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in reply to Re^5: How should Perlmonks deal with Plagiarism?
in thread How should Perlmonks deal with Plagiarism?

I think the point is that your suggestion that "foreigners are taught to cheat" is based, at best, on misinformation.

That is not my quote. And I find your assertion downright offensive. My point is that plagiarism, like many things, is viewed differently by different cultures. There are cultural dimensions to plagiarism. It is easy to define plagiarism, but it becomes a much more complex issue when dealing with different cultural worldviews. In my original post, I was simply agreeing with someone who made the same point. You can disagree with these statements, but don't put words in my mouth, buddy.

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Re^7: How should Perlmonks deal with Plagiarism?
by BrowserUk (Patriarch) on Oct 10, 2006 at 02:52 UTC
    That is not my quote. And I find your assertion downright offensive.

    If I draw that inference from your post, what inference do you imagine the diligent, hardworking, silent, moral majority of non-Western monks and Anonymonks that saw your words, drew?

    They are most unlikely to speak up given the current climate because of the actions of two of their number, but they are listening, and feeling the prejudice that such 'tar them all with the same brush' comments barely conceal. It's not so far from the 'they don't know any better' justifications for segregation that have littered history.

    Had those two guys been called Bill & Joe, and a monk with an eastern sounding handle had suggested that Western moral standards were not the same as those in Eastern cultures, there would have been (rightly) uproar. The implication of your post is that no two Western guys would have done such a thing--but every Western country has prisons full of guys who've mostly done much worse.

    There are definitely cultural difference in many areas, but I know of no society in which 'plagiarism', defined as being 'to deliberately misrepresent another writing, ideas or efforts as one's own', is an acceptable practice. I don't claim to be cognisant of all norms in all cultures, but if you believe that you know of a culture in which plagiarism is an acceptable norm, then I would suggest you cite references, rather than perpetuating prejudice through anecdotal evidence and hearsay.


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