Plagiarism rap: no-win for SC

Hostility to the Supreme Court’s redefinition of plagiarism is rising. At first only lawyers reacted when twelve SC justices inserted “malicious intent” as condition to prove the offense. Then the four offended foreign authors decried the SC threat to punish for contempt U.P.-Law professors who called for Justice Mariano del Castillo’s resignation. Now educators are chiming in, too, lamenting potential student indiscipline and academic dishonesty due to the ruling. Inevitably the next opposers will be musicians and artists, writers and publishers, inventors and producers who are in constant fear of theft of their intellectual property. Clerics and lay leaders might even join in, since a morality angle is now being forwarded.

The SC is in a no-win situation. Unintentionally the Coordinating Council of Private Educational Associations (Cocopea) highlights this in its statement calling for a correction of the SC decision. If, as the group pleads, the twelve justices acknowledge plagiarism, they will have to sanction del Castillo. But it will be pointed out in the process that they blindly had affirmed the latter’s ponencia in the case of World War II comfort women, and so lose face. If they stand pat on clearing del Castillo, students will be taught about their wrongness, so also lose face. Truly, people are the products of their decisions.

The Cocopea is the biggest umbrella of school administrators and owners. It represents thousands of members in asking: “How can we now discipline our students who copy the works and writings of other authors without attribution when they can simply take refuge behind the [SC] ruling?” In deriding the decision the group seeks not del Castillo’s punishment for lifting passages without attribution in a ponencia. “We are not lawyers, we do not imply legal sanctions,” points out Fr. Gregorio Bañaga. Still the signatories reiterate long standing academic policy that “plagiarism is intellectual dishonesty ... punished most severely.” So they ask the SC to follow “The Way Forward” stated by Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno. In her dissents Sereno had suggested, among others, that the SC: (1) request del Castillo to acknowledge and apologize for the plagiarism, and (2) issue a corrected version of the decision.

The Cocopea includes the Philippine Association of Colleges and Universities (PACU), Philippine Association of Private Schools, Colleges and Universities (PAPSCU), Technical-Vocational Schools Association of the Philippines (Tevsaphil), and Association of Christian Schools, Colleges and Universities (ACSCU). Its biggest adjunct is the 1,290-strong Catholic Educational Association of the Philippines (CEAP), headed by Fr. Bañaga, president of Adamson University. The CEAP derides the SC “decision (as it) abets intellectual sloth and dishonesty.” Bañaga wonders how lifted passages had escaped notice of del Castillo and the 11 other justices, when there’s a computer software to detect so. At any rate, the CEAP “call(s) on the rest of Philippine academia and the entire citizenry to unite and speak with one voice and act collectively in defense of honesty and integrity ... Plagiarism is not only a legal issue but more importantly a moral one.”

Actually the Loyola Schools, of which the Ateneo University and its law school are part, had spoken up a week ahead. It is significant, for del Castillo and the supposed legal assistant blamed for the lifted passages are Ateneo grads. VP John Paul C. Vergara stated in a memo: “As articulated in the Loyola Schools Code of Academic Integrity (A Student Guide), the objective act of ‘plagiarism is identified not through intent but through the act itself. The objective act of falsely attributing to one’s self what is not one’s work, whether intentional or out of neglect, is sufficient to conclude that plagiarism has occurred. Students who plead ignorance or appeal to lack of malice are not excused ... The [SC] decision notwithstanding, the Loyola Schools’ understanding and definition of what constitutes plagiarism has not changed. Cases of plagiarism will continue to be handled in the same manner, and with the same regard for due process, as stipulated in the Student Handbook.”

Earlier eight law schools and deans also denounced the SC issuance of an order to the 37 U.P. faculty members to justify their opinionating. The justices deem the professors’ call for del Castillo’s resignation as showing contempt of its proceedings. But the law schools and deans joined the fray in defense of academic freedom.

The aggrieved authors, Dr. Mark Ellis, Professors Evan Fox-Decent and Evan Criddle, and Christian Tams have also asked the SC to withdraw the order. Tams also admonished Filipino lawyers to exercise restraint, as the issue could tarnish both the U.P. academe and the highest court of the land.

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”A slave can be comfortable  if he serves with love. But not so the master  he has to live with his unloving.” Shafts of Light, Fr. Guido Arguelles, SJ

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