He claims defamation requires a statement of fact rather than an opinion. This very much depends on the particular jurisdiction. Defamation does extend to opinions, especially unreasonable opinions, in many countries.
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Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?
31–40 of 231 posts
Re: Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?
#32If something is not illegal but clearly bad, it's a lesson that we should change the law. It absolutely should not be legal to lob a completely baseless murder accusation at someone with no evidence.
The problem is that "changing the law" usually changes the legality of more than just the specific situation at hand.
So a law banning "my tarot cards tell me person X is a murderer" may also ban "I've carefully reviewed all the evidence, and I think person X is a murderer" where this is a reasonable accusation. And we can go from murder to "rape" or "abuse" etc.
You need to be very careful with this kind of stuff; in this particular case, yeah, I agree that it probably should be illegal. But at the same time: what else would this also make illegal, and wouldn't the cure be worse than the disease?
Re: Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?
#33If something is not illegal but clearly bad, it's a lesson that we should change the law. It absolutely should not be legal to lob a completely baseless murder accusation at someone with no evidence.
The law deserves more nuance than that: it's clearly bad that someone can baselessly accuse someone else of murder, but it's not clear that a weaker defamation standard produces better social outcomes overall. In this particular case: the woman making the baseless claims is pretty clearly mentally ill. Is society best served by her being fined or serving jail time? It's not clear to me that it is.
> In this particular case: the woman making the baseless claims is pretty clearly mentally ill
What makes you say that? I have admittedly only watched one or two of her videos, but I didn't see anything that clearly points to her being mentally ill as opposed to stupid and mean.
Re: Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?
#34Earlier quoted context omitted.
The law deserves more nuance than that: it's clearly bad that someone can baselessly accuse someone else of murder, but it's not clear that a weaker defamation standard produces better social outcomes overall. In this particular case: the woman making the baseless claims is pretty clearly mentally ill. Is society best served by her being fined or serving jail time? It's not clear to me that it is.
It seems pretty fucked up that if I’m being defamed, I can’t do anything about it if the person defaming me is mentally ill. Do I just have to sit there and watch my reputation go down the shitter, with potential loss of jobs, income, etc.? That doesn’t seem like a workable system to me.
This person seem have hundreds of followers on social media sites, which is hardlya big audience, and the claims are so obviously batshit insane that I don't think there will be much risk for loss of jobs, income, etc.
Re: Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?
#35I’m confused by the idea that “Professor Scofield plotted and ordered the murders” is a statement of opinion. It seems like a clear example of what I’d consider a factual claim; it’s objectively true or false based on what happened in the physical world. Why does the factualness of her reasons for speaking the claim affect whether the claim itself is defamatory?
I am not a lawyer but as I understand it you are allowed to have an opinion (eg saying "I think Sam cheated on his test"), but you're not allowed to imply you have inside knowledge or proof when you don't, eg saying "I saw Sam sneaking looks at his notes during the test", when in fact you didn't see anything.
You can shorten the first statemebt to "Sam cheated on the test" and argue in court that it is just stating a personal belief that you are entitled to. You don't have to preface every statement with "I think" or "I believe", those can be implied when you make a statement.
But if you said the second and included the detail of claiming to have seen it yourself, and later it comes out in court that you knowingly lied about having seen the alleged cheating and did not see anything, you can likely be held liable for defamation.
Re: Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?
#36Earlier quoted context omitted.
The law deserves more nuance than that: it's clearly bad that someone can baselessly accuse someone else of murder, but it's not clear that a weaker defamation standard produces better social outcomes overall. In this particular case: the woman making the baseless claims is pretty clearly mentally ill. Is society best served by her being fined or serving jail time? It's not clear to me that it is.
> In this particular case: the woman making the baseless claims is pretty clearly mentally ill What makes you say that? I have admittedly only watched one or two of her videos, but I didn't see anything that clearly points to her being mentally ill as opposed to stupid and mean.
That was based on her calling herself God in her profile plus, you know, thinking that you can solve a murder with tarot cards.
Re: Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?
#37Saying someone is an idiot is an opinion, there is no standard for this claim to be proven true or false. Saying that someone is a murderer is not an opinion, regardless of how you came to that conclusion, you are making a statement of fact. The US justice model is seriously janky if you can accuse random people of being murderers, ruin their lives, and get away with it. My opinion: whether your 'proof' comes from go…
OJ Simpson is a murderer.
Is that a fact or an opinion?
Should anyone who assets that have to defend it in court?
Re: Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
> In this particular case: the woman making the baseless claims is pretty clearly mentally ill What makes you say that? I have admittedly only watched one or two of her videos, but I didn't see anything that clearly points to her being mentally ill as opposed to stupid and mean.
That was based on her calling herself God in her profile plus, you know, thinking that you can solve a murder with tarot cards.
What if she doesn’t believe that she is God or that she can solve a murder with tarot cards? There are plenty of people on TikTok clearly performing as fictional characters.
Re: Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
That was based on her calling herself God in her profile plus, you know, thinking that you can solve a murder with tarot cards.
What if she doesn’t believe that she is God or that she can solve a murder with tarot cards? There are plenty of people on TikTok clearly performing as fictional characters.
Sure, that's possible. Maybe the court case will reveal that!
Re: Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't have anywhere near the background expertise that you do, but surely there's some kind of "reasonable person" standard at some point, right? Or is that just for juries in criminal trials?
Danger, Will Robbins. I have zero expertise; I'm an annoying nerd like most of the rest of us. I just read lots of law blogs. :) The post touches on this: In determining whether the audience is likely to interpret a statement as one of fact or one of opinion or hyperbole, courts consider a viewpoint of an audience familiar with the speaker, the forum, and the circumstances. The interesting thing here --- and this is…
But tarot reading is an appeal to a supernatural force; your religious beliefs do not need to conform to what is commonly believed by other people in order to be fully protected.