Tag: aacc

The Tim Clinton Saga: Twitter Plagiarism is Still Plagiarism

I’ll just get right into this. Here is a tweet from American Association of Christian Counselors president and Trump evangelical advisor Tim Clinton (I have screen caps of all of these):

Who do you think came up with this pithy quote? Doesn’t it look like Tim Clinton who is now affiliated with James Dobson’s Family Talk Radio is taking credit for it?

Actually, it comes from a chapter by Everett Worthington on forgiveness. The chapter was in a book Clinton helped edit but he didn’t write the chapter. Ev Worthington did. The quote is verbatim from Ev’s chapter.

Lest you think Clinton didn’t know about this tweet, he retweeted it (or at least someone managing his account did).

Here’s another one.

This quote posted on Clinton’s AACC Twitter account actually comes from the same chapter by Ev Worthington on the next page.

One might protest and say surely Clinton doesn’t keep up with his social media pages. His interns and underlings are probably doing this. Allow me to point out that in many of these tweets his Twitter account is included in the tweet: @DrTimClinton. Unless he doesn’t do anything for himself, he has to wonder when he said or wrote the things attributed to him. Here is another example of a quote attributed to him and brought to his attention via his Twitter account.

Note the quotation marks and the attribution to @DrTimClinton. However, this was really written by Ed Stetzer in Chapter One of a book edited by Clinton. Again, Clinton is listed as an editor but Stetzer wrote the words which are quoted here verbatim and attributed to Clinton.

The sleuth who sent these to me has uncovered 14 more of these, some of which involve taking sole credit for quotes from books where Clinton had one or more co-authors. It would be proper to give all authors credit for a quote unless it was clear in the book that the quote came from a specific author.

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(In the image, Tim Clinton is above Donald Trump’s head, to the right of V.P. Pence, Image: Johnnie Moore’s Twitter feed, )

Tim Clinton’s American Association of Christian Counselors Removes Members Benefit

The American Association of Christian Counselors is controlled by Trump evangelical advisor Tim Clinton. The AACC is the largest association of Christian counselors in the world. Recently, in part due the discoveries of psychology professor Aaron New, I have demonstrated that material from other authors has appeared without attribution or citation in some of  Clinton’s online articles, one published book, and AACC’s flagship journal Christian Counseling Today. Now, the AACC has removed volumes 15-19 of Christian Counseling Today from the online archives which are available to members only. Currently, AACC members can access volumes 20-24, but nothing before that.

The AACC member who related this information to me didn’t get a notice about the loss of this benefit but simply discovered it when attempting to access older issues.

The choice of volumes is interesting and may reflect an awareness of additional problems in those issues. Indeed, I am aware of concerns in at least one of those issues. I wonder if the AACC will recall those issues from members and/or the many libraries which subscribe to the periodical.

There are more examples of material taken verbatim from online sources into books by Clinton and co-authors which I have not yet published. Perhaps I will get to some of that tomorrow or next week.

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Image – Public domain

Tim Clinton’s Co-Author: I Always Check My Sources

Defending himself against charges of academic misconduct last week, American Association of Christian Counselors president and Trump advisor Tim Clinton blamed a former employee for lifting material from other sources for use in articles which carried Clinton’s byline. Even though AACC’s code of ethics discourages ghostwriters, Clinton blamed an employee who functioned in that manner for material in his articles which came from other sources.

One online article by Clinton, “Press On,” (cached)* which contained plagiarized material was first published in the book Ignite Your Faith by Clinton and Max Davis. Because I wanted to find out how the copied content got into “Press On,” I contacted Davis for comment (I also contacted Clinton with no response).

When I contacted Davis, he said he did not have any part in writing the devotional “Press On.” He added that he always checks his sources and “never once in all my years as a writer has this happened” referring to copied content ending up in one of his books.

He also wanted me to know that he was not the fired AACC employee blamed by Clinton for academic misconduct to the Christian Post.

*The same article with the title “Strive to Excel” was once posted on Dr. James Dobson’s Family Talk website. It is archived here.

 

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(In the image, Tim Clinton is above Donald Trump’s head, to the right of V.P. Pence, Image: Johnnie Moore’s Twitter feed, )

Tim Clinton: Who You Gonna Blame? Ghostwriters!

On Wednesday, I documented that 59% of a 2005 column with American Association of Christian Counselors president Tim Clinton’s byline in Christian Counseling Today came from op-eds by Chuck Colson and Pete DuPont. When asked by the Christian Post about the matter, Clinton through his spokesman Jimmy Queen again blamed a former employee for lifting the material.

For the president of the AACC, this defense seems like a leap out of the frying pan into the fire. Blaming the ghostwriter lets Clinton maintain his “zero tolerance for plagiarism” but creates another conflict with his own code of ethics. Enter AACC code of ethics 1-880-c:

1-880-c: Avoiding Ghost Writers
Christian counselors shall resist use of ghostwriters, where the name of a prominent leader-author is attached to work substantially or wholly written by someone else. Authors give due authorship credit to anyone who has substantially contributed to the published text. Order of authorship should typically reflect the level of substantive contribution to a work.

Nearly 60% of Clinton’s column came from material we now know he did not write himself. He may have rearranged a few sentences but most of it was taken verbatim from op-eds Chuck Colson and Pete DuPont. Thus, even if Clinton didn’t know where that material came from, he knew it didn’t come from him. Mr. Plagiarizing Ghostwriter should have gotten first author credit if the AACC code of ethics is a guide.

Other Problems with the Defense

Clinton’s column, “Judicial Tyranny and the Loss of Self-Government” contains personal elements clearly intended to communicate that he is speaking in the first person. He begins with a personal anecdote involving his children. He wrote, “I don’t often write about political matters” leading the reader to believe that the words to come are his words about political matters.

In the middle of the two borrowed sections of text, he or someone inserts a connecting paragraph. Then at the end, it is Clinton writing again about a CounselAlert sent out in April 2005 on the issue of voting rules for judicial appointments. Only Clinton knows what he knew. However, if the situation is actually about ghostwriting, then I wonder what happens now?

The issue of ghostwriting came up in a big way for evangelicals during the demise of Mars Hill Church when Mark Driscoll’s “content management system” came into public view. No doubt many big name Christian authors use them. However, the AACC took a stand and said Christian counselors don’t do it. Now we learn that apparently at least one of them does and has done so for years.

What now?

Check a side-by-side comparison of Clinton’s “Judicial Tyranny and the Loss of Self-Government” and the op-eds by Colson and DuPont.

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(In the image, Tim Clinton is above Donald Trump’s head, to the right of V.P. Pence, Image: Johnnie Moore’s Twitter feed, )

The Silent Clean Up Continues

(In the photo above, Tim Clinton is above Donald Trump’s head, to the right of V.P. Pence, Image: Johnnie Moore’s Twitter feed, )

As Professor Aaron New documents today on Twitter, AACC owner and Trump evangelical advisor Tim Clinton continues to quietly clean up his citation problems. Good thing too because failure to attribute your work properly is a big problem in professional circles. Look at what the American Counseling Association code of ethics (2014) says:

G.5.b. Plagiarism
Counselors do not plagiarize; that is, they do not present another person’s work as their own.

G.5.c. Acknowledging Previous Work
In publications and presentations, counselors acknowledge and give recognition to previous work on the topic by others or self.

Let’s see what Dr. New brings us today.

If you look at the right side of the tweet, you will see Dan Allender’s name added recently. This has happened since my articles on Clinton’s citation inadequacies have appeared. According to New’s count, 28 articles were on Clinton’s website (owned by AACC which is owned by Clinton) without the true author listed.

Good for Clinton that he is getting those authors names up there. I just wonder how he is going to address the other issues, such as the one I wrote about yesterday. The print article can’t be withdrawn and corrected quietly.

Prof. New asks a good question: Are any AACC members concerned about this? Mainly I have heard from people who don’t feel they can speak up because they fear repercussions. It remains to be seen how seriously Christian counselors take the matters raised over the past week.

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