>But I don't think there IS any legal protection in this situation. This does >not even approach the legal definition of slander, so a discussion about >possible legal action is over before it begins. I don't think an _opinion_ >can be slanderous. It can be malicious, hateful, even against the law if it >promotes violence, but that would fall under a different statute than >slander.
A malicious statement that causes harm to another comes under slander (oral) or libel (written). It may or may not hold up in court, but those are the laws that would govern it. I'm not sure you could defend Imus' statement as "opinion" versus outright slander. To stand as opinion it still needs to be something you believe as true...certainly hard to defend calling them "hos" on that regard. You can also not defend statements by saying they were intended as a joke, if anyone other than the person being attacked found it defamatory, which was certainly the case here as well. Again, it'd probably be hard to prove this in a court case...because the law does put the burden of proof on the plaintiff, and it certainly is a case that rides the fence either way. But I do think it does meet the definition of slander regardless. BTW - there are others that think the girls would have a good case for slander...Newt Gingrich for one. Aggh, am I agreeing with Gingrich?? I do find it interesting that we've changed so much in the last 20 years or so as to consider this kind of thing practically acceptable and the majority of people don't think Imus should be fired and a little slap on the wrist sufficient. Anyone remember Jimmy the Greek? He was fired after making a statement that blacks were better athletes due to being bred for strength during slavery. And you can bet there would have been a major uproar had he been not. Even though it was certainly just his opinion and not even intended to be malicious (just happened to be incredibly racist). ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Deploy Web Applications Quickly across the enterprise with ColdFusion MX7 & Flex 2 Free Trial http://www.adobe.com/products/coldfusion/flex2/?sdid=RVJU Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/message.cfm/messageid:232489 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.5
