First, let me extend a very warm welcome to the many new Filipino readers that have discovered this blog in the past 24 hours. My husband is from Australia, so I do get down to that part of the world on occasion and I hope to visit your beautiful country at some point in the future.
It is great to have you here, although the circumstances of our meeting are, to say the least, unusual.
It seems one of your esteemed Senators, Tito Sotto, plagiarized a blog post I wrote on February 23, 2011 entitled How The Pill Can Harm Your Future Child’s Health, lifting entire sections of the article basically word for word that was delivered in a speech to the Senate Floor regarding the possible passage of the highly controversial Reproductive Health Bill.
What’s worse, Senator Sotto is denying the charge of plagiarism, saying in an interview with ABS-CBN:
“Why would I quote the blogger? I was quoting Natasha McBride.”
Nice touch Senator. You almost had me convinced you were a nice guy with the tears and all.
Many of your citizens have emailed me assuring me that was a put on, and I’m starting to think they are right.
A thief is a thief, Mr. Senator. Denying it doesn’t get you off the hook; it just makes you a lying thief.
On the bright side, I am thrilled that your lapse of moral judgment has brought much-needed attention to the fact that the birth control pill can have devastating consequences to a woman’s long term health and possibly those of her children and even grandchildren. Gut dysbiosis is a serious condition that has multi-generational consequences that women need to be educated about and completely aware of before making the very personal decision to use them.
It was indeed brave of you to take this controversial position. Kudos to you for that.
By the way, I am truly sorry for the loss of your son.
As the mother of two sons myself, I can only imagine the pain and devastation you have felt from such an experience.
While this has been a highly charged and hopefully enlightening experience for all involved, it’s time now to set the drama aside and get back to fighting the good fight by continuing to educate people about how their food and pharma choices affect not only themselves but also those they dearly love.
And although my attorney will likely try to persuade me otherwise, for now I’m moving on as I’ve got work to do.
Women of the Philippines: I am terribly sorry my blog was used and twisted against you. You deserve the choice to use The Pill if you want or need to based on your particular circumstances. While I want you to know that this choice has health consequences as does the decision to use any pharmaceutical drug, I in no way would ever condone taking this choice away from you! Mabuhay!
Well, according to the law you really cannot sue Sotto. However, that is not the issue. Whether or not he can be sued, what he did is still plagiarism, and is unethical. Remember, even students who commit plagiarism cannot be tried by court, they can only be suspended, failed in the subject, or expelled based on the school policies. 😀 Then again, just because there is no criminal liability doesn’t mean what they did is wrong and unethical. Damn it.
According to Mr. Sotto we paste and copy whatever we want, because he teached us now: “It´s a blog and has no copyright” . A strange understanding what Philippine Laws says.
http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/255890/plagiarism-common-practice-ok-in-senate-says-sottos-aide
Former Sen. Ernesto Maceda was in the Senate Wednesday and acknowledged that the copying of bills from a previous Congress was indeed considered acceptable among his peers during his term. In the case of speeches, “when we lifted a passage or quotation, we gave the corresponding attribution to the source,” he said.
However, Maceda would not hold Sotto and Cayetano personally accountable for passages in their speeches that might have failed to attribute the right sources. “I can believe the two senators if they say their speeches were prepared by their staff. It was an omission…. I think to me it’s not a big thing. It’s forgivable if it does not really affect the overall content of the speech…. Almost all senators depend on staff work,” he explained.
Santiago was also magnanimous when asked about the issue. “Maybe the speech writer just overlooked it…. This is politics so I guess we should give more leeway to the senators as long as later on they admit that they took it from some other source and they acknowledge that source,” she said. “This is not academe where it is grave, in effect a mortal sin not to attribute something to its source or author,” Santiago added.
Still, Maceda said it would be good if the senators would “express an apology to authors asking it.” Not on Villacorta’s watch in the case of Sotto. “Senator Sotto was not personally responsible for preparing the speech. He only read it on the floor. Besides, I already apologized to (US blogger) Sarah Pope,” he said.
Please focus on other issue that needs your immediate attention dear senators! stop debating on RH Bill! It won’t do any good to us! You’re just wasting our taxes!
Another member of sotto’s writing staff “Jammer”… duh! as if he understand the recent post of ms. sarah. IDIOT! please read it!
Vote sotto again! hahaha
I was going to post the link but Philip was faster than me. lol. I wish to emphasize the stupid argument of Atty. Villacorta here.
“Copying is a common practice. Why do you need to think of a brand-new measure when a good one that was not enacted already exists?” said Hector Villacorta, Sotto’s chief of staff.
At a breakfast forum, Villacorta said former senators would sometimes approach incumbent ones and ask them to refile the measures that failed to reach approval during the former senators’ term.
“They request new senators to refile [the bills] because (these are) already in the archives. Why reinvent the wheel? Re-filing is an accepted practice. It is called copying,” he said.
“It’s really copying …. Why exert effort when these bills are just lying around?” Villacorta said.
“Even our image was copied from God. We are all plagiarists,” he said.
Tsk.. tsk.. why even mentioned God. He got nothing to do with here.
Indeed, like what Santiago said, it may not be academe but not really serving a good example to its people.
Villacorta did apologize, that’s given, but it is really funny how law makers can find a way to break their own laws or find a way to construe it…
Politics is really more exciting than telenovelas… hehehe…
http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/255890/plagiarism-common-practice-ok-in-senate-says-sottos-aide
Here’s Atty Villacorta’s side about plagiarism for Ms. Pope.
Sorry but I will just have to comment on this…
I find it funny that the number of pinoy posters here is overflowing, to the point of bashing each other out — a good sign of FOE, but somehow crossing the line for some.
I agree that the main issue here is the fact that the good Senator’s staff failed to acknowledge Ms. Pope (which they should have) other than Dr. Mcbride. If that happened, this wouldn’t even be an issue.
I agree as well that he could have atleast humbled himself, a bit, as his staff already confirmed that they lifted the entire passage from Ms. Pope’s blog. —> But what’s new with this issue? None. MAJORITY of Filipino politicians are either that good or that unlearned about the LAW, which they themselves promulgated, and try to work their way around it.
Anyway, unless Filipinos become smart voters, we will always have these types of politicians leading our government…