Imagine an office – all your colleagues and all your supervisors and anyone with a say in your tenure prospects, your research funding and your publications – where everyone organizes their careers in such a way that a “human rights” commission would have no reason to object. Their teaching practices, their research, their political views; everything they think and do including and especially their “private” lives from the television they (do not) watch to the fast food they (do not) eat to the sex lives they (do not) allow themselves to have. Even the concept of a “private” life dismissed as reactionary and/or illusory and in any event subject to the scrutiny of any undergraduate with internet access and a grudge. That is the life I escaped. Even a couple years after the fact I find it a surprise when my internal censor warns me against writing something for fear of losing my livelihood and my career and I realize I have already crossed that bridge, burned it and done a little dance some time ago. It is a small price for freedom compared to the price so many have already paid for me. But it is something.”
The bigger picture is slowly beginning to sink in.
The CHRC reach into the realm of our impolite medium treads upon the internet’s most sacred ground, something we have taken for granted since the earliest days of Usenet – the right to call each other names.
“First, they came for KKKate, and I did not speak out because I was a leftard.”
the thing is, that if kate’s case gets tossed then precedent is set. i’ve gone through comments at major news outlets, ctv the globe etc, and seen sda quality comment threads, including some base and potentially actionable stuff. if kate gets walloped, there’s a certain sense that she had it coming from a purely combative and ideological perspective. that said it would contribute to a chilling effect on the blogs. many of us would need to reconsider our approaches.
I wonder how many of you have paused to consider your own databases, and the google caches they lurk in? Have you thought about how you might be called to account for readers who have accused me of being bought and paid for by politicians? Of being a “Nazi sympathizer”? Who’ve denigrated my artwork? Who have posted fabricated “quotes” they’ve attributed to me?
Because, in case you haven’t noticed, there’s really no way for me to lose. I may shell out a few dollars over this complaint, but the precedent will be a gold mine. The Canadian left have provided me the fodder for a full time career as a plaintiff.
So, hurry now.
Purge.
But, set that aside for the moment – have your commentors accused Brian Mulroney of criminal activity? Jean Chretien? Grant Devine? Every premier in the history of British Columbia? They’re all private citizens, they all know good lawyers.
And as a commentor accessing this medium – what then? Welcome to your new role as “Exhibit A”. Will the blog owner trade your identity for a free pass?
Someone in media asked me in private conversation why this issue is so heated, so personal. I answered, “Then, you don’t understand. This is an existential threat to the Canadian blogosphere. This is not about what we say – this is about who we are.”
ahh, true west – is your self-esteem being threatened? You, the noble lord-of-the-manor,can’t handle criticism and so are threatening me that you’ll continue to comment against me, whom you define as a peasant? How’s that for mixing with the farmyard…
heh. Take it elsewhere, truewest. That includes your incredible pompous self-asserted superiority and your endless semantic twists.
Now, Glenn Reynolds is an esteemed legal mind. You, on the other hand, are not. I concur with Vitruvius’ conclusion about you.
So – Cheers.
ET,
Kind of missing point here, arent you? You can whine about my tone all you want, but that doesn’t change the fact that you got the law wrong — ridiculously, absurdly wrong in fact.
Indeed, you have repeatedly mistated or misinterpreted the law, without apology or correction. So, I’m sorry, but this isn’t about my self-esteem at all. It’s about the sloppiness and intellectual dishonesty with which you approach this particular subject.
So yes, if you continue to post your ill-informed musings on the law, I will continue to point out your gross errors. That’s not a threat — interesting that you would view correction and criticism of your factual errors as a “threat” — but an attempt to prevent you from misleading others.
Cheers yourself
PS I’m sure Glenn Reynolds is just dripping with esteem and his description of the public figure doctrine is accurate enough . That doesn’t change the fact that his pronouncement on this particular aspect of American defamation law have no application — zero, nada, zilch — in this country. You might as well cite shariah law to make your point.
I don’t have a dog in the fight with regard to Truewest, but inasmuch as regards his comments about civil and criminal defamation and Glenn Reynolds, he is correct.
skip – we aren’t talking about current laws in Canada; we are talking about how they should be changed – and why.
Therefore, truewest’s pompous claims of ‘the way it is now’ are utterly irrelevant. As is truewest.
ET,
Since you clearly don’t understand what the laws are now, you’re hardly in a position to suggest how they should be amended. And since you don’t seem able or willing to do the research that would allow you to understand why the laws came to be the way they are now, any suggestions you might make are, to borrow your words, entirely irrelevant.
Indeed, given your woeful record of legal interpretation, from your inaccurate analysis of the Charter to your imaginative (but ill-informed) parsing of s.13(1) of the Canadian Human Rights Act, the notion that you have any credible idea to bring to the reform of defamation law is laughable.
Posted by: Friend of USA at April 13, 2008 11:54 AM
The Grasshoppa has learned well.
Hugger
Aye lad, funny how that works.
Posted by: Vitruvius at April 12, 2008 11:46 PM
Don’t know if you caught my earlier comments on lawyers and the big dupe, but…
See what I mean?
Even the wannabe’s, and the soon to be’s just can’t help themselves. Fortunately it’s not billable.
Ach Cap’n, I’m given her all she’s got!
Second Star to the right, straight on til morning.
Hugger
truewest (or is it NS?) you always write as if you’ve just swallowed a lemon. Sour, malicious, mean-spirited, dried up…Ah well.
As for your legal expertise, if I recall correctly, at one time, you affirmed you were NOT a lawyer. So, stuff it. My opinion is equal to, and in my non-lemon-aid view, better than yours.
Now, I’ll take vitruvius’ advice – and he, by the way, is someone here whose intellect, knowledge, wit and analytic ability are in the top 1% of everyone — I’ll take his advice and no longer answer or interact with you. Cheers. Do you really need that lemon?
Warman should sue Al Gore for inventing the Internet, which has caused people not like Warman.
ET,
I said I wasn’t a lawyer. Never said I hadn’t studied law.
In any case, this isn’t about opinions. It’s about whether or not you actually understand the law you propose to reform or whether, like Vitruvius, you propose to rewrite it from scratch, on the back of an envelope. And do so without concerning youself with 400 years of jurisprudence or indeed, the pesky detail of the state of the law today. (Which doesn’t sound very conservative to me, but I digress).
There is no question that the internet and the blogosphere raise new issues in defamation law. In addressing those issues, courts and legislatures will have to strike a balance between the protection of reputation and freedom of speech and the press. They will have to address various technical issues, such as whether proprietors are liable for comments posted on their sites or whether you can be sued for linking to a defamatory post. But courts and legislatures have struck that balance and addessed those issues in past. When they do so again, I expect and hope that they will be guided by well-established legal principles and not by the goofy scribblings you and Vitruvius has set out above.
The Reynolds article makes some interesting points, but he tap-dances around the central reason why slander and libel are treated differently: permanance. Slander is fleeting and therefore damages cannot be presumed. Libel sticks around and can be presumed to cause harm.
In that sense, his suggestion retraction and apology should be a full answer in the blogosphere makes some sense, but only if it can be shown that as many people saw the retraction as the libel, which could arguably rebut any presumption of harm. The rest is less persuasive. A unretracted defamatory statement posted on the internet remains accessable and searchable for years to come. Reynolds may see bloggers as being less authoritative than newspaper, but those who run and frequent them these little echo chambers and who denounce the MSM at every turn, have a different.
Incidentally, it should be noted that Reynolds’s argument would have precious little effect on the Warman defamation suit. While some bloggers may have removed the impugned allegations, I don’t recall seeing a retraction and apology (other than in the Post) and, indeed, some of the defendants continue to publicly assert the truth of the allegation.
If a blogger insists on the truth of something the claimant says is a lie, he or she better be prepared to prove the truth of the statement, just as a print or broadcast journalist would be required to do.
Greg,
when you say
The Grasshoppa has learned well.
I honestly do not know what you mean.
Let me explain, for the first half of my life I only spoke French so there are occasionally some expressions in English I do not get.
If Greg will not, could some kind soul help me with the “grasshopa” comment?
Friend, I think it may be this fable:
http://www.dltk-teach.com/fables/grasshopper/mstory.htm
Friend of USA,
From the TV show Kung Fu (I think it was a 70’s show) … the master called the student grasshopper.
I’m going to finally close this thread out of my tabs, and I must say, it’s been a slice, thanks for your interlocution folks. After all is said and done, I have to return to the last sentance of the final version of my essay on this matter as referenced above, which reads: I still think that a rush to judgment, unless one’s hand is forced by temporal circumstances, is a bad idea, at least when considered from the perspective of one’s own good. I think I’ll stand on that.
This is yet another reason the U.N. should never be given control of the internet.
America might get a little weird with the copyright laws, but they’ll never censor political speech like Canada is doing or the U.N. has proposed.
Posted by: truewest at April 13, 2008 7:22 PM
Personally, I think it’s you who don’t get it. Jurisprudence be damned. That’s exactly what’s wrong and what’s at stake here. Do you understand the KISS principle? Hopefully, as that is what needs to be applied and fought for.
Its when the suits carrying microsofts latest version of your life in a box, begin to work their magic of convolution and obscuring everything, that Freedom becomes the casualty.
People like this HRC affiliate will forever cry foul, and look for new ways to do so, particularly when they see a greater opportunity to farm.
He’s a big boy, and can sling it pretty good, so what’s stopping him from defending himself on the multiple available internet forums? If he feels he is so aggrieved, then give back. Anyone who has an average ability to write can rebuke outlandish statements intended solely for the purpose of character assassination. It’s like shooting fish in a barrel.
You seem fixated on the seriousness of blog entries and there effects. I don’t presume to speak for all people, just a sizable segment that matters. That being critical thinkers. Believe half of what you read and less of what you hear, was spoken by a true optimist. If you want to somewhat effectively address truth and lies, more focus on Government please. People actually believe a lot of what they say. Flip side is, those who are so easily convinced by low mentality attacks already came to the table with their minds made up, and in reality, few of them read a whole lot anyway, especially about this type of thing.
In the end, the true intent of an individual will show through the dirt and mud slinging. I would suggest a good dose of class for this aggrieved soul, it works wonders in convincing people that you are who and what you say you are.
For example, I have heard bad things about this blog and Ms. Kate. Is one of the reasons why I came here, to find out the truth for myself. The TRUTH! Yes Charlotte, I can handle the truth.
Hugger
Kate, I hope you will take any defense money that is left over and sue those who have called you a Nazi, a racist, and KKKate.
With the rate of donations from across the world, you’ll surely have a massive war chest at your disposal. This will get really interesting, really quickly.
Greg,
I’m sorry but I think you’re being unrealistic and cavalier in suggesting the “Jurisprudence be damned”. If people are telling lies about Warman – and I presume you’re speaking of Warman here — why should he have to spend his life wandering from blog to blog, denying those allegations in front of a hostile audience? Defamation law recognizes that we have the right to a reputation and the right to redress when that reputation is damaged by falsehoods. The medium in which the damage occurs is irrelevant. Indeed, as we’ve seen in the Warman case, the allegation can move quickly and easily from blog to paper.
I sense from your earlier post that you fear a floodgate effect, with defamation lawyers filing suits in response to every slight on the internet. That fear is, I think, unfounded. Defamation suits that go to trial are seldom if ever profitable cover their costs; damages awards are generally modest in Canada and costs awards cover only a small portion of legal fees. In short, you’d have to be crazy or rich to make a hobby of filing defamation actions.
Thanks Jan and thanks Ural,
Although to be honest, I am still not clear on what Greg was trying to say.
so I will just pretend I get it that he was paying me a compliment and leave it at that!
Posted by: truewest at April 14, 2008 9:49 AM
In cases where the scope of interest is large, then perhaps the person in question might be obliged to spend some time pasting a given message, blog to blog. Nature of the beast. Few things are perfect. If addressed on the largest forums, which would be the targeted audience, trickle down would take care of the rest that are of consequence. Redress should be, and is usually afforded by the same means as were the offending statements.
These suits may well not be currently profitable for those who bring them, but are in fact profitable for the Lawyers. One must sow the seeds, before one can reap the bounty.
The overall effect of this type of restriction, is not dissimilar to the internet filtering, monitoring and censoring software that exists and has been provided to countries like China and Iran by companies such as Yahoo, Google and Cisco.
So, the choice seems clear, not unrealistic, nor cavalier. Do we wish to accept further restrictions on access to information and freedom of speech as exists in the aforementioned countries? To further that thought, do we want to hide xenophobes, racists, hate mongers and opportunists or do we want to know where to find them? You never know, rational thought might just have an effect on some of them, or more likely some who visit their sites. We will never have the chance to do that, if they are kept from circulating their material. These sentiments will always exist, better to air them and try to deal with it, than to suppress it and feed the anger.
In other areas of the blogosphere there is also reward in free access, such as you can learn a lot about a public figure, particularly if they choose to run an open blog. That’s a good thing, as it strips away many previously strictly guarded fallacies.
So, do we speak to our elected representatives on this subject, and clearly put forward demands supporting freedom on the internet, or do we do the Canadian? Show our bellies and hope for a scratch.
If Jurisprudence is allowed to exercise its long standing patterns, then I expect we should prepare for this medium to be changed forever. Consider how many blogs and open forums would disappear under the weight of broad changes in liability.
Greg,
Since you appear to believe in the power of the blogosphere to cure defamatory statements (as if by magic) perhaps you would like to try a little experiment.
Provide me with a legally executed release allowing me, or a person of my choosing, to post a defamatory statement of fact about you at, say, five blogs of my choosing. The release will specify that I am allowed to use your real name and that there shall be no limits placed on the words I may use or the sort of accusation I may level. It will further specify that you have consented to this extraordinary waiver of your right to take legal steps to protect your reputation because you believe that the internet should be free from legal constraints of any kind, and that the proper and only answer to any defamation is the right of reply in the forum where the impugned statement was posted.
We can sort out the precise wording later, but you get the drift. Let me know