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PaperclipPerfector  10mo ago (text post)   26432 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 15, 2024

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Epps' suit against Fox News will be allowed to continue, suggesting the possibility that he could win millions of dollars.

On a purely academic level, I wonder if there's an argument that, in isolation, "he's a fed!" is not actually defamatory. The claim is (I assume) that he was defamed as "working for the feds by encouraging protesters to enter the Capitol," but the second half of that claim is pretty evidently true from the video evidence. Is the first half alone, even if it is false, a negative claim about a person? I'm sure it is to some people, but it seems fraught to allow a court (in which most of the professional parties probably see "working for the government" as a positive, or at worst neutral claim) to generally rule as defamation something that only a small minority actually find disparaging. The overall claim is probably disparaging to the government itself, but I'm not aware of any law against alleging government conspiracies.

Sure, I believe he's received a bunch of hate mail for these accusations, but I'm pretty sure that's par for the course of anyone who achieves that level of infamy.

Can’t find the court docs at the moment, but

In court papers, Epps described chilling harassment after pro-Trump media commentators suggested he could have been planted in the crowd by FBI agents to incite violence and embarrass the Trump movement: a busload of Trump supporters driving past his wedding venue during nuptial ceremonies and shouting threats, shell casings appearing on his property, and strangers telling him in person to “sleep with one eye open.” Epps said the harassment forced him and his wife to sell their business and move to another state.

If he is able to prove financial damage to his business, that’d probably satisfy the legal requirement.

If the statement is not defamatory as a matter of law, damages don't matter.

Sorry, I was unclear.

I think the alleged harms to Epps’ business satisfy the fourth element of defamation. I’m not commenting on the other three.

https://revolver.news/2023/07/against-all-odds-rap-legend-tupac-shakur-shot-down-ray-epps-defamation-claim-against-tucker-and-revolver-news/

Revolver news agrees with you.

Turns out that there's actually legal precedent that calling someone a government agent doesn't count as defamation.

The counsel for Tupac’s estate contended that the allegedly defamatory statements at issue were not capable of defamatory meaning. In other words, they contended that accusing someone of working for the federal government may harm that person’s reputation with some, but it nonetheless cannot be considered defamation from the standpoint of law.

Turns out that there's actually legal precedent that calling someone a government agent doesn't count as defamation.

I think you'll find there's some reason this precedent doesn't apply in the instant case.

I think that's a fairly likely outcome. Hell, given Fox's actions as of late I wouldn't be surprised if they throw the case and just give in anyway because the legal settlement would be worth paying in exchange for the political outcome.

I think the 'fed' modifier turns it from "honest person encouraging protestors to enter the Capitol (true)" to "dishonest person sets other people up to get arrested." It's not the working for the government that is defamation, it's the claim that he orchestrated a false flag.

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