**Moved to the general section**
Hello there,
As I am still a member of this forum, I thought I'd have to post my reasons for removing myself from a recent thread, and as it stands why I have to distance myself from this forum.
Journalists are often trained in libel law. Many of us have a heightened and perhaps enlarged sense of what can be considered actionable, and know the outcome of those actions. For the record, I was first trained in libel in the mid-1990s as a result of the Walker Wingsail Systems vs. Yachting World lawsuit (damages £1.5m + costs), and followed a series of substantial out-of-court settlements.
Put simply, libel is the publication of statements that exposes a person to injury or ridicule in the eyes of reasonable people.
A statement made that potentially damages the reputation of a person, or the office that person holds, or a company, are not libelous if the statement is true and thereby justified and fair comment. However the onus is on the person making the statement to demonstrate justification.
'True' in this context does not allow for 'a man in the pub told me' arguments. It doesn't even allow for 'I know it because everyone knows it' arguments... if you lack first-hand, documented statements that defend your position, the statement is defamatory. Although the defense that the statement was made in 'good faith' and 'reasonable belief' that the statement was true can be used, mistake of fact is very difficult to prove if you are stating supposition as fact.
Group defamation is usually harder to prosecute; if you say "all journalists are corrupt", those reasonable people cannot identify a specific group of journalists you are attempting to defame. Saying "the team at Shopping Bag Aficionado are idiots" is a group defamation, but again unlikely to be considered defamation because the opinion could be considered fair comment. However, saying "the editor of Shopping Bag Aficionado is corrupt" impugns both the position and the character of person holding that position and is potentially actionable.
Incidentally, suggesting a person is lax in the execution of their job without evidence to confirm that suggestion is one of the most common 'accidental' libels (the most common is 'getting it a bit wrong' - if someone has 15 convictions for robbery, but is on trial for armed robbery, calling them an 'armed robber' before conviction will land you in court... even if they are subsequently convicted for armed robbery). If you say 'the reviewer at Shopping Bag Aficionado got it wrong'... that's opinion and fair comment. Even saying 'the reviewer at Shopping Bag Aficionado got it wrong because he never opened the bag' demands evidence (the unopened bag).
Quoting a defamatory statement, even to quash that rumour, or to show both sides of an argument, usually ends up being just as defamatory.
As an editor of a consumer magazine, I have to distance myself from any such potential actionable statements, because they travel upstream, cause a lot of collateral damage and are also breathtakingly expensive. Having been through it once (even at one remove), I have no intention of repeating the experience, especially based on the actions of a third party.
As I also have no desire to see someone end up losing their house or business over making ill-conceived statements, I'm making this post.
I urge everyone to remember that publishing online is still publishing and if a statement is posted on a forum, it can be read by a reasonable person who is not a member of this forum simply by putting the right terms into a search engine.
If you want to know more (and I think you should), I recommend this site:
http://www.aubi06.dsl.pipex.com/law/libelcheck.shtml
Finally, if in the unlikely event that a magazine called Shopping Bag Aficionado exists, I apologise unreservedly for any unintentional slight on the unimpeachable reputation of the editorial staff of that fine (if probably imaginary) magazine. In my defense, I made a comprehensive search prior to producing examples and found that no such magazine currently exists.