Your Autistic Life on Nostr: npub1zdp33…2vqv8 Opinion is generally protected, yes. So if you watch a tape of ...
npub1zdp33shl69xr0uq3x8n5gsjykq9upycwh6nqm02c3f6x0frrn0dq42vqv8 (npub1zdp…vqv8)
Opinion is generally protected, yes. So if you watch a tape of Alice telling someone else to go to hell, and you conclude that Alice is an asshole, and you claim that to the world, that's not defamation. You made a reasonable inference from what you saw.
If you watch a tape of Alice telling someone else to go to hell, and you infer from that she embezzled, you're in a much tougher situation.
Or to give a different example, you cannot slap an "in my opinion" at the start of your statement and then claim that it was just opinion.
"In my opinion, Alice embezzled $3,385,000 from Widgets Inc by writing false checks."
I'm sure the court would say that the later part of the statement is not a matter of opinion. Either you have proof of it or you don't. It is a statement of fact and actionable.
Opinion is generally protected, yes. So if you watch a tape of Alice telling someone else to go to hell, and you conclude that Alice is an asshole, and you claim that to the world, that's not defamation. You made a reasonable inference from what you saw.
If you watch a tape of Alice telling someone else to go to hell, and you infer from that she embezzled, you're in a much tougher situation.
Or to give a different example, you cannot slap an "in my opinion" at the start of your statement and then claim that it was just opinion.
"In my opinion, Alice embezzled $3,385,000 from Widgets Inc by writing false checks."
I'm sure the court would say that the later part of the statement is not a matter of opinion. Either you have proof of it or you don't. It is a statement of fact and actionable.