Scott Giarrocco wrote a good response to my recent post concerning Grant's
photo on the Internet.
 
Legal interpretation is a field in which reasonable men and women can, and
do, disagree.  Yet, I think that Scott's response urges caution to the
extent that it causes self-censorship, which is as damaging as any other
kind of censorship.
 
By the way, I ran the original posts past my journalism law professor, and
my political science constitutional law professor, who is fairly well known
in his field (Craig R.  Ducat).  They disagreed on one point, which I will
discuss below, but otherwise agreed with my position.  One, as long as the
authors of the web page print only the truth, they have nothing to fear.
Perhaps the most crucial part of libel is showing that *lies* were
published.  I wrote in my post that I assumed that the web page authors
intended in sticking with the truth.  That way, they had nothing to fear.
 
Two, Scott brings up the issue of Firestone v. Time, and how it pertains
with vortex (or limited) public figures.  Yet, Firestone was a woman
defending her interests in divorce court, and had no choice otherwise.
Grant obviously made a conscious decision to go legal with the issue.  So,
while I don't think the cases are similar enough, Scott was wise to bring up
the case, since it is important to the issue at hand.
 
So, is Grant a public figure?  The Supreme Court has designed the following
test:
 
1.) the alleged defamation must involve a public controversy; 2.) the person
suing for libel must have voluntarily participated in the discussion of that
controversy; and 3.) the person suing for libel has tried to affect the
outcome of the controversy.
 
I would say Grant fits this definition.  Yet, this is were my two professors
disagreed.  So, I realize that it is a legal point that is still hotly in
debate.  Were my professors and I agree, however, is that this issue is
actually irelevant to the proposed web page, as long as the truth and only
the truth is printed.
 
Scott also mentions that he wishes to protect BIG from a costly libel suit.
This is actually irelevant to the issue at hand, which concerns people
wishing to set up a web page independent of the FML.
 
Yet, Scott makes an excellent point concerning that with lawsuits, even the
winners can come out huge financial losers.  That is one of the ugliest
aspects of our legal system, and one which I could passionately discuss in a
more appropriate forum.
 
Scott reminds us that the First Amendment was meant to protect us from prior
restraint.  Yet, his pleas for extreme caution in the face of potential
lawsuits create the prior restraint from which our Constitution supposedly
protects us.  It's a fine line we must tread, and there is no legal
consensus to help guide us.
 
Yet, there is one element that is beyond legal reproach, and that's the
truth.  Stick with that, and you should have no problems.
 
        Markos and Zoe
 
p.s. This will be my last post on the issue, since it has only passing
relevance to ferret owners.
 
e-mail: [log in to unmask]
 
[Moderator's note: The opinions have been interesting, but now we're
drifting from the topic.  I hope it had the effect of suggesting that anyone
putting this guy's mug an a web page seek legal council, and thus we don't
need to discuss it here further.  BIG]
[Posted in FML issue 1613]