To think most of Mumsnet do not understand libel?

[antelopevalley]

It is really common on here now to see an accusation that what an MNer said is libellous. It rarely is.
Libel is not a criminal offence, it is a civil wrong. Someone has to take you to court.

Libel refers to damaging someone's reputation and character and is based on stating as fact, things that are untrue.
So if I said someone famous who is known to be in a happy marriage was having an affair with someone else, and that was false and I said it maliciously, it would probably be potentially libellous i.e. that famous person could take me to court. Although unless you have an online following, that is very unlikely to happen.

But if I said the famous person was sleazy and I would not trust them, they seem the kind to pretend to have a happy marriage in public while having multiple affairs, that is unlikely to be libellous. It is my opinion and is not presented as a fact. It is the second kind of statement that some MNers keep saying is libellous.

You can say legally that you consider a named politician or famous person to be untrustworthy, sleazy, a bit thick, etc. It is opinion.

So please stop telling people that what they have said is libellous. The only potentially libellous comments I have ever seen on MN (rare) are deleted when reported. The matter is just an opinion that you may or may not agree with.

People on MN especially use a lot of words they don’t understand. Probably because they have heard them and would like to shoehorn them into the conversation. Narcissist, gaslighting and anxiety for example.

OK but what's your point?

All sorts of words have a technical meaning that is different from their use in everyday conversation. Have you ever talked about your stomach, when you actually mean your abdomen, for example? Or about someone suffering from shock, medically, when you actually mean they are psychologically distressed? (shock has a very specific medical meaning that has nothing to do with feeling upset)

Also, your explanation of defamation is pretty simplistic and actually sounds more like defamation in the US. Because of the strong legal protections of free speech, opinion in the US can rarely be defamatory. It is not as clear cut in the UK, as Sally Bercow and others have found out, to their cost.

I'm with you there @sst1234

@MissLucyEyelesbarrow I said probably on purpose. Sally Bercow was clearly implying as fact a sexual abuse allegation. Simply because you do not say, x did this, but imply it through words, is not necessarily enough to protect you against libel.

Key to defending a libel claim is not just that what you said is true, but that you can prove in court, on the balance of probabilities, that what you said it true. And also that you have a ton of money in order to be able to defend that claim, because there’s no legal aid in the civil court.

I work as a journalist and see things on here every day that are defamatory, things that I’d be ripped
to pieces for it I stuck them in a newspaper (despite the fact the newspaper I work for likely gets lower PVs than MN)

@antelopevalley
This is all too common that people don’t know the definitions of terms they toss into their word salads.

It’s correct to say that people don’t understand libel particularly well which is fair enough if they aren’t lawyers. I don’t think you’ve got a great grasp either though, calling someone sleazy could be libellous in certain circumstances.

You're wrong to assume that an opinion is not defamatory because you have the right to hold it. Libel would require you to have published your view, and publishing an opinion is not protected in the same way as holding an opinion is.

Eg I can think that Ms XYZ is a thieving scumbag, but if I publish it in a social media post I am at risk of losing legal action if I can't back up my view with facts. (For the avoidance of doubt, Ms XYZ here is a fictional character, any similarity with any real person living or dead is entirely coincidental.)

Are you a lawyer, OP? Because you sound like someone who doesn't know a lot about defamation, with an overly simplistic view of the Law. You may think that saying someone is sleazy is not defamatory. Good luck proving that that is an honest opinion, and not a statement of fact.

Hope that first year law essay goes well. It's nice that you're keen.

About 90% of what’s spouted on here is nonsense though isn’t it

You only need to look at the threads on asking for management advice for a staff issue to see all the people saying “well I’d fire them / whatever” to see that people rarely have the correct experience or qualifications to give the advice they’re suggesting

Libel is an opinion that is why court cases are so long and expensive

If you say you believe someone is sleazy then they could very much take you to court for defamation as this could be damaging to their reputation and you would need to back it up with fact. There’s a difference between thinking something and putting it in writing.
I voiced the belief that someone was disingenuous a couple of years ago. I can’t go into further detail, but he pursued me for over a year, demanded copies of my income etc to prove I couldn’t pay him compensation. Sent a letter suggesting I pay him £7000 in damages.

Some of it was bluster on his part but he was a lawyer so I had no option but to seek legal advice which put me out of pocket anyway.

As it turned out I was right and his downfall came after his year to take me to court was up.

But after that I would always caution anyone against saying anything derogatory online because once you’ve written it it’s out there forever.

Disingenuous is a middle-class way of saying you are a liar.
@JaniceBattersby Our libel laws are far too harsh. I know you have to be able to prove it is true in court. But on MN people generally do this by posting a link to already published news articles. And MNHQ tend to accept that.

Are working class people not allowed to use big words?

YANBU

Although the list of things many MN users get 100% wrong is endless

I reported a post on a thread about the false allegations about our 'national treasures'. The post was genuinely libellous as it said the people involved (and cleared) had got away with what they were accused of. MN HQ didn't take it down, which really surprised me.

I am working class. I had never heard anyone use the word disingenuous until MN. In my world people just say you are lying.

The thing is that some things are clearly not intended as they are written and yet MN has been threatened with legal action.

E.g. some of the things said about Gina Ford could have been considered as libellous, but they were so ridiculous that presumably nobody would really have taken them seriously. Except her legal team did, and mn were threatened with legal action because people opposed to her methods of doing things.

For years Gina ford was not allowed to be discussed on here for fear of reprisal. And a lot of those posts were based on opinion only.

@hewouldwouldnthe I can't think of anyone cleared who people still say has got away with what they were accused of. I do know famous people who members of the public say they have been cleared, when in reality they have not been. The allegation has been dropped because of a lack of evidence, or even suspected government involvement.
Jimmy Saville was never charged for his crimes. Not being prosecuted means nothing.

@GhostFromTheOtherSide Anyone can threaten libel. Just as anyone can pay a solicitor to write a letter threatening court action. Some people do this all the time as it can be successful. Some people simply do not want the hassle of dealing with these kind of people.
But that does not mean it is actually libel.

The board police have spoken.

I don't think you are fully up to speed on defamation, OP. For one thing libel has to be written or otherwise published (including on social media). Your post repeats several times that you can "say" something derogatory that would be libel, but that is not the case - it would be slander if spoken in real life (not on social media). Also you can say or publish anything at all, even if derogatory and damaging to someone's reputation if you can prove that it is true. This would apply equally to anyone repeating or publishing a false allegation, including retweeting it. They would need to be prepared to prove it was true. Best not to risk having a defamation suit against you to sort it out in court.

I wouldn't say being disingenuous was exactly the same as lying. It's more when you use things out of context or use weasel words so to twist the meaning.

For example there was a thread on here about somebody who had unfortunately died during an activity, and a poster said that because they had been 1000 people who did the activity at at that location , and one person had died, the chance of dying during the activity was 1 in 1000.

That might be a defensible point but it was disingenuous because there hadn't been enough people doing it, and enough people who died, for that to be statistically meaningful by itself.

Reading with intrigue

Yes. I had someone online threaten to sue me for libel because someone had asked for advice on where to study a particular subject and I said I personally would would not trust a certain unaccredited college, who made up their own diplomas with a bargepole.

That was my opinion and I stood by it. It was not libel.