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True Defamation [pdf]

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Re: True Defamation [pdf]

#51

Post by impossiblefork »

cess11 wrote: post #24
impossiblefork wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There aren't five cases in the Swedish court system where this has been relevant. There's only really been two cases. One is a case where a Swedish Christian Democrat politician brought up what the opposing council in a certain dispute had done previously and was convicted of defamation for this. Another is a case where a Swedish journalist was convicted of defamation for that he brought up that a guy who was suing p…

OK, so it's not actually a big problem. I can't identify the first case, the second sounds like Lamotte, and if so, it's not a journalist but a YouTube beggar catering to a neofascist audience. To me it's obvious that you either ignore or is unaware of constitutional limitations of the criminalisation of defamation, notably in ECHR and three constitutional laws. If you spread defamatory 'truths' in a free speech sett…

Lamotte is a very pure example of a journalist. The fact that he, during the later part of his career has been funded by small donations from the general public is only in his favour. That he worked for a large mass of people is something positive.

The ECHR is great and I believe that both these cases, if the people convicted had sued Sweden in the ECHR, then Sweden would have lost.

However, Swedish law is still Swedish law. Parliament is sovereign and can what it likes, legal as illegal. It'd be great to have an ECHR judgement against Sweden in one of these cases, it would have given weight to the need to change these laws into something with respect for truth, giving us a chance to throw away the tradition of the courts to regard reputation as something belonging to a person, when reputation is other people's beliefs. There should only be protection against reputational harm from falsehoods.

Re: True Defamation [pdf]

#52

Post by arh68 »

Thoroughly wordy; this could have been 3 pages. Deeply unconvincing, to boot. (am I defaming the author by saying their writing sucks?) I'm more convinced "true defamation" is not defamation at all.

> as long as we understand the “opinions” involved in people’s reputation to be something formed more or less involuntarily as a consequence of receiving information being circulated about them.

What? Involuntarily? My opinions are certainly not formed involuntarily as a consequence of information. That's not something I can "understand".

One's reputation is not their property. How can my opinion be your property? Step off.

> It is wrong, all else equal, to knowingly damage an aspect of other people—like their face or their farm—in which they have strong interests.

No, it is not. If James Taylor has a strong interest in singing, it is not wrong to say he sings flat. It can be mean to criticize people for things they cannot change, but it's hardly wrong.

Re: True Defamation [pdf]

#53

Post by cess11 »

CrazyStat wrote: post #30
cess11 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Has the truth of Wallin's claims actually been established? IIRC that hasn't been done, and if so that case is irrelevant. And it's not an article, it's an opinion piece by a person who also claims to have been mistreated by Virtanen and helped spread Wallin's statements about him: https://www.svt.se/nyheter/granskning/ug/reportern-skrev-att... Edit: Should probably add that there is very little chilling from our def…

> Has the truth of Wallin's claims actually been established? IIRC that hasn't been done, and if so that case is irrelevant. No, it's absolutely not irrelevant. The court refused to consider whether Wallin's claims were true because it held that they would be criminally defamatory even if true. > In this case, despite Mr. Virtanen’s being one of the highest-profile writers at the country’s largest newspaper, the cour…

TFA is about the situation where something is true. It does not apply in this case.

Wallin has had every opportunity to "present a case for truth" but hasn't, and it's likely impossible to determine since the accusations were brought forward after a very long time. You should also know that Wallin has been harassing public servants because the authorities put down a dog that belonged to a friend of hers.

Here's a better source about the defamation case: https://www.nj.se/nyheter/aven-hovratten-foller-wallin-for-f...

Re: True Defamation [pdf]

#54

Post by cess11 »

arlort wrote: post #34
agolio wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know nothing of Swedish law, but do these rulings not conflict with Section 11 of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights?

The EU charter of fundamental rights does not apply to national law And the echr gives a lot of leeway to national laws

ECHR is law in Sweden and the constitution states that no law can be enforced that is contrary to the ECHR. This has consequences for when defamation is punishable.

Edit: And the EU charter is basically the ECHR but with some minor additions and it's own court.

Re: True Defamation [pdf]

#55

Post by cess11 »

impossiblefork wrote: post #51
cess11 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, so it's not actually a big problem. I can't identify the first case, the second sounds like Lamotte, and if so, it's not a journalist but a YouTube beggar catering to a neofascist audience. To me it's obvious that you either ignore or is unaware of constitutional limitations of the criminalisation of defamation, notably in ECHR and three constitutional laws. If you spread defamatory 'truths' in a free speech sett…

Lamotte is a very pure example of a journalist. The fact that he, during the later part of his career has been funded by small donations from the general public is only in his favour. That he worked for a large mass of people is something positive. The ECHR is great and I believe that both these cases, if the people convicted had sued Sweden in the ECHR, then Sweden would have lost. However, Swedish law is still Swed…

No, he is not. I don't think he's even had "utgivningsbevis" at any point in his career as YouTube beggar. Maybe he got one after he lost the defamation cases, I'm not sure. During this particular criminal venture he didn't even try to protect himself with the formalities around and practices in journalism, so it mostly shows your political sympathies when you claim he was one.

ECHR is applied in swedish courts, it's swedish law and constitutionally limits every other regular law.

Re: True Defamation [pdf]

#56

Post by CrazyStat »

cess11 wrote: post #53
CrazyStat wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Has the truth of Wallin's claims actually been established? IIRC that hasn't been done, and if so that case is irrelevant. No, it's absolutely not irrelevant. The court refused to consider whether Wallin's claims were true because it held that they would be criminally defamatory even if true. > In this case, despite Mr. Virtanen’s being one of the highest-profile writers at the country’s largest newspaper, the cour…

TFA is about the situation where something is true. It does not apply in this case. Wallin has had every opportunity to "present a case for truth" but hasn't, and it's likely impossible to determine since the accusations were brought forward after a very long time. You should also know that Wallin has been harassing public servants because the authorities put down a dog that belonged to a friend of hers. Here's a bet…

TFA is about defamation being actionable even if the accusation is true. This is exactly the case in Sweden generally and in Wallin’s case specifically. This is the basis on which Wallin’s case was decided. It applies perfectly to Wallin’s case.

I’m not sure why you are bringing up irrelevant facts to make Wallin look bad, so I won’t bother responding to them.

Re: True Defamation [pdf]

#57

Post by impossiblefork »

lupire wrote: post #18
impossiblefork wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>One upside is that the court does not have to delve into the question of truth as a part of legal proceedings. That's only an upside for lazy jurists. For the people who say true things and punished for them, it is only repression. I think should follow the basic view that we have always had: that the courts may consider anything they have knowledge of, the free evidence evaluation. The primacy of freedom of speech…

Religion? Religion is the one area of the life where truth s independent of proof. Some would say that truth without proof is my truth at all. Religion says that A's unverifiable statements are sacred and not allowed to be criticized, but B's are heretical and punished.

Perhaps, but at least in my religion lying is a way to not get to be part of the world in a far future state when it is put right.

Some religions say that unverifiable statements are sacred, but I don't have any kind scriptural infallibility in the variant of mine that I hold to. There's also an element in it equating God with truth, which would imply that going away from truth, or not seeking it, is going away from, or not seeking God.

I don't if this is unique to my religion, but if it is, then it fits me very well.

Re: True Defamation [pdf]

#58

Post by klyrs »

rsynnott wrote: post #37
xwatersy wrote: post #4

The book excerpt is very interesting because it focuses on private individuals defamed by groups . It argues that bringing up true statements about these private individuals that occurred a long time ago is also defamation. We see the opposite in public discourse. Mobbing private individuals is perfectly fine, criticizing organizations or their leaders (public figures) is punished harshly. Organizations destroying th…

Who are you seeing being punished for criticising organisations? In general it’s extremely difficult for an organisation to sue an individual for defamation.

I had the same question. The closest I'm aware of isn't organizations, but protected classes who can sue individuals for hate speech e.g. inciting violence against them.

Re: True Defamation [pdf]

#59

Post by cvalka »

Instead of reviving defamation, we should introduce the right of rebuttal. The right of rebuttal should replace defamation and libel lawsuits. It's compatible with the freedom of speech and the first amendment.

Re: True Defamation [pdf]

#60

Post by hilbert42 »

lukan wrote: post #47
hilbert42 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I will probably also not trust this guy in 2 years, unless he can convincingly explain why and how he changed." As you correctly say, 'there are no simple solutions to a problem this complex as human trust' but your last point is telling. Let's assume your villain provides proof well beyond reasonable doubt that he has actually changed for the better the fact remains that most people will always remember the fact—ev…

'try to please all and you'll please none'. Yes. But I do not want to try to please all. In case of doubt, for the (potential) victims. I am dealing right now with a case, where a pedophile tries to sneak into some semi public group activity/festival I am part of. The most frustrating thing is exactly this, some people saying the past where he was convicted is gone (or the conviction wrong) and he changed. Except it…

"And if the conviction would not exist officially anymore, I would have allmost nothing solid against him,..."

I reckon your example illustrates my point that people never quite forget any accusation whether true or false. And it's why I suspect it may be evolutionary or partly so (but I've no proof of that).

Why? Well, the person to whom you are referring would be perceived by the vast majority to be a menace to society and potentially very dangerous. His past actions and behavior were so hideous and unacceptable that they would never forget what he'd done. And I'd posit this makes sense from an evolutionary perspective—if we forget about his past actions and or hide facts about them then we do so at our peril. Keeping such knowledge is thus a survival instinct.

Even if it's demonstrated he's changed, it's nevertheless better people keep knowledge of his actions and behavior because there's always the possibility he's a recidivist or that he could become one in the future. Clearly, it's not in society's best interest to either hide his past actions or to forget about them entirely.

That doesn't contradict what I said earlier (and perhaps I should have been more precise in what I said). However, your case is extreme and it should always remain so. The other extreme is where some trivial misdemeanor could be blown up out of all proportion and ruin one's life.

Now let's consider a hypothetical case where someone's life can be ruined through a false accusation. Person A intensely dislikes person B for whatever reason (it's irrelevant) and secretly spreads false rumors that B is a pedophile when he is not. This example is NOT in the same league as say the one I used earlier where people called me a 'ratbag' behind my back, it's altogether something much more sinister and dangerous.

Person B cannot protect himself because he doesn't know where the rumor started (or cannot prove his suspicions, or he may be altogether unaware of the rumor and never learn its consequences) and therefore he cannot sue in a defamation case. And likely worse, those who hear or become aware of the false rumor about B will never forget that they've heard it. Moreover, those who become aware of the rumor may not inform B of the fact, B may never learn why he's always being shunned.

Mud sticks. What remains stuck on B may only be a tiny trace—and he may not even be aware it's there [if he's unaware of the rumor]—but nevertheless it's still there! And its presence has consequences.

Personally, it's hard for me to think of any action that's more despicable than what A did. I'll refrain from stating what punishment I'd dish out to A if I were ever given half a chance.

These examples only illustrate why defamation is such a difficult and vexed matter.

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