Potential Plagiarism in 034

Summary:

Exactly what it says on the tin.

Potential Plagiarism in 034

AbsentmindedNihilist 26 Apr 2019 01:12

A chat user who goes by Razorhat brought to our attention that 034 may have been plagiarized from a Japanese Light Novel, and helpfully put together a document comparing their similarities. I am about to fall asleep, and as such have done only a cursory scan of the first part of the document, so if people would prefer not to wait until morning for me to look at it more thoroughly I will paste it here for staff to peruse as they wish.

https://pastebin.com/JG0m5TZg

Link to 034 for reference: http://www.scp-wiki.net/scp-034

Last edited on 26 Apr 2019 01:15 by AbsentmindedNihilist Show more

Re: Potential Plagiarism in 034

ProcyonLotor 26 Apr 2019 01:21

I'm not currently in a situation to give this a deep dive, but my initial impression is that the vast majority of any similarities seem to stem from the fact that both works draw heavily from Aztec culture/common perceptions and stereotypes thereof, and the other purported similarities that I've followed up on based on the report are not particularly convincing. I'll give this a more thorough investigation when I am able, and my opinion may very well change.

Last edited on 26 Apr 2019 01:21 by ProcyonLotor Show more

Re: Potential Plagiarism in 034

Modern_Erasmus 26 Apr 2019 01:59

It's plausible, but there's no hard proof either way. Razorhat was incorrect that no aztec ritual was like this however. A prominent one involved flaying the skin off of captured warriors, and priests would then wear said skin on their own bodies. This is actually more of a direct connection to the SCP than to the light novel, since the latter's disguise elements are separate from the knife.

Source: https://www.historyonthenet.com/aztec-religious-ceremonies-and-rituals

Imo, it's entirely possible both the novel and the SCP were inspired by the Aztec ritual and just happened to be released in a similar time frame.

Re: Potential Plagiarism in 034

Dexanote 26 Apr 2019 17:50

Yeah I'm not seeing it. This is a Weeping Angels/173 deal but far more tenuous.

Even so the uh light novel does not appear to have much, if any, sort of tone resemblance to the knife.

This is a stretch. And even so, we have far more blatantly inspired SCPs with far less tenuous connections to alleged source material.