Firstly, just an update. Dr. Nolte replied to my email and, since I don’t have permission to reproduce her reply in its entirety, I’ll just say that she was eminently gracious (then again, she hadn’t read my blog!) and allowed that she would pursue the differences between women’s and men’s health in the near future, and thanked me for bringing up “a very interesting point”. (When I get a bit depressed about one person can do to change anything in this goddamned world, I may just pull out her email and rest my eyes on it for a while.)

But, of course, just when I think the world is taking on a slightly rosier hue, along comes the RWA. Are they seriously vying for the Most Stupidest Writers’ Organisation In The Galaxy Award? Up till now, I thought the SFWA had that one sewn up, but the RWA obviously doesn’t want SFWA to get a clear run at outright, indecipherable stupidity, and so we have this.

Now, it all boils down to Cassie Edwards, so if you don’t know what I’m talking about, best go to Smart Bitches for the original series of articles and Dear Author for a less server-thrashed analysis of all the commotion. Two points, if I may:

• Some people are saying that this is Sarah and Candy going after Cassie Edwards because they’re meangirls. Well, neither of them found the original problem. It was a friend, who was given a selection of books, who decided to do some searches on suspect paragraphs and then clued the Bitches in.
• Everyone on the author’s side—fans, publisher—talks about “paraphrasing”. Paraphrasing is when you take text that belongs to someone else and put it in your own words. Edwards did NOT do this.

But then the RWA waddles into the fray.

Okay, I’ll come clean. After the e-publishing debacle last year, I really really wanted to let my RWA membership lapse. But the problem was that the chapters I was part of gave me a great feeling of belonging (Outreach in particular), which is a precious thing when you’re halfway around the world. And so I thought I’d give them another chance … at least until my membership came up for renewal. But it appears that the RWA are just determined to push me out of the organisation.

In a letter to members about the Edwards debacle, they said that while:

… RWA does not condone plagiarism or any type of copyright infringement … [awooga, awooga, CYA alert!] … [Cassie Edwards] allowed her membership to lapse four or more years ago. If guilt is admitted or established, RWA will take appropriate steps with regard to the Honor Roll listing … The president was asked to give an expert opinion on the issue based solely upon information available in internet blogs. The president does not have enough first-hand information to adequately assess the allegations.

You know how I love ripping these things apart! So let’s see if we can get this straight.

One. Cassie Edwards left four years ago, so don’t bug us about it.

Two. “If guilt is admitted or established”. Not that WE are going to do anything about it. We’ll just wait until divine enlightenment falls from the sky, and only then might we get off our arses and make a further statement.

Three. “The president was asked to give an expert opinion … but does not have enough first-hand information”. Because the president is a deaf-mute who is not a writer and, furthermore, is unable to communicate with anyone.

The RWA is supposed to be an organisation that advocates for romance writers. I think the proper thing to do would have been to say: “The RWA takes accusations of plagiarism very seriously and, with this in mind, we have contacted the originating source for these discussions and requested that they hand over all information associated with this matter as urgently as possible. The RWA will be convening an emergency panel to independently assess these allegations and will make a report to the general membership within 30 days on this matter.”

That’s what I expect from a professional organisation. Instead, we get a mealy-mouthed “not enough information”, with an added quote from RWA President Sherry Lewis (in an AP article) to the effect,

It’s not clear-cut to me … You can see similarities in the passages, but I’m not qualified to make that assertion.

Not qualified? Is there some PhD in plagiarism that you need before you can compare two paragraphs of text? The response from the RWA smacks of nothing more than ponderous yet terrified damage-control. Where is the fire of advocacy? Where is the passion for the written word? Was there even any to begin with?

Sherry Lewis is herself the author of several books, including the “Time Passages” series (An Echo in Time, Time to Dream, Whispers through Time, Only Time will Tell). My initial thought was, well we’ll see how she feels when her work is lifted word-for-word, but is that really what we’ve been reduced to? That it’s only when someone has come along and poked us in the eye with a sharp stick that we realise it’s a bad thing to do to other people?

On the other hand, you can’t argue with over 10 million books in print. Because, as much as we rant and rail, we already know who’s going to win this one, don’t we? With that in mind, I think I’ll just go get my copy of “Heart of Darkness” by Joseph Conrad (published in 3 parts in 1899), do some global search-and-replacing, set it on an alien world, then publish it as my original work. I mean, if I’m successful, it’s not like anyone can touch me, right?