Week 3 lecture and reading- Defamation!

Defamation- Published statements to a third party which affect the reputation of a person. Before the reading and lecture this week I was unaware of just how much of the news printed in papers could be seen as defamation and the serious consequences if a person decides to take libel action against a journalist for this. Previously I viewed defamation as a journalist publishing untrue comments about a subject which they have written about, however I was very mistaken. The three key points to deciding if something is defamation consist of;

1.       Does it lower the reputation of an individual in the minds of right thinking members of society;  

This is any statement whether it is true or not which could make a person be hated, ridiculed, avoided or prevent them from being able to earn a living as a result of loss of business from a story. Therefore my previous viewing of defamation was completely wrong as shown in the example in lecture three. The ‘Sun’ newspaper’s main headline stating ‘George comes out’ referring to George Michael’s release from prison, but also stating the well known fact of George being gay could be viewed as defamation and could result in libel action.

2.       Statements have to be published to a third person;

This rule to determine defamation from reading this firstly in Mc Nae’s and then again hearing this in the lecture was very intriguing. I had never previously thought that anything which is written down or spoken to a third person would be seen as published material and therefore could be seen as a defamatory statement causing a person to lose income as a result of lowering the reputation of an individual. This could mean a simple blog like this is classed as published and therefore liable to legal action being taken against it for defamatory statements.

3.       The person has to be clearly identified;

This is the most obvious of the three rules as if a statement is defamatory it must ensure that the person it is stating against is clearly identified to reduce the chance of any other person with the same or a similar name or similar details is mistaken with this person and therefore as a result losing income or has a reduced reputation as a result. Reputation has always been important throughout history and this continues today.

However after reading about the ways in which a journalist can be sued, it is always nice for a potential future journalist to become aware of the ways in which to defend the defamatory statement which you have created; therefore reading about justification, privilege (which I already had a small knowledge on before the reading or lecture) and fair comment.  Justification; ensuring that statement is true and fact full and fair comment; ensuring that any opinions given are based on fact, true, provable and honestly held are of great importance to prevent legal action, as well as privilege making sure that published defamatory statements are in the public interest to avoid legal action.   

Following these rules as well as noting that it is best to stay away from malice, bane and antidote, and ensuring that corrections are made to any unintentional defamation by accepting your wrong and publishing a correction and letter to the individual stating without prejuecide’ and staying away from stories involving rich individuals who are likely to sue for defamation whether they are right or wrong! Should keep a journalist out of the courts and from being sued and therefore this information is key and should be remember and kept close to a journalists heart when publishing material.