That Plagiarism Thing

I hate numerous types of people and in my top five, I've listed:

1) People who cheat and lie
2) People who make excuses
3) People who are irresponsible
4) People who insensitive
5) People who have no pride

I am noting this so I have enough personal reasons why I am repulsed by the whole Mark Solis incident, from which my immediate reaction was, "Someone has the gall to openly steal someone's photo?!"

In the digital world and with the emergence of the social media, stealing someone else's photograph is like committing suicide. And that, this boy did, in a social sense. Shame. Shame. Shame.

I've worked with photographers since 2007, after I graduated from college and got employed in a travel and lifestyle magazine. I was in the industry when photography blossomed to what it is now. I've seen that population balloon from a few established photographers to numerous amateurs and enthusiasts. Before I left that field, I was entertaining at least five young photographers in a week. When I entered journalism (and left, am no longer associated with any news organization), my world widened. In the beat, I am acquainted with a lot of photojournalists, all investing blood sweat and tears just to get a shot. They invest in not just gears but experience. All of them, like us writers, take pride in their works. Anyone who is in the creation industry does. And its probably a reality that this boy does not understand.

So when I learned of this incident, I was appalled. No, I was angry.

How can a young man just steal someone else's work--and repeatedly do so? He even won competitions with plagiarized materials!

Last night, the news mentioned that he has no money to pay for his tuition and this prompted him to submit plagiarized photos. And yet, days before that, in an unsigned letter to the owner of the photograph, he excused his youth and his blindness for the prize. Really, I know a soap opera plot when I see one. (Please refer to number 2 listed above.)

And just this morning, someone posted a note branding this plagiarist as merely a victim of the system. And I raised an eyebrow. This excuse is reminiscent of the field days, when I normally get this excuse from desperate leftists and anarchist/Marxist students who are obviously inexperienced and blindly idealistic.

The bottomline is this: Solis stole and owned someone else's photo. He did do do this once, which can be excusable by lapse of judgment, but more than three times. (And probably more considering this track record.) Sometimes you forgive someone who makes a mistake, thinking he'd repent and never do it again. But with this boy? I don't think he even had a conscience to begin with.

Its not the system that drove him to do this mistake but his overzealous ambitions, his lack of esteemed character and obviously, his lack of principle. There's no amount of excuse that can cover what he did. So he and the people around him should stop making excuses, stop blaming the system, stop bringing up his financial issues.

As a writer friend said in Facebook: "We all have a choice when faced with a dubious opportunity. Others in a worse situation, who have had better opportunities--like honest taxi drivers who return passengers' valuables; one driver even returned P5 million worth of jewelry--chose to do the right thing. It's not just some system. It's one's moral choice."

Right. He chose to err. He should face the consequences. - 9/25/2013