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Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?

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Re: Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?

#41

Post by ummonk »

Beltalowda wrote: post #32
squokko wrote: post #11

If 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; i…

"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."

Countries that extend defamation to opinions tend to apply a reasonable person or similar standard to the opinions.

Re: Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?

#42

Post by gnicholas »

mbg721 wrote: post #5
tptacek wrote: post #2

Fascinating: this is a defamation case that could conceivably turn on the conventional interpretation of specific tarot cards. You can make up a completely batshit but purely subjective reason to accuse someone of a crime, and the "subjective" part insulates you from liability, but if there's a shred of objectivity in the claim to latch onto, and you lied about it, you can be liable.

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?

From what I recall of law school, the reasonable person standard is most common in tort law, and specifically in negligence cases. These involve car accidents, trip and fall, etc.

There is no general overarching rule that applies a reasonable person standard to all areas of law.

Re: Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?

#43

Post by nitwit005 »

I doubt this is relevant, as she apparently posted a series of videos with the claims. This was not a one off card reading that she could claim simply a valid interpretation.

While there might not be precedent for this particular issue, quite a number of people have claimed God, or some other religious idea was behind their actions. Never seems to help their case.

Re: Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?

#44

Post by tarotuser »

Greetings. I'm rather new here and a friend steered me towards here.

I'm a pagan, and unfortunately this has caused a rather ugly stir in our communities.

In recent (last 1.5 years), TikTok has been the primary contributing 'terrible occultists, witches, and pagans'. Their practices equate to what we would describe as cargo cultism, commercialism, and general lack of any understanding what we do. Most of us look down on the TikTok types, and we believe for good reason.

Now, tarot. For those of you unaware, it's seen as a 78 card (standard card deck, with an extra card between jack and queen, and a new suit called trumps) divinatory method to be able to answer questions we have in our practices. There's 2 major ways to do a reading : mechanically, and intuitively.

This person was doing an intuitive reading... Which is what makes this even uglier. And if it were just a mechanistic reading, you still have to deal with slightly different symbology changing the card descriptions.

Long story short, they should have never did a reading about someone else without permission. And they should have never did this publicly. And they should have never accused anyone from a reading. At all.

It is a spiritual practice, however. Basically it took a practice many of use privately, and brought it out in the open as some criminal tool... But without any of the science.

Re: Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?

#45

Post by mind-blight »

saurik wrote: post #17
squokko wrote: post #11

If 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.

Some things that are bad are not so bad that we should make them impossible to do. Just because you might be a jerk to do something, doesn't mean it should be enforceable by armed people with guns. Is it really insufficient (or somehow so difficult) for us to simply dislike people who are jerks rather than try to put them in jail / fine them?

It gets complicated when a jerk has a platform that reaches a bunch of other jerks, some of whom go on to do things like stalking, harassment, and death threats. That's why Alex Jones was fined a billion dollars.

Re: Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?

#46

Post by jakeinspace »

tptacek wrote: post #2

Fascinating: this is a defamation case that could conceivably turn on the conventional interpretation of specific tarot cards. You can make up a completely batshit but purely subjective reason to accuse someone of a crime, and the "subjective" part insulates you from liability, but if there's a shred of objectivity in the claim to latch onto, and you lied about it, you can be liable.

How great would it be if the defendant were forced to perform a tarot reading on the stand? I’d pay good money to see that.

Re: Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?

#47

Post by Sniffnoy »

SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #8

I’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?

The thing you're missing here is that "opinion" is a term of art in this context, and has a meaning broader than its usual one. Importantly, for these purposes, any inference is considered "opinion".

So "Professor Scofield plotted and ordered the murders" could be a statement of fact, but "The evidence I've shown you demonstrates that Professor Scofield plotted and ordered the murders" is necessarily a statement of opinion in the legal sense.

Re: Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?

#48

Post by tptacek »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #40
tptacek wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

The idea here is that it is at least conceivable, if not especially likely, that you could generate some evidence that the Tarot reader just made things up on the fly, claiming to have read something in Tarot cards completely inconsistent with normal Tarot interpretation or their own previous readings; there might just be evidence that they deliberately made it up (we know they made it up, but you might find evidence in the cards, which is aneurystically ironic).

Re: Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?

#49

Post by tptacek »

gnicholas wrote: post #42
mbg721 wrote: post #5

Earlier 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?

From what I recall of law school, the reasonable person standard is most common in tort law, and specifically in negligence cases. These involve car accidents, trip and fall, etc. There is no general overarching rule that applies a reasonable person standard to all areas of law.

Defamation is a tort. :P

Re: Can a Tarot card reading be defamatory?

#50

Post by bagels »

SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #8

I’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 think the claim is more like "My tarot cards told me that ..."
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