is outraged by his crime and the US Courts have now given him 120 years in prison. But now you may be wondering what that has to do with anything. Well, to me, the difference between the Madoff scandal and instances of plagiarism are just a matter of scale. Taking another person’s creation — whether it be a portfolio of investments or a story full of words and ideas — claiming it as your own and using it for your own use is the same act of betrayal and villainy. What does a writer have as his/her currency if it isn’t words and ideas? Nothing. And what does a writer do when she/he puts those words and ideas into the public arena if not offer them to the world as investments into the collective coffers of wisdom and beauty?
I said I am naive, but I am not so naive as to think that the world will ever equate the value and importance of art with that of money. The “outside” world, that is. But the insiders? The ones who create these works of art and then go on to disseminate them? If we ourselves don’t value our work so highly as to protect it against theft then how can we expect anyone else to? When plagiarism occurs, it is an act of violence against one of our own. It must be punished with the same outrage and horror as the “outside” world uses to punish financial theft. Plagiarism is a dirty business. The fact that a “special” day has had to be called for in order to call attention to it, is absurd. Plagiarism is a crime. Period. And should be treated as such.