Plagiarism is introducing another person’s ideas or thoughts in your work and passing them off as your own. Students commonly commit plagiarism as it makes meeting assignment deadlines easier. By plagiarizing, they can finish a lot of assignments in a short period. In his book The Plagiarism Handbook, Harris (2001) describes plagiarism as “using another person’s words or ideas without giving credit to the other person.” All distributed and unpublished material, regardless of whether in composition, printed, or electronic structure, is covered under this definition. There are many forms of plagiarism; direct, self, mosaic, and accidental plagiarism. In recent years, open access to any intellectual material has made plagiarism a regularly committed intellectual crime. Many prominent people have also been accused of plagiarism, either in their speech or written materials. The current president of the United States, Joe Biden, had to give up his presidential race in 1988 after confessing to having committed plagiarism in law school (Perticone, 2019). Former first lady, Melania Trump, has had several accounts where she was accused of plagiarism.
Melania Trump's Republican National Convention's speech in 2016 is said to have been plagiarized from Michelle Obama’s Democratic National Convention’s speech in 2008 (BBC, 2018). After scrutiny, Melania's speech was very similar to Michelle's in both wording and ideas. When questioned on the “TODAY Show” about the speech's similarity to Michelle’s address in 2008, Melania denied the claims saying that she had written the speech herself with minimal aid and that she had even read over it after writing. However, looking at the speech, one cannot help but notice the striking similarities. A section of her RNC 2016 speech reads, “my parents impressed on me values that you work hard for what you want in life. That your word is your bond, and you do what you say and keep your promise. That you treat people with respect." Comparing this excerpt to Michelle’s, “Barack and I were raised with so many of the same values: that you work hard for what you want in life; that your word is your bond and you do what you say you’re going to do; that you treat people with respect, even if you don’t know them, and even if you don’t agree with them” (Jaffe, 2016). One cannot fail to see that the two excerpts seem to have been written by the same person. The same values of respect and keeping one’s promise have been put across almost in the same wording. Hence, Melania Trump’s plagiarism accusations are not far-fetched. The evidence of the resemblance of the two speeches shows that Mrs. Trump had committed plagiarism. After the controversy blowing up, Mclever, who assisted in writing the speech, confessed to having copied some ideas from Michelle Obama.
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Another instance where Mrs. Trump has been accused of plagiarism is when she released her booklet on cyber safety. Mrs. Trump has been known to speak bravely against cyber-bullying and internet safety. Her initiative as the first lady focused on online abuse and opioid abuse among children. However, after releasing her “Be Best” initiative on open dialogue supporting children and positive use of the internet, the booklet was met with criticism for resembling Mrs. Obama's previous booklet. Critics claimed that the graphics and literature were similar to Mrs. Obama’s booklet. After the similarities were pointed out online, the White House claimed that Mrs. Trump wanted to use her platform to promote the former booklet’s ideas. The booklet name was also changed on the website from “by First Lady Melania Trump and the Federal Trade Commission" to "Federal Trade Commission booklet, promoted by First Lady Melania Trump” (BBC, 2018). Mrs. Trump had plagiarized the “Be Best” booklet from Mrs. Obama. If it were truly her work, there would be no need to change the booklet's billing on the initiative’s website.
There are several cases of plagiarism that have led to people being discredited or sued. It is a crime that people should avoid. However, there are several things a person can do to avoid plagiarism. The first is time management and conducting adequate research. Most people plagiarize because of tight deadlines and last-minute rush. When this happens, students copy an article directly from the internet without changing a single word. Others add fake citations to their work to look like they are giving credit to the source. Many who buy papers from students ahead of them who have already done the course only change the name and date on the papers. By starting the assignment research early, one can develop enough original content, and plagiarism is less likely to happen. The second thing is quoting. When elaborating on another person’s idea, or in the case where the student has to use a person’s idea to defend their work, one should quote the author of the source. Lastly is a citation. While borrowing information from databases, proper citations and a reference page should be included using proper citation styles (Harris, 2001). Plagiarism is an infringement of the original owner's rights and an insult to their intellect.
References
BBC News. (2018). Melania Trump Faces New Plagiarism Row over Cyber-safety Booklet. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-44038656
Harris, R. (2001). The plagiarism Handbook: Strategy for preventing, detecting and dealing with plagiarism.
Jaffe, A. (2016). Melania Trump Republican Convention Speech Bears Striking Similarities to Michelle Obama Address. NBC News. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2016-election/melania-trump-appears-plagiarize-michelle-obama-convention-speech-n612141
Perticone, J. (2019). Flashback: Joe Biden’s First Presidential Run in 1988 Cratered Amid Multiple Instances of Plagiarism. Business Insider. https://www.businessinsider.com/plagiarism-scandal-joe-biden-first-presidential-run-1988-2019-3
