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Mom Makes Website, Gets Sued for $2 Million
An anonymous reader writes "A Canadian stay-at-home mom of 3 recently created a website to report on environmental problems around her neighborhood. The general public and governmental workers lauded her for her efforts. The environmental Ministry spokesman was even quoted as saying 'Obviously we can't have staff everywhere all the time, so we depend on the public out there as surrogate eyes and ears for the ministry'. However, not everyone was quite as happy, as she soon found out, when one company decided to sue her for libel to the tune of $2 million."
"The truth" was a solid defense against libel claims?
But she has to prove it, and they've got the bigger pocket books...
In the U.S. this is a no brainer, but this crap happens in canada too? I thought they were ALL enviro-hippies there.
Fascism is the greatest political ideology ever conceived. Sorry.
Good to know its not only in America where you can get sued for anything. God Bless the coporations, and their willing to sue the people.
Yay, I have a sig.
Bad: Woman rights remarks about your company.
Worse: Sue said woman for more than she can ever possibly make under normal circumstances, breaking her family apart and probably separating her three kids.
They could have made it 'better' by being like "We're glad you brought this to our attention and we're going to fix it. Thanks for your vigilence!"
Job? I don't have time to get a job! Who will sit around and bitch about being broke and unemployed then?
Remember Bush's Golden Rule: "He who has the gold makes the rules."
Actually, I first applied that to Poppy many years ago, but it goes double for Dubya.
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
I'm so glad I live in Canada, we don't have to deal with this bullsh.. uh, wait.. what the.. oh crap.
Nobody's gay for Mole-Man.
--davecb
davecb@spamcop.net
1. Sue the popular hero
2. ???
3. Watch profits tumble!
They'll pay for this, or my name isn't Darl McBride!
The summary does not state the womans name, Louisette Lanteigne, nor does it link to her website (it's geocities, so this is a google Cache), nor does it mention the company's name, Activa Holdings Inc.
http://brandonbloom.name
If there were just misunderstanding (wrongfully interperted information), then company would have invated this lady, described problems and how they will solve that and then all problems with bad PR would go away. Of course, if they choose this course, they have something to hide - because it is typical defence nowadays - attack.
Of course, a little bit more details about which claims company thinks are false would be helpful for more concrete judgement.
user@ubuntubox:~$ stfu This server is going down for shutdown NOW!
Not quite true. Canada has a loser-pays system, so the losing party has to pay the winning party's costs, but it's usually only a portion (depending on the case - if the judge feels the actions by the plaintiff are malicious and without merit, then the losing party will receive most, if not all, of their legal fees paid by the plaintiff).
Before anyone sets up any kind of web site, I strongly advise you to purchase an Umbrella Liabliity Insurance Policy. Among other things, these policies protect you from accusations of libel and slander.
While truth is an absolute defense against libel or slander, you don't want it to cost you your life savings to defend against a frivolous lawsuit because you spoke the truth someone didn't want to hear. For the cost of the umbrella policy - typically around $300 per year you can virtually stop any potential frivolous lawsuit. Such lawsuits are designed to intimidate the little guy and you're much less of a little guy when a multi-billion dollar insurance company is the one that is paying to defend you against the suit.
I'm a big tall mofo.
I've been to a handful of corporations that have radically switched from a 'Covetous' image to a more 'environmental-and-neighborhood-friendly' image. Refineries like Valero (Houston, TX) are among those.
Let's slashdot the website and every one will be happy.
More seriously, this is the job of the gouvernment to check this kind of stuff. When there is enough material and when they are aware of it, what are they waiting for? There is rarely, in such cases, smoke without fire.
Million Dollar Screenshot
A SLAPP suit. They are illegal in the US.
"Eve of Destruction", it's not just for old hippies anymore...
There's a big difference between being negligent and allowing your kid to play around a swimming pool or bucket and pointing out where pollution caused by corporations, et al is occuring.
The second is something that affects a lot of people who didn't cause the problem in the first place and can continue affecting people in that area for years.
Whoever moded you insightful needs to have their head checked.
Everything I need to know I learned by killing smart people and eating their brains.
Who's the company? Is this going to be another McLibel?
Who are "Activa Holdings Inc", and do they have any reputation to lose?
...Libelous statements sue... uh...
In South Korea, only old libelous... damn.
I, for one, welcome our Libelous Housewife... shit.
Uh, well, good for her. Fuck the man. Yeah.
Anyone got a link to this woman's website? I'm giving odds that theres a few crafty animated gifs on there.
s'wut i sed.
That's not how it works...
The woman pays her lawyer out of pocket. She very likely doesn't have the millions of dollars to spend fighting a lawsuit against a company with very deep pockets. Eventually she cannot afford her lawyer and ends up settling with the company for her silence and perhaps a statement absolving the company. Whether or not her accusations are correct have little to do with the outcome. What matters is if some lawyer, seeing her evidence, is willing to take on the case.
My first reaction is that the company is scum. It tries to bury the truth instead of dealing with it. But it is essential to know whether or not her claims are in fact false before questioning the validity of the suit. After all, I can't just say something bad about a company that does bad things.
Then again, you would think the firm would go out of its way to disprove her allegations. It doesn't seem to even try. At trial, the firm would likely need to show her statements as false. If she's telling the truth, I bet the firm will crumble. Rather that having all of their dirt come out in open court, they'll use a last minute excuse like "We felt bad for her kids, so we are letting her outrageous claims go... this time."
I can't wait to see how this turns out.
What are you eating? isItVeg?.
--dave (who went to university in KW) c-b
davecb@spamcop.net
Case in point: I have a neighbor. He's an old man with a bad attitude who is basically a crank. He also walks around the neighborhood look for "issues" and is a total PITA if you get on his bad side. A few years ago, my boy (who was about 3-4 years old at the time) was obssessed with hoses, drains and pipes. He LOVED to put together sprinkler systems using PVC in my back yard. Of course, I encouraged him in his hobby, even though my water bill wasn't exactly pleasant news.
Well, the water running down the street just drove my neighbor insane. He tried to convince the neighborhood that the water was going to degrade the street. When that didn't work, he actually reported me to the Environmental Protection Agency (who sent out a very nice woman, who was very impressed with my son's sprinkler systems when I happily showed her around).
And I wasn't the only one -- at various times, he has had run-ins with the neighbors over phantom problems. The guy lives to find issues that don't exist.
So you'll pardon me if I don't necessarily believe this woman isn't a total wack-job without more evidence beyond this article.
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
Of course, if these developers had nothing to worry about, they would have doubtless been able to convince everybody of the truth of their case without recourse to litigation.
Any environmental scientists in Canada with soil sampling equipment who might be prepared to volunteer to go and do some soil analysis to help the defence prepare its case?
Pining for the fjords
I don't think you really undestand the way the world works, buddy.
This is not a "you have wronged us, we deserve damages" lawsuit. The company knows she couldn't ever pay $2 million. This is a "we know you can't afford to defend against our coporate lawyer onslaught, so you'll have to settle" lawsuit. If she tried to defend herself, they would ensure the attourney costs would financially ruin her. I'm sure they just want to settle out of court for her taking the site down.
Let's hear it for coporate censorship. If you say something we don't like, make sure you're willing to give up your life for it.
Parent as +2 insightful?? Mod down, please.
Nice assumption about rich stay-at-home moms, but my family had five children, my mother stayed at home, and we lived below the poverty line. I think that's more typical than the rich "busy-body do-gooders". Sorry to burst your own little self-righteous bubble.
I will NEVER buy anything related to Activa Holdings Inc. If that is how they behave when someone challenges them, then I will not support their company or any company that works with them. Since I'm in the market for a house, I will make sure that my future house was not built or supported by any company related to Activa Holdings Inc.. If they feel they have been wronged by what was posted on the website, maybe they should show how it is wrong. By sueing, its saying to me that they have something to hide. I hope there will be a way to give and support the fight against Activa. Companies that sue like this, are not companies that we need.
An optimist believes we live in the best world possible; a pessimist fears this is true.
Her Webpage
Since she's on geocities and this trounced her bandwidth, I linked the Google cache. Cheers.
...therefore, to silence others, acuqire their property. Landlords can silence tenants, shopping malls can evict patrons wearing political slogans the management disgrees with, etcetera.
Typical libertarian capitalist fallacy that puts property as a primary right, rather than as a secondary tool to ensure primary rights.
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
This is supposedly the URL:
t _topic&f=5&t=001759
http://ca.geocities.com/infringements@rogers.com
of course, its exceeded its transfer alloted for the day, so its down.
Typical. It IS cached by google, though.
Found some info here:
http://www.rabble.ca/babble/ultimatebb.php?ubb=ge
Theres some info with contact information for the woman and the company.
s'wut i sed.
"To me, all speech is a natural right as a form of expression. Swearing, discrimination, yelling fire in your own theater, or even preaching the murder of another."
So who is responsible if you yell 'fire' in your theater and two children are trampled to death in the ensuing chaos?
Suing people with limited means for their free expression is, I believe, the way of getting every pro-bono civil liberties lawyer in the country on their case.
When Soderberg finishes the true-to-life movie, they'll probably sue him for the grosses.
Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
... these cases don't happen in america... oh wait. RIAA... crap.
Speaking is NOT communication
Here are the rules:
1) Money is all that matters.
2) If you are not a millionaire, you are a second class citizen
3) You are not allowed to buy from a small company if there is a bigger one available
4) If something a company sells you is crap, well, too bad.
5) If you buy something from a company, they own you
6) Speaking against anyone or anything richer than you is illegal.
7) It is the government of the companies, by the companies, for the companies.
8) Anyone who doesn't go to the Commerce School deserves to be screwed over
Let's see, we're all guilty of...well, pretty much everything.
To me, all speech is a natural right as a form of expression. Swearing, discrimination, yelling fire in your own theater, or even preaching the murder of another. If you don't like a certain form of expression, don't allow it on your property.
But discrimination results in people not being able to make so much money, and thus not being able to own property, and thus not being able to reduce the acreage available for bigots to be bigoted on, and so on. Seems like that'd create an underclass, which never ends well.
I could care less about what media companies might do with the freedom to libel. Who cares. If you're in the public eye, accept it. If you run a big business, combat it with great quality of service.
But how do people find out about your excellent quality of service or great product if the people getting paid to talk loudly are all saying it sucks? The system you describe would allow any company to cover another with as much slime as they could buy, which would tend to lead to horrific monopolies - a classic market breakdown effect. Slime does have an effect, and it's not always trumped by quality of service. Besides, do you really want to produce a system in which only the biggest liars are able to survive? We're close enough to that already without adding fuel to the fire.
For the love of God, please learn to spell "ridiculous"!!!
Seems to be offline but here's the google cache link if you're interested: http://72.14.207.104/search?q=cache:zQLM8Fs0lo8J:c a.geocities.com/infringements%40rogers.com/+Louise tte+Lanteigne&hl=en&client=firefox-a
If someone gets sued for 2 million bucks that doesnt have 2 million bucks, what happens? Do they lose everything and declare bankrupcy? Do they keep losing what they earn until 2 million?
slashdot: where everyone yells sarcastic metaphors to themselves to understand the issue
I know your joking, but it looks like the situation is changing.
Take a look at the exchange rates for the Canadian dollar versus the US dollar over the past five years:
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=CADUSD=X&t=5y
Notice that the value of the Canadian dollar has been steadily rising relative to that of the US dollar since about March, 2003. Now, I'm sure you know what began in March of 2003 (hint: invasion of Iraq). Again, look at that chart if you do not believe me.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
Now, the problem I have is that even if she drops the website and the company continues to pursue the lawsuit, she has so much to lose. She's risking the well-being of her three kids to battle a libel case, one which she (presumably) has no funds to support. I'm not suggesting its wrong to take a stand, but I know first-hand what it is like to battle a corporation when you are being sued. My best friend was sued $150,000 by a company (he had an accidental fire in the house he was renting) and lost everything. The company never got a dime from him, but he was forced into bankruptcy, fell behind on all his bills, and to this day is still being tracked by companies trying to collect for unpaid bills. He lost to the one with financial superiority, and this really threw his life off course -- all over an accidental fire. Now he can't get a mortgage, credit cards, or much else.
If I was in this woman's position, I'd value the well-being of my kids over battling a corporation, because odds are she will not walk away from this in a better position than she was before this lawsuit started.
For he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother.
... MILS ... Mothers I'd Like to Sue ...
The Luddites were ahead of their time.
Wasn't that Jafar in Disney's Aladdin?
So then, as a matter of principle, you won't be suing me when I rent a few billboards near your house and put your name, address, and photo on them, along with labeling you a known liar, thief, and pedophile. Hope you produce some seriously high-quality products, my man.
ABSURDITY, n.: A statement or belief manifestly inconsistent with one's own opinion.
If their actions have placed her kids at risk and (been part of what) led her to spend the expense and time of putting up the website to document their illegal actions, that should be just cause for a countersuit against them.
Sue them for direct costs, her time (at a consulting rate of $60/hour), and punitive damages of $2Million. If they have said anything public about the suit (like claiming that she lied), then she can also countersue for libel. (In Canada, You can't sue for statements made in court or court documents, but you can sue for what's said on the courtroom steps before or after you file.)
Free Software: Like love, it grows best when given away.
What is this company hope to obtain in order of the suit, a pair of used baby bottles and a couple of hand me down t-shirts?
God must be blessing America, or maybe the people do that?
How is this news worthy? The company in question should be shamed.
I own stores, they're my property. If I don't want a communist shirt on my property, it's my right.
If I'm a landlord and I don't like a tenant, I shouldn't be forced to accept them. It is my property.
Yes, some racist white guy may say no to a black family. What stops another landlord from saying no problem? Competition opens doors shut by others.
Thank you, Google Cache!
c a.geocities.com/infringements%40rogers.com/+Louise tte+Lanteigne+&hl=en&client=firefox-a
http://72.14.203.104/search?q=cache:zQLM8Fs0lo8J:
ttyl
Farrell
CAN-CON 2019 - Ottawa's only book oriented Science Fiction Convention! October 18-20, Sheraton Hotel, Ottawa, Canada h
So who is responsible if you yell 'fire' in your theater and two children are trampled to death in the ensuing chaos?
All the fools who failed to use common sense (ie. Do I smell fire? Do I see fire? Is the fire alarm going off?), panicked, and then trampled the children to death.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
2 million $ if it's as clear cut as it seems to be and they lose this case eventually ... if companies can get away with this sort of thing it wont stop, if there's a financial deterrence then they'd stop doing it unless there was a real case.
Since I can only go by what we've read in the article, I have to ask you "what the hell are you talking about?".
Something that affects a lot of people who didn't cause the problem in the first place and can continue affecting people in that area for years?
What something? What people? What problem? What area? What effects?
The article says NOTHING about what her complaints or accusations were. The ONLY comment in the article is the following:
She said she was constantly keeping her kids and their friends out of trouble, as they would keep running into hazards around their neighbourhood.
What neighborhood doesn't have "hazards"? What neighborhood exists where you don't have to keep your children away from some "hazards"?
I'm not going to get on my knees and praise some busy-body armchair activisit with a pack of pampers and a website, just because we're told that she's being supposedly unfairly sued by a big bad evil corporation for some vague unnamed things that she claims they did. Until then, she's just a do-goooder busy-body trying to stir up trouble so she can get a little attention. I mean, unless her kids are falling down 30 foot wells or growing an arm out of their foreheads . . . Or at least she has some medically documented evidence and solid basis for whatever claims she's making about.. whatever.
Seriously, what a bunch of sycophants that you're all reading this "your rights online" crap and assuming that she's the next Mother Theresa based on an article that says *NOTHING* more than "this breeder chick said some stuff about this company that does some business in this place where she lives and they didn't like it so are suing her".
And hell, if she's not making the shit up and is sure about the claims she's making and the company she's making them against, what does she have to worry about? Someone will pick the case up pro-bono, she'll win and she'll be able to go on a talk show circuit and parade her snotty little toddlers around on cable news. It'll be all awesome and stuff.
Why is there no PayPall donate button on her site?
to the tune of $2 million.
Is that Canadian? So, about $35 USD?
python -c "x='python -c %sx=%s; print x%%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))%s'; print x%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))"
Nonsense. 1. Stay-at-home moms have a lot more time for this sort of thing. 2. Stay-at-home moms are typically bored as hell. 3. Stay-at-home moms make for a much better story! (This is the main point.) A lot of people are out there fighting for our rights. While I do applaud moms, they're certainly not the only ones doing so.
I don't believe in libel or slander.
If I call your (Significant other), parents, employer, all of your clients, (clergyperson), the managers of all the nearby grocery stores and tell them all that you're a child molester and a rapist don't you think you'd be harmed?
Don't you think that you'd be entitled to sue me for slander?
If I posted your picture, phone number and address on my blog and said all of those same things, why shouldn't you be able to sue me for libel?
Well, at least as long as the things I said/wrote were untrue.
Did the fallout of criticism over DIVX make people stop shopping at Circuit City? No.
I worked at CC when DiVX was launched. The difference is that most of what people were saying about DiVX was TRUE.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
If she has a case, someone will take it pro-bono. Lawyers love a good "david versus goliath" fight on their record, if they know they can win and the person has a case.
On the other hand, if she doesn't have a case and her claims are baseless, she's doing damage to a posssibly innocent party and no lawyer will touch it. If no lawyer will touch her case, it's a sign that she's full of shit. Or at least, she's spouting things without anything to back it up - which is just as bad. It's one thing to go around claiming, say, "Microsoft is teh evil!" as a rather generic sentiment. It's another to go around saying "Microsoft is releasing toxins into the local water supply from their software packaging and is killing thousands of babies as a result". If you're saying one, it's opinion. If you're saying the other, you should have some sort of evidence to back it up. If you have evidence to back it up, you'll get support and legal help by throngs of hungry lawyers. If you don't... they'll laugh at you and you'll be stuck paying the bill for your thoughtless and wild comments.
In the end, she'll get what she deserves. Since the article is "People Magazine!" light on details, we can't really know.
even preaching the murder of another.
Drop dead.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Well, those rights are within reason, you do not want to have any racism/discimination issues brought against you, now do you?
If you believe in privacy, and believe you have "nothing to hide" at the same time, you're a goddammed idiot
I am for due process of law, but if a jury calls your case a SLAPP and the judge agrees with that, I think the amount you have sued for should be taken away as a fine and the right to appeal the ruling should be eliminated. Call it a fine for trying to turn the justice system into a tool of injustice.
Click here or a puppy gets stomped!
We need the government to enforce environmental laws, because you can't sue the government.
Timing, she is a cruel mistress.
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
Here is Activa's contact info for all you slashdot do-gooders. I'm posting as AC as I live in Canada and don't want to be sued by them (I actually live in one of their subdivisions), so please MOD thos up.
Name Werner Brummund
Job Title President / CEO
Postal Address Activa Group 735 Bridge Street West Waterloo ON N2V 2H1 Canada
Phone 5198869400
Fax 5198868955
Email kyantz@gto.net
They keep losing what they earn (or have already earned, including assets) until $2 million, unless they file bankrupcy.
http://www.archive.org/details/ThePowerOfNightmares
http://www.sorbaralaw.com/Contact_Us/contact_us.ht ml
maybe mention that they just got their clients north american coverage for their mis-deeds! that wasn't very smal.. uh?
I don't know about this case and I did not read TFA. But this isn't OT, it summarises my feelings after reading all of todays stories. Although many make the obvious comment that "It's all about money", money is only a piece of the jigsaw. Control through FEAR is what this is all about. With enough frightening publicity and lawsuits to stifle speech everybody clams up and we become silent. Something is needed to really put the fear of God back into the corporations. We desperately need a massive victory where a household name is hauled over the coals, no holding back. Something that utterly breaks and bankrupts a major corp. The economic impact, job losses etc have to be considered 'collateral damage'. Those jobs will reappear elsewhere in the economy so its no big. Maybe it could be Sony? Maybe one of the other media or drug companies, who knows. It doesn't really matter who, but an example should be set. It seems the government and the legal system are becomming useless to protect the individuals rights. I propose a war chest. What it really needs is a major donation by a rich benefactor and some very ruthless, determined and smart lawyers on the side of the people. Starting with about 5 or 10 million such a fund could be carefully managed, only going after cases that stand a VERY high chance of success, gaining damages and adding to the war chest. In fact with a run of luck such a scheme could snowball into a deadly machine that has the corporate weasels quaking in their boots. Seriously people, we need to get on the offensive, to attack, not just keep defending. A change of tactics is needed from passive to active and highly aggressive. Yes, I am openly advocating organised premeditated ecomomic warfare and a premptive and vicious attack against a major corp. Lets give THEM something to be really afraid of. Instead of getting a little bit angry drip by drip as each corp makes bolder and bolder moves against us, let's just pick one and go after it full force and no stopping until its dead. Any suggestions for an unredeemably evil corporation that could be 'killed'? And how?
Will this also work for copyright infringement, I.E. P2P, BITTORRENT, ECT? If so, this might be a good investment for us all.
Speaking from near-total ignorance, I'm guessing no. Slander/libel is a tort, while copyright infringement is a criminal case. I've never heard of insurance that would defend you against prosecution for criminal acts. In fact, I'd argue that such insurance would be a bad thing, since it would make people more likely to commit crimes.
As I said, though, this opinion is straight from my butt.
According to her website: "I will proceed with years of documentations and photos to back me up". It would be great if they go to court and lose, what will that do for their PR?
There is no god but Google and GTalk is the messenger of Google.
Your accusation of fallacy is resting on those two examples being perceived as bad. For those who don't, your assertion is therefore in effect groundless. For those who do, they probably tended to believe in your thesis anyways. So why bother?
Attention zealots and haters: 00100 00100
Actually, you can. It happens a lot. Google search for "sues canadian government".
Yes, indeed. I believe that the Electronic Frontier Foundation actually has women working for it that don't have children! Also, I think that there might even be men working there (I'm not positive about that so don't quote me.)
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Roofers working without safety equipment? WTF I don't think I have ever seen roofers work with any, except maybe safety googles. As for her "getting sick" during construction? Gimme a break we are talking buildings made of wood and concrete there aren't things used in residential construction that are going to make a larger area sick. She sounds like a nutbag hypocondriac to me.
"the malicious, high-handed and arrogant conduct of the Defendant warrants an award of punitive or exemplary damages to ensure that the Defendant is appropriately punished for her conduct and deterred from such conduct in the future."
The adjectives used at the beginning of that seem to describe the entire complaint, actually.
Basically, they want her punished, and for that reason they should lose the case automatically; criminal law is for punishing, civil law is for settling disputes.
And since when is $2million 'appropriate' to hand down to any 'normal citizen'?
FGD 135
Well :)
This case shows the merit of the loser pays rule.
It's the only way civil court proceedings can be made even remotely fair -- instead of the extortion/lottery they are in the US right now.
Then perhaps the company could've proved her wrong, not sued her.
Piece of cake. Send out a plane ticket to Mrs. Brockovich.
30% off web hosting. Coupon code "SLASHDOT".
i don't know what activa's all angry about, slashdot probably just took down her site anyway.
From the site:
"I saw a suspicious looking diesel tank. I took a closer look and saw it was intentionally supported on a pile of scrap wood on a tilt. That's when I noticed the rubber hose. The hose was being used to syphon the diesel fuel and below it was evidence of a spill. The area smelled strong and the ground was saturated."
So, essentially, she had a nice suburban neighborhood and then somebody came in and dumped a tanker of diesel fuel all over the place. Yeah, I'd be pissed, too, if that happened on my street. I'd be demanding a cleanup.
And:
I saw many unharnessed roofers and dozens of workers without hard hats actively working on site. This one unharnessed roofer was quite a site to see. The yellow cable in the roof photos is the extention cord for the nail gun this fella was using while working on a roof of the house at 23 Big Springs Court. He squatted down on the wood of the roof and slid down it like a slide.
Now, this is probably not her business. But still, this speaks of massive unprofessionalism. Some guys may be too macho to use safety harnesses, but every site I've ever been on required hard hats *everywhere*, even with nothing overhead. I don't know how things are regulated in Canada, but here in the USA that sounds like tens of thousands of dollars in OSHA fines, just for starters. Still other reports seem kind of iffy. Empty beer bottles can be left by any passing gaggle of kids - pictures of workers on the job in the daytime with the bottles in their hands would have been more damning.
It looks like she might have had pictures, but they're not coming up in the Google cache. Pity, as even a photo or two would confirm this. I pray for her sake that this gets the throwing out of court that it most probably deserves. As for Activa Holdings, stupid move. Before, they had one website bad-mouthing them, now they've got half of Slashdot.
How does the management of Activa Holdings Inc. sleep at night? There are so many better ways this company could deal with this problem. The company is worried about slander, about their reputation being sullied? They're making themselves look worse and drawing even more attention to their alleged environmental crimes.
I guess the important thing to do is follow up on this story. Write, phone, fax or email the CEO of Activa Group, Werner Brummund at:
Activa Group
735 Bridge Street West
Waterloo ON
N2V 2H1
Canada
Phone 5198869400
Fax 5198868955
Email kyantz@gto.net
Send letters and emails of support and/or financial support to:
Louisette Lanteigne,
700 Star Flower Ave,
Waterloo Ont.
N2V 2L2
Canada
butterflybluelu@rogers.com
We should spread the word about this, the more people who know about this David and Goliath fight, the better. The worst thing we can do is just shake our heads in pity and forget about this whole thing.
Btw: what materials does Activa Group sell?
SEO Copywriter. Just Say ON
She should have just called herself "Mrs. X." They can't sue you if they don't know you who are...
Yep, you can't go wrong with "Mrs. X".
Oh please. Now who doesn't understand the way the world works.
Company: Now see here young mother. I realize the webbery has been great fun for you but your facts are ever so spurious.
Mother: Oh I see my ways were errant. Let me unpost the hideous libels I have lain upon you.
This
And until
1) judges throw out lawsuits where a more powerful entity has no case and is just trying to abuse its power over a littler guy,
2) and people boycott larger entities that engage in such sleazy tactics,
then such injustices will continue. I'm not holding my breath on #1, because judges are attorneys too, litigation is their business, and they like it, and the last thing they would want is less of it.
Attention zealots and haters: 00100 00100
The U.S. has the Sullivan decision that defined libel and, if memory serves, ruled that the offending party has to prove that the particular writings at issue were made with malice and without regard to the truth. Prior to this the defendant had to prove that what he said was the truth.
This could prove to be an excellent test case of Canada's libel laws vis a vis our Charter or Rights. If Activa Holdings is successful in their lawsuit then just about any negative comment about any company made in the press, on the radio or TV or by the public is actionable. Some provinces, such as British Columbia, have SLAPP legislation that helps in defending such lawsuits but Ontario, where this lawsuit was filed, to my knowledge does not.
So it would be alright for someone to say you have sex with goats and children? Doctor photographs of you that seem to show you in those acts?
Your statement is all about what you think and what you believe. Most others do not feel the same way and it is not law.
The concept of a "natural right" is very odd as well. Who grants this natural right? It is not a not a physical law. Who or what grants these rights?
"To me, all speech is a natural right as a form of expression. Swearing, discrimination, yelling fire in your own theater, or even preaching the murder of another. If you don't like a certain form of expression, don't allow it on your property."
This statement also has is interesting. What about property held in common? There really isn't anything called public property there is only property held in common. If the majority of the property owners disagree with the expression shouldn't they have a right to not allow it? What about when you expression crosses over on to my property. I could almost go with your idea of freedom of expression if I never had to see or hear it. However expression does cross over in on to private property all the time. If you play your stereo so loud that I can hear it in my home or even in my car while I am driving you are then expressing yourself on my property. Even if you are broadcasting porn on a TV signal you are sending those photons on to my property. The current libel laws are pretty good just they way they as are the current protections of free speech.
What I find strange is that a company would try this. In the US many big time lawyers would take this case for the publicity and counter sue. If what she says is even close to the truth they would loose so big it would make their head spin. The court system in the US really does work most of the time. I bet the one in Canada does as well.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Somebody explain this one to me please.
SEO Copywriter. Just Say ON
I'm not surprised that the builder is trying to screw over the lady, while making a huge mess of their construction site.
... Adera ... is the same kind of company.
... again all from an AWARD WINNING building company! No wonder there's so many leaky condos in this city.
... even though they will simply shut down, start up under a new name, and carry on with their crap.
The 'Award Winning' company that built my townhouse in Burnaby BC
They knowingly built my whole complex below code. You can not get a queen sized mattress to the top floor going up the stairs, they are too narrow (yes, this is a building code they ignored). In fact some of the original owners here forced Adera to buy special two-piece mattress sets.
Then there's the brutal water heating system. They knew damn well that once the place had sold out, the water heater system would be totally inadequate and prone to breakdowns, forcing our strata to look into a Boiler system.
Then there's the creaky floors due to various other codes being ignored, such as distance between the stringers, and the methods of tying down the floor.
Then there's the fact that every damn outlet in the house is crooked, the builders couldnt take 2 seconds to level them, not even the ones cut through tiles!
And how about the severe cracking in the cement foundation in part of our underground parking.
And the insufficient gutters and downspouts, built below code, that overflow in a heavy rain.
And there's the landscaping that has been eroding away due to poor construction, one person has pretty much lost their back yard.
Our building is only 6 or 7 years old. These are just the bigger problems
I wish the lady luck, take down those bastards
George Bush + Linux = "I will not let information get in the way of the fight against Windows"
I remember hearing about this case. My local newspaper had an editorial that was basically cheering for the guys who libeled McDonalds.
That was when I decided that, if they care that little about the truth, I didn't really need to read that newspaper any more.
Great minds and all that :)
ABSURDITY, n.: A statement or belief manifestly inconsistent with one's own opinion.
You can get sued for libel and slander. Who knew?
Also, go read the woman's site if you haven't already. The entire website is full of "I saw this, I took pictures of that. Activa is the developer of this site."
How can it be libel if she is simply reporting what she sees? It's obvious from her tone that she has concern for her neighborhood including many sincere warnings to parents in the area about specific threats (stagnant water, pressure treated wood).
I'm at a loss here as to what Activa's case is.
:wq
These suits want to achive a long-term scare factor: "we have a bigger war chest and look what we can do to you in the court" so that nobody dares to speak out.
She should create a defense fund where people could donate money. After all, how much do we value our Freedom to Know (CC)?
And then there should exist an universal defense fund which would have the mission to support whistleblowers and to counter Big Money (R). (the ACLU does this kind of work pro bono, but I am talking about an exclusive fund for free speech ).
Fight Frist Psoting!
Browse Slashdot with 'Newest First'!
The woman appears to be quite the alarmist. For example, she falsely states that pressure treated wood is not safe since it is treated with, among other things, arsenic. Such wood is safe if handled properly.
On the other hand, she doesn't say anything on there that is immediately libelous as most of it is "i saw this happening the other day at the site."
I've always wondered what the internal culture is in companies that leads them to launch suits like this, as they almost always backfire even if they are won. The McDonald's lawsuit against a couple of people distributing anti-McDonald's pamphlets, for example, certainly led to much more anti-McDonald's media coverage than a couple of nutty activists could ever have managed on their own.
Wow, this happened in my University town of Waterloo Ontario. More here http://www.rabble.ca/babble/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get _topic&f=5&t=001759 I wonder how this will turn out?
Yes, actually it doesn't hurt to ask. Sue first and ask questions later is a rather bad practice, especially for a business which is trying to protect its image. They're only going to drag their own name through the mud now.
GPL: Free as in will
My wife and me, her being a conservation biologist, me just your regular treehugger, were planning on making a site here ins Costa Rica, based on photos we would take riding around the country, me on my bike, her on her quad (both silenced, small bore, so don;t flame about exhaust fumes and saving the earth ....
....
.... so not we are re-thinking our strategy ...
........ but now we are really reconsidering ....
There are a bunch of local and foreign companies making serious damage, and we want to give it some exposure, besides riding around on our vehicles
quite honestly that news piece made us think about how many companies would want to sue our asses if we get noticed
Our plan was to sneak around various industrial installations with a GPS and a digicam, and then post it blog-style with the help of goolge maps api
Would YOU have the balls?
The lady should counter sue the company for attempting to drive her into bankruptcy. She should sue for percentually as much, based on the company's income, as the company is suing her, i.e. if her yearly income is $60'000 and she get's sued for $2million, then if the company's yearly income is $10million then she should sue for $400million. She should plainly state that she is counter suing because the company is maliciously attempting to drive her into bankruptcy with an amount that she could never pay instead of just suing to get her to close down the website.
She might not win, but it would provide precedence for annyone who is harrassed by giant companies in the future. (Hallo RIAA, did you hear that?) IT sure would be good to see some of those corporations think twice before abusing their power in future.
2. Sue the shit out of anyone who speaks up about it.
3. Profit!
There's no ? about it anymore. Sad.
The three most important words in a relationship are "I love you." The two most important are "Humor me."
Their purported reason for bringing this lawsuit about was to punish this woman for damaging the reputation of the company, and yet having the filing of the suit appear on numerous websites such as /. is somehow good for its reputation?
You're going to have to explain the nonsense thing to me. Especially given that all stories here on /. that are people fighting against the big evil powers that be are women, typically stay at home moms.
As for your points.
Regarding 1: Have you never taken care of kids. They do require constant attention you know. So, where is all that free time that you speak of? Certainly not with a kid aged 21 months at home.
Regarding 2: See my regarding 1.
Regarding 3: This one I'll give you.
You might want to look up the word hyperbole.I find it difficult to believe that she's worried about worker safety, oil and gas spills, construction refuse, and water drainage. Those are pretty diverse interests. When I read the article, what I saw was that she doesn't want development in an area that might damage an aquifer (or maybe she just wants to keep it in it's natural state), so she's looking to get at the company any way she can. The way that it looks to me is that the woman is part of a group that is trying to stop development in an area. So... she's intentionally poking the bear here.
I am OK with that. It's a noble goal to protect the aquifer (if that's what the real goal is). But, let's tell the story correctly. And... before we start donating to this woman through paypal, the group that she's part of needs to pony up a little money to take care of their own political/environmental problems. After that, and when they are truthful about their goals, paypal away. Until then... lady, if you intentionally poke the bear... you can't blame anyone else if you lose a hand (even the bear).
I guess it is good and all that this women is documenting potential enviornmental problems in her subdivision... But really, a subdivision is a big giant enviornmental problem! It is kind of like driving a SUV, and then being pissed off because those people driving Hummers are wasting fuel.
It sucks that the woman is getting sued, that is an outrage. But I wouldn't glorify what this woman is doing too much. She seems more the neighborhood busy body who calls the police when kids are playing touch football in the street, or who get a restraining order to keep their neighbor from painting their house purple, than some real enviornmental crusader.
If I call your (Significant other), parents, employer, all of your clients, (clergyperson), the managers of all the nearby grocery stores and tell them all that you're a child molester and a rapist don't you think you'd be harmed?
I won't be harmed. Do it, my client list is google-able. You'll be hurt in the time you're wasting. Your credibility will be harmed as well.
If I posted your picture, phone number and address on my blog and said all of those same things, why shouldn't you be able to sue me for libel?
Someone I fired did something similar, online. I believe the site lasted a year with no updates and no one except a girlfriend asked me about it. The site might still exist, but with a 2001 date it is pretty meaningless.
My time becoming productive creates wealth for me, your time being unproductive destroys your wealth.
This is the first time I've ever seen a banner on a wikipedia article warning readers it's been linked to by slashdot.
Play Command HQ online
True, but I know of at least one case where a landlord refused a couple because said couple was gay. Problem: he said it to their face, and they had recorded it with a small MP3 player (because the landlord was known to dislike gay people).
They brought the matter to court, and the landlord got the choice: either accept the couple as tenants, or face a (huge) fine.
Personally, I'd steer away from landlords who wouldn't want me in the first place for whatever reason.
http://jcsnippets.atspace.com/ - a collection of Java & C# snippets
You are, of course. All rights carry responsibility. The responsibility that goes along with free speech is that the speech may not cause physical harm to someone. In this case, the speech directly caused a panic and therefore led to physical harm, leaving you responsible as the person who exercised his right in an irresponsible way.
Property rights mean very little in this case. If I yell "Fire!" in a crowded theater, I am responsible, whether it is my theater or someone else's.
We all know what to do, but we don't know how to get re-elected once we have done it
Libel is one of the few cases where the US is better than Canada. It's one thing that routinely pisses Canadians off who discover it.
Canadian libel is based on British libel, and, we have none of the zealous first amendment jurisprudence to mitigate it. You can be seriously fucked in Canada for libel, where in the US you would not.
So it would be alright for someone to say you have sex with goats and children? Doctor photographs of you that seem to show you in those acts?
Sure. This is a good point, actually. Your manner with others is what protects you from such charges. If you're a jerk, a liar and shady, people might say "Hmm, well he was a bit weird."
Accusations make not fact.
The concept of a "natural right" is very odd as well. Who grants this natural right? It is not a not a physical law. Who or what grants these rights?
Natural rights are rights shared by everyone at birth. Some people believe a creator granted them, others believe they come from an inside moral fiber or just from being human.
If you play your stereo so loud that I can hear it in my home or even in my car while I am driving you are then expressing yourself on my property.
I guess that could be called trespass or pollution, but not by me. If the form of expression causes o physical damage, it's fine. I tell people who don't want to see pink houses next door to buy 100 acres of land and live in the woods. Don't want your neighbors keeping you up at night with their hump-hump-monkey-love? Don't rent.
The court system in the US really does work most of the time. I bet the one in Canada does as well.
It rarely works in either.
The court originally was intended to enforce the law. The law was intended to protect private property and the right to be free from others damaging your property or person.
Today, I can not put chemicals into my body of my choice. I can not rent the use of my body by others. I can not tell others I don't like to get out of my store. I am forced to watch what I say in my business to my employees.
The law is a farce. I shall disregard it.
"I have seen kids playing in a stagnant pond of water that was 4ft deep. It was filled with building debris including paint cans, fiberglass insulation, pressure treated wood, oil residue and tadpoles."
Damn slimy tadpoles, polluting our ponds.
Bwahh haha
I'm generally not discriminatory, but I am prejudice. I don't see anything wrong with private non-violent racism.
A restaurant who refuses to serve midgets is a Bad Idea. I won't eat there. But to me, the OWNER of the PROPERTY is free to use his property that way.
Racism and discrimination by government is terrible. As a biracial person, I hate government discrimination but I will protect the private individual's right to congregate with whomever they want.
Disclaimer: I was peripherally involved in the support campaign 1997-2005. As such, my neutrality may be suspect. OTOH, my knowledge of the McLibel case is excellent.
1. The burden of proof lies on the defendant
What can you prove?
Can you prove that the sky is blue, or that the sun will rise tomorrow?
UK (and, I think, Canadian) law means that you have to defend allegedly libellous statements by proving their truth.
If the jury is still out, or you can't prove it beyond a reasonable supposition, then it's libellous. It can be completely and wholly true (in the long run), but if you can't prove it, then you're guilty of libel.
You are guilty until proven innocent.
Let's take a quote in the leaflet that was ruled defamatory:
That was one of the statements in the leaflet that McDonald's found most defamatory.
It came from a 1990 World Health Organisation report on diet and nutrition.
When McDonald's expert witness, Dr. Sidney Arnott, was brought up in the witness box for cross-examination, he was asked what he thought of the above statement.
He said:
However, since the link between junk food and cancer had not been proven beyond all reasonable doubt, the statement was ruled to be libellous, even though it came originally from a WHO report!
(It was subsequently ruled proven during the appeal, as Lord Justices Pill, May and Keane were given access to medical data that had not been present in the original case.)
2. Not proven =/= not true.
Again, since the truth is an absolute defence against libel charges, you need to prove in a UK court that something is true. If you fail, it is not necessarily because you lied. You can repeat someone else's findings in perfect good faith, yet be sued for libel if you are unable to prove the truth of those statements. There is a big difference between something that you haven't proven to be true, and something that is proven to be false; and even with something proven to be false, there's no automatic malicious intent involved.
This goes hand in hand with another major point: at the time of the case, you didn't get Legal Aid in the UK for libel cases. It didn't matter whether the case was in the public interest or not; you had to pay the legal bills yourself.
Consider the case of two defendants earning less than $20,000 between them against one of the richest and most powerful companies in the world. The ability of both sides to summon witnesses and prepare documentation was directly linked to the amount of cash they had.
On issues like rainforest destruction, there were any number of people the McLibel defendants could have asked to act as witnesses - but they couldn't afford the flight tickets and accommodation expenses; so the witnesses never made it to the courtroom.
Over the case, McDonald's spent $16,000,000. The McLibel defendants managed to raise $35,000 in donations.
Consider how that affects a case, when your ability to produce the relevant witnesses depends on how much money you can spend.
So they had to stand up in court and defend themselves - against one of the best libel lawyers in the UK and a highly-paid team; they gave up 15 years of their life to do so, all told.
And they gave McDonald's such a bloody nose that McDonald's abandoned SLAPPs altogether.
Your local newspaper was quite right.
Gideon.
So then, as a matter of principle, you won't be suing me when I rent a few billboards near your house and put your name, address, and photo on them, along with labeling you a known liar, thief, and pedophile. Hope you produce some seriously high-quality products, my man.
Billboards by my businesses run $1500/month with a 24 Month contract.
You won't do it, and no one els would, either. Your statement is ridiculous.
You're right. Nobody should do anything. Thanks for pointing out the futility in life.
...*BANG*
Seriously, while the gp post doesn't necessarily have the answer, surely there's something better than the way things are now. I mean, I hope there is...
They could have contacted the lady and cooperated with her to clean up the mess. Would have been great PR. Instead, they sue her for an amount they know she can't pay, basicaqlly strong-arming her.
Nice going. I am hoping this puts them in the public eye even more, and they get booted from tenders in Canada. Let's see how that affects their bottom line.
Sigged!
True, but I know of at least one case where a landlord refused a couple because said couple was gay. Problem: he said it to their face, and they had recorded it with a small MP3 player (because the landlord was known to dislike gay people).
The gays were idiots, I'd refuse to rent them an apartment out of the knowledge that they use their homosexuality to produce a benefit unavailable to others.
It is the landlord's place. He doesn't need a reason to say no.
They should buy a building and refuse to rent to straights. That's their right.
They filed a bogus suit to try to quiet a concerned citizen, and instead have turned her into a cause célèbre on the Internet, and savvy government officials will play up punishing Activa for votes. When will these idiots learn?
I too have felt the cold finger of injustice.
http://images.google.com/images?q=http://ca.geocit ies.com/infringements%40rogers.com&svnum=10&hl=sv& lr=&start=0&sa=N&filter=0
"I can not tell others I don't like to get out of my store. I am forced to watch what I say in my business to my employees."
And the problem with this is... You don't like it. It looks more like you feel you should do what every you want with no regard to others.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Well, it just got greenlighted at That Other Site. I'm sure the kids over there will show plenty of respect for Activa.
Shut up.
There is a difference between public venue and private property. In my house, I should be able to say whatever I want; in public, I should have to mind my manners. If I am publically lying about a person in public, then that should be actionable.
I agree with the GP that you should be able to do/say pretty much anything you want to on and with your own property. You should be able to hire whomever you please without fear of a discrimination suit, and you should be able to fire people the same way. You should be able to refuse to serve Austrians in your restaurant, require everyone to where a green shirt, etc.
I don't go so far as to say that the same rules hold true on public property or using a public resource. The government must treat everyone exactly the same, regardless or race or station, or you have a breakdown in the system. A person using public property can't be allowed to abuse it to put forth mistruths; they have their own property for that.
In the US, having our freedoms restored from the poor wording of the Civil Rights Act would do a great deal to rid ourselves of discrimination. Instead of it being illegal to do all those things I mentioned, make it illegal for the government to do them. That is as it should be. That would rid us of horrible things like affirmative action, the so called "equal opportunity" laws, race based college financial aid, etc.
It certainly wouldn't create an "underclass" by allowing people to freely associate and freely express themselves. The discriminatory laws that require such things as what I mentioned in the last paragraph *do* create underclasses and priviledged groups. People don't seem to understand or care that in the US, we are required by law to discriminate.
Isn't the point of Geocities that they're an ad-supported site? Why do they buckle under the /. effect so quick?
He won't do it, but what about some business whose owner takes a personal hatred towards you? What of a millionaire or similar?
Any private speech should be protected, but public speech is not private, obviously. You can't just up and allow people to spread outright lies publically, nor can you let someone just put up information that would likely endanger your welfare, and certainly negatively impact your business and social life.
Sucks to be you - I can get four weeks of a 30-sheet for $1100 around here. Piss me off enough, and I'll consider it money well spent, so try not to offend anyone too well-heeled.
ABSURDITY, n.: A statement or belief manifestly inconsistent with one's own opinion.
No, that's not it. Let me boil it down:
I want my private properties to be private. I want to invite who I want to, and avoid who I want to.
It is not your property.
You want to tell me what I can do with my property. You want to force me to congregate with either everyone or no one. I have to rights in my property according to you. I have to be your slave, invest my time and money so you can create your better world, your utopia for all.
I don't care about that. It is my property. My private property.
Not that I agree with the OP, but the mechanism you propose is much easier said than done. Only the gov't has that much "capital" -- they can use force. Even then, there is always a samizdat, an "indy" media.
Assumed here is that there is always a demand for truth.
Okay, so there is no legislation to protect this poor woman from this SLAPP lawsuit in Canada, but can't she countersue for defamation if she wins?
There's an old saying that says pretty much whatever you want it to.
I know an awful lot of well heeled people. I can't imagine any wasting their money that way.
I also think I'd get more attention and business out of it. In fact, I welcome the attention as I can easily counter it.
You'll be hurt in the time you're wasting. Your credibility will be harmed as well.
These are the kinds of things that can be done in one's spare time and anonymously. Without libel and slander laws, the person making false accusations has less to fear than the object of them.
Someone I fired did something similar, online. I believe the site lasted a year with no updates and no one except a girlfriend asked me about it. The site might still exist, but with a 2001 date it is pretty meaningless.
Perhaps then, you fired this person for being inept. Someone who is determined enough AND resourceful enough can and will generate more traffic to their libelous site.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
Oh come on. This isn't even RTFA, you've gone a step past it to RTF summary:
The general public and governmental workers lauded her for her efforts. The environmental Ministry spokesman was even quoted as saying 'Obviously we can't have staff everywhere all the time, so we depend on the public out there as surrogate eyes and ears for the ministry'.
I'm sure you still think everyone is lying but the poor, poor, corporation. Here, look at her response to the lawsuit in the article you didn't read:
"I learned the only way they could get me to remove the site was with an injunction, and an injunction would mean they would have to bring this information in front of a judge," Lanteigne said.
"I thought, 'That's excellent,' because I need a judge to see what's going on here."
She's actually happy that the truth will be heard. Maybe, just maybe, she's actually the one telling the truth.
So then, as a matter of principle, you won't be suing me when I rent a few billboards near your house and put your name, address, and photo on them, along with labeling you a known liar, thief, and pedophile.
You're getting some "don't be daft" responses, but unfortunately this isn't the silly hypothetical it sounds like. The Scientologists have employed very similar tactics against their critics.
Being sued has always been a risk of publishing. New technology, like blogging, changes nothing. The fact is that lots of people lie, and the threat of bringing suit is about the only way to protect your reputation.
There is a kneejerk tendency to assume this is an innocent blogger versus an evil corporation. Maybe, maybe not. If she's can convincingly argue that she did not commit libel, lawyers will be lining up at her door with thoughts of huge percentages in their heads. If she can't convince a lawyer who wants her to win, maybe we ought to reconsider the merits of the corporation's claims.
Publishing is publishing, whether you're the NYT or someone's cat blog. No one gets, or deserves, a free pass. Anyone unprepared to deal with the consequences ought not to publish.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
There was at one time in the western system of jurisprudence the notion of a Trial by Combat whereby the acused had the right to compel the acuser or his champion to engage him (the defendant) or his champion in a judicially sanctioned duel whereby the judgement of God would decide the winner. The theory being that God would strengthen the arm and sharpen the skills of the party representing the truth thereby allowing him or his champion to overcome the guilty or his champion. Although there is little evidence in the modern context to prove it, I would bet that society in general would be more civil and courteous if one risked life and limb by slandering his neighbor or falsly acusing him. How many corporate executives would acuse people of slander or insult them in public if they had to face the defendant or his champion at the wrong end of a sharp and pointy object?
Something like it has happened before. I remember reading about an elementary school teacher who was proclaimed a pedophile. It was later proven false, but that didn't really matter. He was a decent teacher, but after you get your windows knocked in, your tyres slashed, etc often enough, you move somewhere else and hope noone 'warns' your next residence about your fictitious extra-curricular activities.
You can't stop this in private speech, but you can stop people from doing what the grandparent suggested.
Please.
If I disliked somebody enough then I would gladly ruin their reputation for a mere $1500 a month.
That you think nobody would do that is naive.
But how do people find out about your excellent quality of service or great product if the people getting paid to talk loudly are all saying it sucks? The system you describe would allow any company to cover another with as much slime as they could buy, which would tend to lead to horrific monopolies - a classic market breakdown effect.
I would hope that if true freedom of speech were available as the grandparent suggested, people would become less gullible.
Fundamentally, your argument stinks of elitism - it should be the right of landowners in Georgia to refuse to rent anything nicer than a tarpaper shack to black people, it's their property; it should be legal for movie theatres to exclude blacks, for business owners to have a policy against hiring blacks, for the university to refuse to admin blacks.
If the black people don't like it, they should buy their own apartment blocks, their own movie theatres, their own university. Never mind that the blacks are overwhelmingly poor, so this is a completely impossible thing for them to do.
Being poor does not make you a second-class citizen. If you don't like that, move to a country where they didn't execute their royal family two hundred years ago.
What is the robbing of a bank, compared to the founding of a bank? -- Bertolt Brecht
No you would not be able to counter it, nor would any average family be able to counter a determined business or wealthy individual.
Thanks to the AC and the grand parent for the links...
PLEASE MOD UP!
Having complaints lobbed at you has always been a risk of running a business. New technology, like blogging, changes nothing. The fact is that lots of people speak their mind whether or not it is the truth, and like it or not, their is a matter of a little thing called "free speech" which you can do *nothing about*.
There is a kneejerk tendency to assume this is some poor company that could lose millions versus one person with a grudge. Maybe, maybe not. If she can convincingly argue that this "poor company" actually has a problem, then there should be people lining up to protest at this company. If she can't convince anyone, then she's a nutcase that should -- and will -- be ignored.
Publishing is publishing, whether you're the NYT or someone's cat blog. Everyone gets free speech. Anyone unprepared to deal with this freedom should move to China.
This is a sig. Deal with it.
as found here
Peter Armbruster
Vice-President, Operations
parmbruster@activagroup.ca
website (under 'construction' - HA!)
So $36,000 for two years worth of misery for you? There are plenty of people who, if you pissed them off sufficiently, would consider that well worth the ruin it would cause you.
Enough bad press and the vast majority of society will consider an individual a terrible person. For the average Joe, this is not something that can be overcome.
Provide logic and reasoning.
What grants those rights? There is nothing in the physical universe that we understand that in any way indicates that there is such thing as a natural right.
The concept of 'rights' is merely something we have created for the good of society. They don't really exist.
"Bad: Woman rights remarks"
Yeah, I hate hearing about women's sufrage too. We should end it.
--
Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
It seems to me that it only works that way if you assume that discrimination is profitable. In a world were it isn't profitable/popular to discriminate, bigots would naturally not have very much property...
I'm not saying anything about how the real world relates to these fantastic worlds of mine, just pointing out the assumption.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
Great to see more AnCaps here. I appreciate the debates and have reformed many opinions.
If not, that's a form of fraud.
I am an AnCap who disagrees with criminalizing non-contract fraud. If we agree I won't lie or deceive you, then I do, I breeched a contract. If no contract exists, there's no reason you should listen to me.
Threats of violence are exactly what the government uses to violate the rights of individuals, and that is what we as AnCaps are against.
Government has the RIGHT to commit violence, we don't.
I need the right of expression to allow me to preach violence. When tyranny is too great, I will not be silent.
If I convince you to murder, you're the guilty one, not me.
To me, that is a form of aggression against another person, and initiation of aggression against others is a violation of libertarian theory.
Fear != Violence. If I scare you, leave. If I don't let you leave, I have violated you.
How do you differ in your beliefs?
3 the sig... poor moleman
I like your example!
If I'm walking on a public thoroughfare and someone impedes my movement, they've committed violence towards me. I will use force to defend myself.
Yet they can shout discriminatory words at me. They're free to.
Words are not physical actions.
IANAL, but it seems to me the only way to stop this is to establish a legal custom of awarding the people subject to such Corporate Terror with massive punitive damages, to the amounts that can actually deter a corporation from practicing such terroristic behaviours. Also, right now it's a loss-only game for the defendents: they either lose a small quantity of their time and money, or a great quantity of those (assuming of course they don't immediately back down). In the event of a serious loss, this can be a life-wrecking event. Inserting a potential for massive compensation would make it a loss/win script, with the potential to radically change the defendants' life for good, not just for the bad. And of course, it would mean corporations would file lawsuits against private people only in extreme cases (read: the cases they meant to be filed in), and not as part of a standard-practice policy of corporate muscle, getting what they want from common people and stomping their civil rights in the process.
You just did the company a favor, now her site's down! Hurray for free speech!
/. editors didn't remove the coral links whenever someone posts them, I'd be really grateful - so much for coral if the submissions are decoralized (can you hear me ScuttleMonkey?).
Now if the
--that's what she says on the site. I certainly hope it's good stuff.
wait a minute
let's be fair
The gov't never said she was right! They said they agree with WHAT she's doing. And, frankly, so do I.
As long as she is right.
This
could someone tell me if the activa corporation that is suing this
e mentdisplay_id=5216
person is the same company involved in _this_:
http://www.labour.gov.za/media/statement.jsp?stat
call Greenpeace! It's in times like this when they can help!
Okay, let's make nicey-nice. Please mark me as your foe. My settings will then make you almost invisible and we can eagerly ignore each other forever.
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
------ Thanks so much! I have a pretty strong case of defence at my end including many letters of thanks from the Minister of the Environment and the Minister of Labour. To want to sue me for $2,000,000 is just a way of "SLAPPing me." "SLAPP" stands for "Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation". SLAPPs are legal actions (usually defamation actions) launched for the primary purpose of shutting down criticism, and without a strong cause of action. The plaintiff's goal in a SLAPP is not to win the lawsuit, but is rather to silence a critic by instilling fear of large legal costs and the spectre of large damage awards. Despite their right to free speech, critics may be frightened into silence e.g., taking down websites or comments made on line - if they are threatened with a defamation-based SLAPP. This method will not work with me. I've got way to much evidence at my end. I could actually counter sue for what I have been through so we'll see what happens. Either way, I'm glad it's out there in the media. Folks really need to know. With letters like yours it's great to know the message is getting out there. Thanks for your support! Louisette Lanteigne Waterloo Ont. -----
Meh.
Circuit City created DIVX:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DIVX
http://www.rabble.ca/babble/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get _topic&f=5&t=001759
someone may have tracked down activa holdings.
activa's web site is "under construction"...
Didn't they change that recently? In the US, I mean.
We've secretly replaced Slashdot with new Folgers Crystals - let's see if it notices.
this is a _copy_ of a _copy_. the geocities site on which the copy
l ouisette.lanteigne.html
is hosted is overloaded. so i made a copy of the google cache, here:
http://hands.com/~lkcl/activa.holdings.report.by.
... you edit for Wikipedia, huh? ;-)
Furry cows moo and decompress.
Maybe if they did she would admit such mistakes. Now even if she _was_ lying she'll never admit it, and everyone's already seen the site - even if it turns out she was lying, no-one will believe that, because Everyone Knows (TM) it got taken down because of the big evil corporation.
We've secretly replaced Slashdot with new Folgers Crystals - let's see if it notices.
And it's really worth 2 million? Besides, even if she did, the damage is done and this will not be effective in "undoing" it. the right thing to do would be to make a press release refuting the claims. This will be seen as an attempt to sweep things under the rug. Even if the website comes down, Everyone Knows[tm] that's only because she couldn't afford to fight The Good Fight[tm] against The Evil Corporation[tm].
We've secretly replaced Slashdot with new Folgers Crystals - let's see if it notices.
Has that Umbrella Corporation got any tentacles involved in T virus research or cosmetics?
Furry cows moo and decompress.
... search for activa holdings and the womans name --- but use teh cache of found links...
... being a mother and motivated to address her fear that she can't keep kids from being kids.. and getting into things they should not.
....... AS A MATTER OF SIMPLE PUBLIC RELATIONS MARKETING.
What little I read... and there is alot more to read such as city council meetings etc...
and having worked in a related field of cabinetry (one of the later things to install). It is not completely reasonabe to enforce some of her complaints as the environment of a construction site is going to be influenced by the construction. (I have no doubts that personnel at the construction site dislikes nails in the parking lot as mush as she dislikes nails elsewhere.
On the other hand and in recognition of this above fact, is she lying? The odds are she is telling the truth but perhaps expecting to much and as such
Should a construction company and sub contractors police (control teh level of hazards and garbage and etc..) the sites they work at? Yes, they should if only as a matter of public relations marketing. Otherwise it seems to me that there is a matter of private property where kids and anyone else at the construction site, that shouldn't be there, is trespassing.
When I pass by a construction site the way it is kept makes an impression on me as to the quality and attention to detail I can expect from the general contractor. Their expectations on the sub-contractors to maintain a reasonably clean appearance of the property. I get this from working on multi million dollar sites.
But I also recognize a trespassing issue.
Activa should not sue her, thats very bad PR. Instead they should require their subcontractors to maintain their trash and such, as well as post no tresspassing signs.
They should pay her any expense they have cost her in this legal mess and then do the right thing
You had all these problems with an award winning company? My advice would be to stay away from award-winning companies. When a company really messes up, and their customer, a contractor who was supposed to have had oversight, realizes this, he can't admit that he wasn't doing his job. So in turn, he awards a "quality" award to the company as a way of covering his butt, image-wise. Then the government agency that contracted the whole thing out looks at the mess, and decides that the political ramifications of dealing with this are too great, so they then issue a few awards as well, and next thing you know... ... you aren't going to buy from award-winning companies any more, are you?
Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
Activa Holdings Inc., the construction company/home developer, has a website containing nothing but an "under construction" image.
What you say is true, but you have to ask yourself why has this company tried to sue her for $2 million!
Is what she is doing really wrong?
"In a time of universal deceit - telling the truth is a revolutionary act." - George Orwell
Cdn law is different from US law in a number of important instiutional details. The judge can and will award costs. Even if the company is technically correct, it could still wind up paying the defense costs. Automagically if the defendant pays a nominal sum "into court" and the award is less than this.
my other post is +5 insightful
And all this woman is doing is using the power of the state to reign-in a bunch of neighborhood kids who want to have a fun time playing on a construction site. Read her goof-ball rants through google cache and ask yourself if you'd want to live anywhere near this nutball.
Which is more dangerous, pressure-treated wood* or a know-it-all control freak that wants to clamp-down on every child in the neighborhood?
* Containing "dangerous" amounts of arsenic, according to this loon.
Let this be a lesson. In the days of cheap digital cameras, if you're going to take on a task like this woman did, you might as well photograph every last thing and notate when the pictures were taken, and under what circumstances.
If that became a common practice, it's easy to imagine the bigger engineering companies collaborating with our elected officials to create laws and ordinances against "photographing at a construction site" or some shit. Something unconstitutional but meant to up the ante a litle bit for anyone who wants to take this task on.
In the mean time, give 'em hell.
Now before I get modded down, I be to remind whoever might read this that what I am saying is FACT. - bogaboga
I would argue that, in a state of non-contract, we should assume reasonable expectations.
Fine, but the problem today is many assume there is a "social contract." I abhor this idea. Remove the social contract and force people to distrust and I bet we'd see a better world. I'll vote if my candidate will sign a contract specifying his true intentions.
But without that disclaimer, I think you should be bound by reasonable expectations.
Again an unwritten social contract? No thanks. Newspapers who claim ("Everything we write is accurate") would do better than those who disclaim or are silent.
"Yeah, I defrauded you on purpose. But it sucks to be you, because I never specifically said I wouldn't do that!"
Yet requiring people to think about relationships is more certain, and the excuse of "I didn't know!" or "That's not fair!" won't hold weight.
You can always preach violence against tyranny in an AnCap society, because a tyrant has violated the rights of others, by definition.
I never want a freedom defined as "Can" and "Can't." Freedom is absolute.
If you say to me, "I will come to your house later and kill you," is it perfectly acceptable for me to sit home in fear? If an obvious threat like that is made, then I think I have the right to move against you first.
If you said that to me, I'd pull up my shirt and show you my piece. I don't cower. I also have no problem ending you the moment you come on my land.
People who rely on the law to protect them live in fear. I live knowing I can do my best to protect my life. By valuing everyone's life and property, I feel I am in a better position to walk away rather than getting mad. In fact, daily encounters with socialists in Evanston, Illinois prove that I always keep my cool, and they have zero respect for my rights.
for the images
It strikes me that they tried to sue her into closing the site and they have failed, maybe instead they should have thanked her for pointing out where these violantions where taking place and tried to stop them.
Most of the "infringments" seem minor at best, this kiind of bad publicty can't seem worth it now!
"In a time of universal deceit - telling the truth is a revolutionary act." - George Orwell
http://images.google.com/images?q=http://ca.geocit ies.com/infringements%40rogers.com&svnum=10&hl=sv& lr=&start=0&sa=N&filter=0
"In a time of universal deceit - telling the truth is a revolutionary act." - George Orwell
If she is telling the truth she has NO problems, if she is lying then she SHOULD be sued. The law is a TOOL in business. If their aim is to bankrupt her that is one thing but she should win if she has written something accurate.
From the article (quoting an Activa spokesman):
"Ultimately, they're confident it will be resolved in their favour," Murdoch said. "They're confident the right public perception will come about."
The right public perception, or the one they want?
The right public perception is coming out, and it sure isn't what they want.
It's not much consolation, but Canadian courts almost never award punitive damages. Even if the developer wins, the court is likely to simply try and work out a value for whatever damage to the complainant's reputation that the statements resulted in.
J. Greg Murdoch
Sorbara, Schumacher, McCann LLP.
(519) 576-0460
alternate telephone number: (519) 836-1510
Don't harass the man, but don't be afraid to exercise your constitutional right to free speech either.
Infringement can be a tort AND a criminal case, depending on the nature and scope of the infringement. Some of the P2P stuff could very probably be called a tort (Unlike what the *AA orgs and their ilk would have you believe...) and the bigtime ones would definitely be criminal- but they're also guilty of a tort at the same time.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
This is all happening in my city... here is some contact information which is publicly available CHBA, the Canadian Home Builders' Association
Activa Holdings Inc.
(519) 886-9400 Ext.104
Other contact information for the company interesting enough located a couple km away from RIM
Activa Holdings Inc.
Peter Armbruster
735 Bridge St. W
Waterloo, ON
N2V 2H1
(519) 886-9400
www.activagroup.ca
The web site appears to be inactive. The WHOIS contact is Werner Brummund, kyantz@gto.net and fax number is 5198868955
It would also be interesting to know which firms invest in Activa Holdings, as I'm sure investors would like to know how their capital is being used to bully residents in Kitchener/Waterloo Ontario.
I dunno what would be worse to the bystander, if you can actually sing like Hansi or if you can't but try.
Personally, if I had the vocals down I'd be looking for a guitarist and drummer...
If you can't see the value in jet powered ants you should turn in your nerd card. - Dunbal (464142)
Being /.ed will bring this story a LOT of public attention. Waterloo has to have the highest per-capita slashdot readership of any Canadian city- the suburb in which this woman lives has to be crawling with RIM geeks, and everybody knows that /. is required reading for RIM geeks.
Activa will really have to make sure they're model environmental citizens- because now they're going to be watched constantly by geeks with digicams and the ability to google the law from anywhere. Not such a bright move on their part.
Currently, corporations are blessed with many of the benefits of citizenship, and few of the limitations.
What we need are reforms to greatly limit the impact that corpotations can have on individual citizens.
To start, a corporation suing an individual citizen must cover that citizens legal fees, up to a certain percentage of their own legal cost, for instance 25%.
The money will be paid up front on a monthly basis, and does not need to be returned under any circumstances.
Any taxes for the legal fee reimbursement will be paid by the corporation, such that the citizen recieves, after all applicable taxes, the required amount.
The legal fee reimbursement will not be considered income for purposes of welfare, disability, unemployment, etc, and can be used for any purpose with no limitations.
Obviously the first things corporations will do is claim that their legal costs are next to nothing, because all of their lawyers are on retainer, and thus 'free'
Good job at finding the loophole, Mr. Suit, that simply means that the assumed legal cost will be the monthly salary of each lawyer who touches the case, times the number of years that the case. Alternate compensation would also need to be considered, including stock options, company cars and houses, so forth and so on.
Under current market and legal conditions, often it is such that citizens have little to no recourse when corporations violate laws in a way harmful to said citizens.
And yet, the same corporations that are effectively immune to citizen retaliation can effortlessly bankrupt numerous citizens via legal entanglements.
Corporations should not be able to force citizens into disfavorable settlements that entail large fines and the sacrifice of the citizens rights and future liability by threatening a never-ending legal battle that will cost the citizen large amounts of money even to enlist a single lawyer for the duration of their defense.
Corporations may exist solely to turn a profit for the shareholders, but they are allowed to exist solely to benefit the economy and thus the country. Suing private citizens rarely has any kind of benefit beyond establishing corporate dominance over the citizen, which is certainly bad for the country, as the country is, in fact, said citizen.
Of course, I am in no way qualified for legal or economic analysis, so obviously all of this will no doubt cause an economic recession as the rights of the pitiful corporations are simply trampled upon by an uncaring, unfeeling mass of citizens, who the corporations have no means of stopping. Which would be rather similar to the current situation, except with the trampling being the other way around.
Activa claims the website has caused damage to its reputation and launched the lawsuit only after Lanteigne refused to apologize and take down the site. Oh, I see. So they're suing a mother of 3 trying to keep her neighbourhood & kids safe, to protect their reputation. Wait.. isn't that a little counterproductive? They could have fessed up & fixed all of the problems mentioned and kept their reputation, but now I'm sure everyone hates them. Whether they win or not, they're still screwing themselves over in my opinion.
What I don't understand about the yard thing is why if anyone had a two-by-four with rusty nails in it in the middle of the yard - why they just wouldn't take it out themselves! If you have a kid it's just stupid to leave it there, so the report sounds really wierd.
The pictures are pretty compelling though. I think she has a good case for a counter-suit.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Any real estate is "your property" only because of state action. (Who issued that land deed? Who kicked the Native Americans off the land and gave it to the guy who sold it to the guy who sold it to you?)
Therefore if your right to select tenants or evict customers is based on the argument that "it's my property!", then your rightful power to do so is created and defined by the state, not any sort of natural right.
Now, there may be more legitimate arguments based on privacy and self-determination rather than on property. Libertarian capitalists generally fail to realize that property is an invention that we use to help support such primary rights, not a primary right in and of itself; and that much of the property that they place such importance on is an artifical creation of the state, thus making "anarcho-" or "libertarian" capitalism a contradiction in terms.
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
IANAL but this would appear to fall under Fair Comment in the Libel and Slander Act. which states:
24. Where the defendant published defamatory matter that is an opinion expressed by another person, a defence of fair comment by the defendant shall not fail for the reason only that the defendant or the person who expressed the opinion, or both, did not hold the opinion, if a person could honestly hold the opinion. R.S.O. 1990, c. L.12, s. 24.
meaning(by my training of no law training what so ever) that she can have that website that says I saw and I think all she wants, no matter how wrong she is. There is no need for anything more. This sounds like it was just to shut her up, and it looks like it should fail, and as a Canadian, I hope it does.
Happy Noodle Boy says "F###ing doughnut! Mock me? You fried cyclops!!"
Have you seen her site? It rambles on and on she complains about a diesel fuel being spilled or kids making a fort out of plywood or a building who looks like he might have heat stroke????? It is seriously weird read. Like I said before seems like she is way concerned with other peoples biz and affairs in my opinion. Just a nut with too much time on her hands, thats what I think.
Apparently you have never lived next door to a busy body like this (IMHO). Maybe you should try that sometime.
\begin{sarcasm}
How witty.
\end{sarcasm}
And how didn't that reply get sent down to troll?
companies not being able to sue individuals over their speech, even if damaging.
Even though this is from Canada, this reminds me (again) that it's high time to protect our freedom of speech, not only from government encroachment, but also from corporate interference.
It matters nothing to me that any company is damaged from the speech of individuals. Such speech must be protected in these days of de facto corporate rule.
If a company cannot shield itself from one individual's speech, perhaps they should decide to fold their tents rather than harassing this good lady? It seems to me this must be a company that has worn out its privilege to exist.
Steve Magruder, Metro Foodist
>> to silence others, acuqire their property...
Try to buy this post you fascist.
This is a "we know you can't afford to defend against our coporate lawyer onslaught, so you'll have to settle" lawsuit. If she tried to defend herself, they would ensure the attourney costs would financially ruin her. I'm sure they just want to settle out of court for her taking the site down.
You are either dead wrong, or I have been wasting money giving to environmentalist not-for-profit organizations. She doesn't need a billion dollars. She needs a couple of lawyers. She is maybe a dozen phone calls away from getting one. I bet that there is more then one environmental non-prof that would jump a the chance to send her a lawyer or three, especially when she has pictures and the case is so cut and dry.
Is this an attempt to silence her? Sure. I imagine they slapped her with the suit in gamble that she would drop the whole thing. According to her website, they gambled wrong. If you are really worried, I would suggest writing a letter to whatever non-prof environmental organization you regularly donate to and inform them of the situation. Lawyers are not exactly cheap, but most non-profs that deal with environmental law tend to have more then a few handy.
The good news for all is that (from what I remember), under the Canadian court system, if the woman wins then the company will foot the bill for the court charges. Not only that, but I do know that there are times when a judge might reassess damages back to the plaintiff. In this case, they'd better have a good case... as sueing a mom for $2,000,000 might be just the thing to have a judge slap them with a rather large amount in retaliation.
Also, it can't be defamation if the person has no good name to lose. In addition to those two, I believe that the defense of "truth" also holds up if there is any other reasonable grounds for believing that the claims are indeed true.
Having said all of that, Britain has no "right" of free speech (and I'm not sure that that's all that bad) and therefore freedom of speech can NOT be used as part of any kind of defense. Unless you're on Speaker's Corner, then you can say what you like - that corner is totally protected from any and all laws governing speech in England.
Canadian laws are, in many ways, very similar to Britain, so I'd assume the libel/slander laws would be based on the same governing principle - reasonableness and truth first, protection of the individual second, all other rights and obligations third.
The biggest difference I see is that the Americas have nothing comparable to the EU's Court of Human Rights, which can overturn national legal decisions or even national laws, when the EU has compelling evidence that such decisions or laws violate EU or international mandates on human rights, or when they have compelling evidence that the decision/law was in conflict with the broader needs of society.
(Britain has fallen foul of the EU's Court of Human Rights on many occasions. It is by no means a perfect country, it is flawed in many respects - as, indeed, is the EU itself. Frankly, though, I can think of little in the Americas which would lead me to believe they're any better and a lot that convinces me they're infinitely worse in many areas.)
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
go to sorbaralaw.com
click lawyers
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
In my country, this would never have happened. The minister would be too busy kissing the polluters asses to aknowledge the existence of the website. The media wouldn't give a shit, and the woman could go on happily making her website and being ignored.
The story says she could be forced into bankruptcy.... no she can't. She's a stay-at-home mom. That generally means that she has no income. A court cannot force someone into paying a lawsuit with say... her husbands money or even money she already has. The only thing a court can do is garnish her wages. WHAT WAGES?!? Hahahaha. I say she defends herself in court, lets them win for 20 bagillion dollars and then just ignore requests for payment ad infinitim. OJ Simpson is doing it, so why can't you?
... and in the DRM, bind them.
Of never letting Slashdot post any articles not based in the U.S. say Aye.
Or Eh!
In this case, the compelling story is that a mother-of-three is doing this to protect her children against a faceless, insensitive and obnoxious corporation. It plays to our desires to root for the underdog. We can all see ourselves in that situation: a lone voice in the wilderness crying out for solace.
In this case, our libel laws are not very forgiving. The burden of proof is set pretty high. Not impossibly so, but perhaps more difficult than an individual could accomodate without becoming some sort of crucading private investigator.
Now, let's take another scenario. An unrelated, fictional woman has an axe to grind over a local construction company based on some imagined slight (say, she thinks they go to work too early in the morning and mess up her sleep). She then engages in a campaign of deliberate misinformation using plausable but falsified events. In this case, the libel laws are quite GOOD, because it puts the burden of proof on the potential libeler to back up their words with proof, and god only knows what kind of damage could be done by one disgruntled and motivated nutcase.
Personally, I think that libel laws SHOULD put the burden on the person making the statements, but there should be increased protection of the little guy 'whistleblower' from being intimidated away from speaking out in protest when its due. An anti-SLAPP style law would go a long way to resolve that weakness.
Either way, it's premature to judge Canada's (really, british common law's) approach as 'inferior' because of one anecdote where the law isn't supportive of the little guy over big business. After all, the same protection extends to the woman in the event this company tried to railroad HER.
"People will pay big bucks for the luxury of ignorance."
This is one area where the laws in Canada suck badly compared to the USA and other countries. SLAPPs are much easier to initiate here in Canada in order to protect the rich - as well the courts are totally set up to protect the rich when it comes to basic justice issues - like "freedom of speech".
Took forever for the courts in Canada to decide that a woman was a person - because the rich didn't want any woman to be a judge, politician or to hold any kind of official government office!
So it is easy to end up behind the 8 ball. So one has to proceed with caution and video tape everything in situations similar to the one described here. However, any corporation can easily force anyone into the courts - and force bankruptcy by extended legal battles. An easy way to clean anyone out financially in court is the use of so-called expert witnesses. These "experts" do not have to produce scientific documented evident to back up any claim - they simply have to make a statement - and judges accept that as fact. Naturally the rich can bring in as many puppets (experts) as they wish - since the defendant will have to pay for them later!
Nice parrot. Any other tricks you do? Or haven't you moved beyond that in the thrid grade?
This isn't a free speech issue. Nothing has happened that has limited this person's freedom to speak or write what she pleases. Free speech does not include the right to slander or libel. You have a right to say what you wish, and I have an equal right to sue you if I believe you've slandered or libeled me. One right has nothing to do with the other.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
man, i envy you for your language.
On second thought, let's not go to Camelot. It is a silly place.
The difference in this case is that the landlord was stupid enough to give a reason for refusing them - and that reason was against the law. You cannot refuse someone based on race, sexuality, religion, etc...
If he had just said "sorry, I've already promised the house to somebody else" there would not have been a problem. The fact that he explicitly told them "nope, no gays" got him into trouble.
http://jcsnippets.atspace.com/ - a collection of Java & C# snippets
With the laywer(s) salary, the company could probably hire a cleanup crew for a week and really put a positive spin on this story.
"Look, we REALLY care about the environment". "We listen to people"... but noooo, let's release the hounds, show that we are just faceless corportaion that doesn't give a shit about anything but the bottom line. And our laywers have to look busy, or they will lose their $160.000 jobs and company cars...
Actually, if you don't commit slander and libel, you're pretty safe against accusations of slander and libel.
I'm an attorney living in Sunnyvale, and I thought the most effective way to show how wrong you are is to file a frivolous libel case against David Johnson of Mountain View, CA.
When you receive the summons, even though it is a joke and will eventually be thrown out, I highly suggest you hire an attorney to receive advice. I also suggest you show up to court because otherwise a default judgement will be thrown against you and I will collect on it.
... to all hackers out there to pay a little visit to Activa Holdings Inc's website and make a few changes
y'know what I mean (wink wink, nudge nudge)
(a wink is as good as a nudge to a blind bat)
Man, I wish I could. But reality says otherwise... Anyway I agree, I don't know what would be worse for him!
Global warming is a cube.
Courtesy of Dictionary.com:
(emphasis mine)
libel Audio pronunciation of "libel" ( P ) Pronunciation Key (lbl)
n.
1.
1. A false publication, as in writing, print, signs, or pictures, that damages a person's reputation.
2. The act of presenting such material to the public.
2. The written claims presented by a plaintiff in an action at admiralty law or to an ecclesiastical court.
One key point that they need to be able to prove in order to win a libel suit, is that the statement(s) have to be FALSE. Its absolutely not libelous if the statements are true. Unmodified pictures seem to show these kinds of cases very well, although we hope the court has enough sense to do the right thing.
And they said zombies weren't real!
"I want my private properties to be private. I want to invite who I want to, and avoid who I want to."
But you don't want me to have the right to have peace and quite in my property. You feel that you have the right to force your noise on to me and if I don't like I can spend a huge amount of money to get enough space so I don't have to deal with it.
You can keep who ever you want out of your home. However if you want to run a business you have to follow certain rules like collecting sales tax, putting it in an area that is zoned for business, and not discriminating in hiring or service. To use your logic about the loud music I.E. if you don't like it then buy enough land so you don't have to see or hear it. Then you should just buy a bunch of land in the middle of no where are live off it if you don't want to follow the rules for running a business.
Unlike a lot of people I do believe in an absolute right and wrong and a creator. I understand that many on Slashdot do not. By my view of the universe what you want is the freedom to do evil. You want the freedom to discriminate, to exclude, to do what ever you please. You may view this as a good thing, you may even not plan to discriminate but just want the right too. You and I have very opposing views on the what is a "natural" right both based not on fact but internal feelings.
We are lucky to live in a Democracy. The majority of the people have decided that business are not entirely private property that is why they are called the public sector and as such must follow some rules of conduct. You have the freedom to try and convince others your right. BTW the US constitution does say anything about freedom of expression. It does talk about freedom of speech. I find that current interpretation of that to be way too broad. I do not think that it covers photos film, or video since those all involve recording of an action. I feel that it only covers speech, writing, drawing, and painting. A lot of people disagree with me so I have to try to change it by talking and learn to live with it if the majority continues to say other wise.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
-Eric
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Their megabuck legal team convinced the judge to throw out the case before it could come to trial (by refusing to admit expert testimony). I'm appealing, but meanwhile they are suing me to make me pay more than $300,000 in legal fees to their lawyers
Sony and Random House assert in their legal filings that my blogging about the Da Vinci Code case, my posting of legal documents, expert witness analysis and a discussion of my own books as the originals in the genre constitutes evidence of "improper motivation" which they say justifies me being forced to pay .
Why didn't I sue them first?
As already mentioned on this thread, it's all about megabucks. Random House/Bertelsmann is the world's largest, multibillion-dollar publishing company.
Outclassed in the "all the justice you can pay for" category, I first wrote them a non-threatening letter intending to ask that they give me credit. I had no lawyer, no intention to sue then -- as now -- never any demand for settlement money.
Despite my private and non-threatening approach, Random House launched a thermonuclear "fuck off" fax at me threatening me with financial ruin should I pursue the issue. Their fax was so extreme that it was a big clue that some sort infringement may have happened and that they knew it.
Random House slammed the door on private and civil discussion. But, lacking the megabucks to buy the same measure of justice available to large global corporations, I turned to public disclosure and what better way than blogs, one of which was The Da Vinci Crock
I did this because a couple of years ago, before blogs were so common, I created an online forum called PatheticBell.Com (http://www.patheticbell.com/) concerning the misleading ads and promises of Pacific Bell (now SBC) DSL service. That forum collected enough information from angry users to support several class action lawsuits that brought fines and better service.
Because I had successfully used the Web to bring issues to the public's attention then, I saw no reason not to do so again. The public scrutiny obviously generated more heat than Random House could take, so they filed suit against me in New York where the judges are more friendly toward publishers than here in California.
The judge in question refused to allow my expert witnesses to submit their testimony then ruled in favor of Random House's request to deny a trial on the issues. I am appealing.
BIG APOLOGY: I am sorry for all the badly produced .pdf documents above!
The court filings are only available as CRAPPY .pdfs are scanned from printed pages.
Lawyers do this (instead of creating normal, CPU-sucking Acrobat documents) to make it impossible to text search their filings or to cut and paste from them despite the fact that they are public domain documents.
This
Since people could always opt-out of the "social contract" with a simple disclaimer, I don't think it harms freedom.
/. regulars abhor "Opt-out" I would rather that government be "Opt-in," including any social contract.
As most
Government is the ultimate form of Spam and adware. They hit you up with offers of paradise, track your every purchase and move, and disregard anything you do as "private." Try uninstalling it, for proof.
Just from an efficiency stand point, it seems like we'd be better off if we assume reasonable expectations in the default case, and let people spell out exactly what they guarantee in special cases.
Fine, I will write out your trusted contract with government:
You must pay for police protection, but the police are under no mandate to protect you.
You must pay for a public retirement program, but it is not under mandate to pay you anything.
You must pay for public education, even if you have no kids. Educators are under no mandate to teach anything.
You must pay for your land, but government can take it away for any reason.
Yes, but I've defined threatening innocent people as aggression, so to me, that's like saying, "I want the freedom to violate other people's rights," which is a sort of paradox.
Scream and verbally threaten all you want. The minute you draw a weapon, others will silence you.
If someone threatens you verbally, just draw your gun in defense. See if they'll continue.
You miss the point - my right to peace and quiet applies whether it's my property or not. You can and should be arrested for disturbing my peace whether I'm a home owner, a renter, someone sleeping in a hotel, a squatter, whatever.
Property is a means we use to help define and enforce things like the right to peace and quiet. It is not a primary right.
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
Kinda the whole point is that the U.S. government isn't doing that whole "competent tribunal" part, even when doubt exists.
PHEM - party like it's 1997-2003!
Well, if you RTFA, they DID ask first.
"Pulling together is the aim of despotism and tyranny! Free men pull in all sorts of directions" -- Havelock Vetinari
No, libertarians think that property ownership is a primary, natural right and not an invention of the state. You may think they're idiots, which is fine, but you can't use your opinion to make something a contradiction. That's like saying "I don't believe that God exists, so a 'theistic person' is an oxymoron". It doesn't work that way.
But I would really like to know what the primary rights you mentioned are if property ownership is secondary.
If that was the case, I wouldn't get sent so many fake virus warnings by those of my friends who have internet. And slime can be arbitrarily convincing - look at the recent happenings where people finally twigged to the fact that Microsoft's "leaks" are probably no such thing.
For the love of God, please learn to spell "ridiculous"!!!
No, the somewhat dodgy assumption I was making is that those who have the most venues to push their ideology will tend to inflict it on the masses. Which is not always the case, but I think it's fairly valid on the whole.
Discrimination may be profitable for the individual but, if population segment A have cash and population segment B don't, discrimination can be used to keep the cash in segment A's hands, giving segment B no chance to work themselves out of poverty. My belief is that this is more damaging to society than any loss of freedom resulting from anti-libel/slander laws.
For the love of God, please learn to spell "ridiculous"!!!
You're right. Nobody should do anything. Thanks for pointing out the futility in life. ...*BANG*
Uh... all I said was that supporting the right to slander and libel and discriminate against others was probably not in society's best interests. But if you want to take your own life, don't let me stop you.
For the record, I think that in many ways our present (Western) societies are as good as they're likely to get - there's room for improvement, but far more room for deterioration. That's not going to stop me trying to make things better, of course.
For the love of God, please learn to spell "ridiculous"!!!
You are both wrong. We need both old growth forest and new growth. Both encourage different types of wildlife. Deer love new growth forest because their food (young trees) is close to the ground and common. Woodpeckers need old trees because they have more bugs under the surface to eat.
Except for rain forests, the natural order of things is a forest fire every so often (often year). Since people don't like a forest fire, (it tends to harm houses, plus there is the whole Bambi scare) we have logger go in and clean up the forests.
Most logging companies own land. They want to make sure there is more trees - it is a cash crop like anything else. They are re-planting for the future.
They did change the laws, and I don't fully understand how. However even before you could not declare bankruptcy to get out of judgments against you. The lawyers always get paid.
Bankruptcy was never intended as a way to get you out of debt - it was a way to get help paying bills. They will normally dismiss some lesser bills, but that isn't a requirement.
The order of bill dismissal is well defined. Last to go is court and lawyer fees from the bankruptcy costs. Second to last is court judgments from previous actions. Then things like your house (but in most states they cannot take anything you need to live, so your house is probably protected)
I am not a lawyer. I'm giving you my best understanding of the law, If you need legal advice get a lawyer.
It's not my opinion, it's a simple observation that any claim of real estate as property rests on state action. As I stated: "Who issued that land deed? Who kicked the Native Americans off the land and gave it to the guy who sold it to the guy who sold it to you?"
Self-determination, self-expression, the right to control one's own life with minimal interference from others. Freedom of speech, of thought, of conscience and consciousness, of choice. The right to be left alone. The right to self-defense. The right to equality under the law, and due process of law.
("But," you protest, "many of these rights can only be exercised when property is recognized?" "Exactly!" I reply. "The justification for property is that its existence supports these primary rights; and if our notion of property is interfering with the exercise of primary rights, it is property, not liberty, that must give way.")
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
This reminds me of a story that occurred in Miami [ http://www.local10.com/news/4053892/detail.html ] When a little girl was told to stop selling lemonade and cookies because she didn't have a license to sell food/beverage. What else are they going to do? NoMorePoints.com
All rights are defended by state action, thus there are no natural rights! I don't believe in natural rights, so I would agree with that part.
Someone who does believe in natural rights would say that deeds make the protection of rights easier, just like the police make the protection of life easier, but they don't manufacture those rights. They exist independently of your ability to protect them, that's what makes them natural rights - you always have them.
Who kicked the Native Americans off the land and gave it to the guy who sold it to the guy who sold it to you?
Speak for yourself Mr. Western Hemisphere (OK, me too :) ). But plenty of regions have property ownership that can be traced back to (nearly) the start of recorded history. And what about Robinson Crusoe? There's no government on the island, but believers in natural rights would still say that he owned his house and the other things he made, just like he had a right to life.
The justification for property is that its existence supports these primary rights
Not to me, and quite a few others! Obviously I wasn't clear about what I was objecting to. You have a belief about where rights come from and what rights are primary and secondary, others have different beliefs about the same subject. You can't take one of your beliefs and one from someone else and thus produce a "contradiction in terms". That egotisically elevates your opinion into a fact. You might as well assert that rights come from the Christian God, and thus Jews don't have rights, since they don't believe in the divinity of Jesus. Even if you were right, a Jew who disagrees isn't contradicting himself, he would (in that unlikely case) merely be wrong.
Sorry for all of the bold tags, but it frustrates me that you can't seem to understand that other people really honestly have different beliefs. Some people say animals have rights, others think they don't - both are opinions or beliefs, not facts. Mock them all you want, but calling "animal rights" an oxymoron is still factually incorrect. The same for "libertarian capitalist" or "smart American" .
I hope I made myslef clear without offending.
Why bother with a lawsuit to get someone to take a website down. Just post a story to slashdot. Poof it's gone.
I didn't mean that they were "defended by state action", I meant that land ownership is created by state action. Just like copyright.
Please name one region where a claim of land ownership can be traced back to near the start of recorded history and does not include land changing hands because of conquest, confiscation, feudalism, or other state action. I'd be fascinated to study it!
Crusoe's situation is unlikely to pertain to anyone now...
Having the recognized right to occupy a piece of land as your home, perhaps a relationship of stewardship, is not the same as being "owner" of the land. Many societies have not hand the concept of land ownership yet still respected the right to home. (Indeed, in modern Japan, the homeless often set up rather elaborate camps in public parks; they don't "own" the land, yet as a practical matter everyone recognizes their right to occupy that space as home. I don't know much about the amount of legal protection accorded them (would like to learn more), but as a practical matter their space is respected.)
I am not trying to talk about "beliefs" or "opinions". I am attempting to engage in criticism of a poltical philosophy and to offer an alternative. The flaw in libertarian capitalism is not that it contradicts my proposition that property should be regarded as a secondary tool to ensure primary right; the flaw (or rather, one flaw) is that libertarian capitalism makes untrue assertations and assumptions about the relationship between the state and property.
Animal rights is not an "opinion", it is a rigorous philosophical theory, a result of critical thinking. (I refer you to the works of Tom Regan.) Libertarian capitalism is also a philosophical theory, a less sound one than animal rights due to the rather large hole that capitalism, since it relies on the state to create certain property rights, tends away from libertarianism.
(Indeed, libertarian capitalists outright stole the terms "libertarian" from the libertarian socialists, and some - such as the original poster in this thread - are now trying to steal the word "anarchist" as well, as if "anarcho-capitalism" were not a inherent contradiction. One cannot have "a system without hierarchy " that is "based on private control of economic resources", as those who control economic resources are the rulers, the top of the hierarchy!)
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
That's your opinion. Other people believe the opposite:
Even that states that "they argue" not "they prove", because it's their opinion. You seem to believe in your philosophical or political opinion so strongly that you've forgotten it's an opinion, and started thinking it's indisputable. I really don't know how a well-read person (as you obviously are) can forget that. Maybe it's just me.
libertarian capitalists outright stole the terms
Libertarian loosely translates to "freedom supporter", I think it works well for both capitaist and socialist advocates of limited government. It'd love a cite on the origin of the word, though.
> I own stores, they're my property. If I don't want a communist shirt on my property, it's my right.
Nice thought, but since your store is purportedly for public access, you have to comply with a variety of laws that don't apply to private property like a house. For example, there's no law that requires you to have fire exits marked in your house. By the same token, you're not allowed to violate anti-discrimination laws in your store, where they don't apply to your house.
> If I'm a landlord and I don't like a tenant, I shouldn't be forced to accept them. It is my property.
Again, because you're presumably offering the rental property to the general public, you give up the right to discriminate in violation of the law. If you want the protection of contract law and right of separation (you're not criminally liable for crimes committed by your tenant on the rental property, for example), then you need to abide by the whole landlord-tenant paradigm, which includes not being allowed to say "no communists".
> Yes, some racist white guy may say no to a black family. What stops another landlord from saying no problem? Competition opens doors shut by others.
I'd say that (shown by history) other people in the community could apply the pressure that stop the other landlord. It's appallingly naive to say that competition will fix a problem like this. The reason laws like this exist is specifically because competition didn't fix problems like this.
Virg
No, that is my reasoned conclusion. Others have reasoned conclusions that differ, either because one of us has engaged in a fallacy or because we take different axioms. (If someone takes as an axiom, for example, that it's perfectly ok to have a society in which one group enslaves another, our reasoned conclusions are going to differ, and I can only hope for a compassionate change of heart to lead to a different set of axioms - and in this case. meanwhile be prepared to use force to use this person from putting their conclusions into practice!)
My "opinion" is that chocolate tastes better than stawberry (though chocolate-covered strawberries rock++), Sapporo's new winter brew is better than Kirin's, the Baltimore Orioles are morally superior to the New York Yankees, redheaded women are beautiful (as are blondes, and brunnettes, and purple-dyed punk girls, and shaven-headed artsy types, and...what was the question again?), Escher's works are more interesting than Piccaso's, and Bugs Bunny is better than Mickey Mouse. They are not arguable or examinable, they are simply the untrained reaction of my nervous system to the world.
My "reasoned conclusions" are subject to argument, they are the result of a trained process of logical disciplined thought. Of course I may apply this process imperfectly, which is why I am willing to argue and re-examine them; but after many years I have a high degree of confidence in them. They are propositions such as: capitalism is problematic for anyone who claims to value liberty, animals are due significant ethical consideration, drug prohibition is orders of magnitude more harmful than the level of drug abuse that would prevail in its absence, evoluton rather than religion should be taught in science classes, etcetera.
You seem to be unfamiliar with the conventions of rhetorical writing. Did Tom Paine or Socrates or Lao Tzu go around saying, "In my opinion..."?
Of course you can dispute my conclusions. And of course I'm going to dispute your disputation, unless you find a genuine flaw in my argument.
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
> There is a difference between public venue and private property. In my house, I should be able to say whatever I want; in public, I should have to mind my manners. If I am publically lying about a person in public, then that should be actionable.
That's a good metric, until you find the grey areas in "public". Is a restaurant public or private? Sure, it's owned by a private entity, but it's open to the public. If I walk into a restaurant and start talking trash about someone, and the other patrons are listening, am I talking privately or publicly? It's the "private protperty for public use" that gets you into hot water, and these are the venues for which anti-discrimination laws were originally scripted.
> You should be able to hire whomever you please without fear of a discrimination suit, and you should be able to fire people the same way. You should be able to refuse to serve Austrians in your restaurant, require everyone to where a green shirt, etc.
The basis of anti-discrimination laws has always been exclusionary. For example, it's not actually a violation of anti-discrimination laws to require that everyone in your restaurant wear green, because that's not exclusionary. It is, however, not legal to open a restaurant to the public and then disallow certain people on the basis of stuff that's not disruptive to your business, like being Austrian. The reason is that while it seems on the surface to be a matter of private property, history has shown that such discrimination can persevere in the face of financial loss, because some people will value the prejudice above monetary gain and if they carry enough financial or civil weight, can enforce that desire on their communities. Moreover, in cases where discrimination shows a profit (building access to your business for the handicapped costs a lot, for example) you can develop a class of people that never get redress against discrimination, and this was deemed a long time ago to be detrimental to society at large. Keep in mind that none of this applies to private property (for example, you can hire and fire a nanny for any or no reason with little legal difficulty and you don't need ramps in your house), when your business is a public entity you must play by the rules of society.
> A person using public property can't be allowed to abuse it to put forth mistruths; they have their own property for that.
In the fifties, white superiority wasn't considered a mistruth. There are still people who don't consider it a mistruth now. Again, some people place a very high value on their prejudice. If someone who does that ends up in a very high position or on a position of monopoly, it's reasonable to assume that society at large will suffer unless that person's prejudice cannot be used in public (and quasi-public) settings. If the only grocery in a town with thirty black people decides not to serve them, they have no real recourse to competition since nobody can profitably run a grocery for that small a clientele.
> In the US, having our freedoms restored from the poor wording of the Civil Rights Act would do a great deal to rid ourselves of discrimination. Instead of it being illegal to do all those things I mentioned, make it illegal for the government to do them. That is as it should be. That would rid us of horrible things like affirmative action, the so called "equal opportunity" laws, race based college financial aid, etc.
It would do no such thing. These things exist specifically because of discriminatory practice that made minorities into second-class citizens. Competition didn't eliminate or even significantly ameliorate these problems in the forties and fifties, so I have no idea why you think that it'll magically work now. As I said before, your view of discrimination requires that people value monetary gain more than their prejudice, and that's a very naive view of the world. The United Negro College Fund exists because when it was created, it
capitalism is problematic for anyone who claims to value liberty
All of your other conclutions I can understand, but this confuses me. To me, capitalism means "a system where people have the liberty to trade". Also, I have major problems with how it's currently implemented, and would love to see changes within capitalism, but I don't know of a reasonable alternative with NO capitalism. Even if I did, people always want to trade, and if 90% of your economy is on the black market, you're still 90% capitalist. (Under Soviet capitalism, the black market trades you?)
> If someone threatens you verbally, just draw your gun in defense. See if they'll continue.
This is getting quite tiresome. Your argument requires that the only thing of value that you have is your personal safety. OK, then try this: the threat becomes "give me $100.00 or I'll blow your house up while you're away." Now, to credibly defend yourself against the threat, you can't just "show your piece", you have to stay at home to defend it. If you leave, your bravado (and your firearm) is irrelevant. Or try, "Give me $100.00 or I'll kill your kid when he's not near you." Again, your ability to defend yourself doesn't help, and unless you want to spend your life in proximity to your kid you can't defend him at all times, so again the threat carries weight. Since the threat requires you to change your behavior to deal with it, it's rational to consider it a use of force.
Virg
No, YOU suck!
go to sorbaralaw.com, or to lawyers directly (both of which would show up as coming from slashdot in their referrer log).
I've been speaking to Lorraine via email, and she has now set up a legal defense fund.
/. reader would like to make a donation towards the fight, you can make a donation here:
e rs.com/rel=url2html-24165http://ca.geocities.com/b utterflybluelu@rogers.com/>
If any generous
ahref=http://ca.geocities.com/butterflybluelu@rog
Personally I see her cause as worthy - lets face it, if we don't stand up dirty business people like that will just continue to bully the little guy.
(I'd appreciate this being modded up, or maybe added as an update to the original article?)
A weak argument that sounds strong because of the way one chooses his words can be countered by "parroting" their argument and exposing this weakness. Apparently, you were not able to appreciate the effectiveness of this, instead attacking and insulting me by calling me a parrot and an elementary school student. Thank you for that.
And by the way, insulting someone to counter their argument is something third graders do as well.
Since you were not able to grasp the concept of my counter-argument, I shall explain it for you. America's lawsuit-happy attitude is exactly what supresses free speech these days. People are afraid to speak out because they don't want a lawsuit thrown at them. It's very effective in stopping free speech since the government can't simply repel the first amendment. It's sickening to see all the lawsuits and threats of same being thrown about to limit freedoms we should enjoy.
This is a sig. Deal with it.
Parroting is a common technique seen on Slahdot. It is childish because it is often used by children to rebut the arguments of their parents and other adults who might actually know what they're talking about. It almost always fails because simple word replacement doesn't construct a logical argument.
The point is this: There is no relationship between free speech and litigation. We have always been a litigious society, even in the colonial era. Suing someone because they slander or libel you does not restrict their speech. Free speech does not include the right to engage in libel or slander.
The other poit is this: Anyone who publishs on the internet is playing by the same rules as people publishing in older media. The technology used to publish does not, and should not, change the law. Someone who posts their stories to a blog has no more, or less, protection that someone whose stories appear in a newspaper.
No one, including you, who posts here linking litigation to free speech restriction -- usually in cases involving a business and an allegedly helpless individual -- ever proposes a reasonable alternaive to the current situation or, in fact, demonstrates a cause-and-effect relationship between the suit and that individual's free speech. Allusions to corporate "armies of lawyers" are beside the point, If someone can convincingly demonstrate they did not engage in slander or libel, they will have no trouble finding lawyers to defend them, who will expect to draw their fees from the proceeds of a successful countersuit.
People lie. There's no reason to believe that bloggers don't engage in libel or slander as much as the rest of us.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
That's a market economy, which (while imperfect) is generally a positive force (provided that there are no external costs or monopolies, and the buyers and sellers meet with equal power and full knowledge). Markets vs. command economies is an independent question to capitialism versus socialism: the first question is "what can we do with property", the second is "what sort of things can become property, and how".
Capitalism is an economic system based on private control of resources (capital); as I've been arguing, this necessitates state force to initially create, and then enforce, that control. And the concentration of power into the hands of this state-backed minority of owners is corrosive to liberty, causing a slide into plutocracy.
It contrasts with socialism, an economic system based on the exchange of labor. Both can be found with or without centralized command of the economy; the US during WWII would be an example of a capitalist command-economy, while libertarian socalists point to voluntary collectivisation in some regions during the Spanish Civil War.
Recommended reading: Libertarian Socialism, a little jargon filled ("fetters of capitalism") but informative about the topic.
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
"The current situation" is so ridiculously stupid that I (and many others, apparently) do not feel it necessary to provide a "reasonable alternative". How can someone who has created a website that "led to letters and kudos from various government officials for reporting alleged violations" (from TFA) -- and specifically from the (then-)environment minister -- suddenly get sued for millions from the offending company? Obviously this wasn't "slander or libel", as you keep repeating (I have found that a person that wishes to plant a half-truth or lie in the minds of someone will continually repeat that lie until it becomes truth -- see also President Bush and the words "weapons of mass destruction"), but a genuine complaint. Even if it was a bit slanderous, just because something has gone on for years doesn't make it right (re: your claim that this has gone on since "the colonial era").
And "cause and effect"? Well, this person wrote a website, you see, and it caused the company mentioned in the website to file a suit to shut her up, their desired effect. Simple, no? Or did you mean something else?
And sure, some people will be willing to defend their freedom of speech, but many others are now afraid of the "army of lawyers" corporations have, and will simply fold. And what if not everything this person said was true? Would that be enough to not prove "convincingly" that this person was not involved in your "libel and slander", even if there were still a lot of truth in what the person said? And would this be enough to shut this person up?
Perhaps you do not see the terrible abuse of power large corporations have at their disposal in today's world. Perhaps you don't see their avarice slowly eroding personal liberties, like the media companies all but eliminating personal fair use. The rose-tinted glasses of patriotism for countries being crushed under a mountain of greed has made people actually fight against their own freedom and unknowingly work for their oppressors. Maybe it has been going on since colonial days, but it's time to end it. Realizing "that's the way it's always been" is a poor argument is the first step to positive change.
This is a sig. Deal with it.
private control of resources ... necessitates state force
And this is where a natural rights supporter would disagree - you are believe that legal and moral claims to property are the same, while they believe that the moral claim comes first, then the legal one comes along afterward, as a way of protecting that moral right. Their belief is similar for the right to live - you always have a moral right to live (even with no government to protect it), while laws against murder are just a legal recognition of that pre-existing moral right.
Natural rights supporters would say that even when legal rights are lost the moral and ethical rights still exist. Your "Native American's kicked off their land" example makes that point quite well. They had no legal right to the land (at least under US law), but we still believe that action to be unethical, because they had a moral right to it.
It contrasts with socialism, an economic system based on the exchange of labor.
That's the strangest definition of socialism I've ever seen, could you elaborate? On the other hand, if you're talking about the labor theory of value, that was the prevailing theory (even among capitalists) during Marx's time, but it's been well-refuted for quite a while.
As for your ideas, in the words of every long-lived thrill-seeker, "you go first". Form a commune or town, run it on those ideas, and we'll see what happens. No matter how it turns out, we'll then have empirical evidence rather than conjecture, which would make this more of a scientific, as opposed to philosophic, discussion.
I don't know if the wonen commited libel or slander. I don't care. it isn't important to me. i do know that no amount of praise or awards is a guarantee that she did not. I don't now what she wrote that is at issue. If she wrote something innocuous, then she should have not trouble finding lawyers to represent her in a countersuit.
Nor am I concerned about whether or not what she did is "right". What is right and what is wrong is a matter of individual judgement. If you believe you are right and the law says you are wrong, then you ought to be willing to deal with the consequences.
What I am concerned about is people who assume that the technology used to publish should, somehow, reduce or eliminate the publisher's legal responsibility for what they say. It shouldn't. People who publish on the web cannot escape the consequences of libeling or slandering people.
As for the rest of your hyperbolic rhetoric, it is irrelevant to the specific topic under discussion. I could agree with everything you say, and it would not change my opinion, first, that people who publish on the web cannot and should not avoid legal responsibility for their words, and, second, that there is no rational reason to assume that this woman did or did not engage in libel or slander without seeing the specific text at issue. Someone can publish a million unexeceptoinal words a day for decades, but still libel or slander someone in a few short sentences.All those decades of innocuous words would be irrelevant.
If you want to "change" things, let's hear how you would ban corporations from suing while protecting the right of the rest of us to protect ourselves from libel and slander. Or, is it that you don't think that's important, either?
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
If you wrote that "DoktorSeven is a fat smelly idiot that murders babies and eats them during his satanic rituals while listening to music he downloaded from the Internet illegally," or some other (much more sane, likely) slanderous thing...
I'd ignore you. As I should. Even if these hypothetical lies got public attention, I would not be truly harmed; they are only words, and false ones at that. The only way I would be harmed by them is if criminal charges were brought forth by the force of your words, and there would have to be proof before that could happen.
So where's the harm? Why would I need to protect myself from simple words, unless I was extremely thin-skinned person with absolutely no maturity. That's how I view people who sue others for insults.
Someone harassing someone else go far enough where it goes past simple slander and becomes criminal; I do believe (going back to the topic at hand) if this person launched a prolonged baseless campaign against the company in question and had no actual facts to back it up, and, *despite repeated findings that the person has no facts behind her* (important), continues to campaign against the company just because the person has a personal grudge against them, this person should be dealt with accordingly. But given that 1) the person apparently had truth on her side 2) from what I read it did not seem like a prolonged baseless campaign, just a simple website, this specific case did not seem like it was enough to make this woman into a criminal.
And yes, I disagree with the laws. If I believe a law is wrong, especially if it has been used against me, I'm not going to sit back and "deal with the consequences." There have been unjust laws throughout history, you know; allowing governments to suppress freedom with unjust laws isn't good.
This'll be my last reply on this; I'm sorry you disagree, but I am sure you mean well. I just feel that people should have more freedom than most people do.
This is a sig. Deal with it.
If you have no assets to protect, then it is rather easy to claim that you'd ignore "simple words". But, of your livelihood, or the reputatioin of members of your family, were at stake, you might think differently. If you ran, for example, a restaurant, and a blogger posted a story alleging that he found dead roaches in your food, would you remain so unconcerned while your business withered away? If some adolescent blogger published defamatory comments about your child which provoked physical attacks on her, would your still walk away?
I don't disagree that people should have more freedom. But, taking away freedoms, like the freedom to prote t ourselves from the consequences of liel and slander, isn't the right way. You'd only be taking away the freedoms of people with whom you disagree, not increasing your own freedoms. As I've said, the right to free speech does not include the right to libel and slander.
And good luck with dealing with the consequences of violating laws you don't support. It usually involves jail time.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"