AH, 'Celebrities' and 'Abuse'

oscarBravo

Bonito wrote: »

So we can use "nice defamation"?

"Ah, sure Terry's a right aul lovely bollox."

Am I doing it right?

No, and it troubles me slightly that I have to explain the difference between criticism and abuse. See if you can tell which is which here:

"Terry rarely contributes anything worthwhile to a discussion."

"Terry's a bollox."



(With apologies to Terry, who isn't a bollox and whose contributions I value greatly.)

Bonito

oscarBravo wrote: »

No, and it troubles me slightly that I have to explain the difference between criticism and abuse. See if you can tell which is which here:

"Terry rarely contributes anything worthwhile to a discussion."

"Terry's a bollox."



(With apologies to Terry, who isn't a bollox and whose contributions I value greatly.)

Bold = Criticism.
Underline = Abuse.

Nah, Terry offered to be the guinea for this so it's all good.

Can boards be sued for critical abuse or abusive criticism?

Like, Bonito is a lazy stupid bollox who contributes nothing worthwhile to a discussion.

If statements are true, are they just very critical rather than abusive?

You shouldn't be worried, I'm not a solicitor or anything. Would you rather I didn't ask what we can and can't say on boards and end up causing boards to be threatened with legal action? Not everyone knows the sites terms of use and rules off by heart.

K-9

I thought the vast majority of the stuff was grand. After all it was criticising the writing and attitude of the articles.

Describing somewhere as the Monte Carlo of Europe, in the biggest selling newspaper in the land, will lead to critical comments!

Posting Facebook or Bebo links is too far. Nobody knows what a poster on the internet is going to put on them.

Gummy Panda

DeVore wrote: »

No pleasing some people it seems....

DeV.

That's just what jesus said

MitchKoobski

This might read a bit messy, can't really phrase it all how I want. I didn't really post in the Tom thread at all, but it was a bit funny seeing one or two of the videos. However when people started rooting out his facebook and personal details, and then taking the piss, it got out of hand and had to be closed. It went from being a bit of a pisstake to something that was harsh and unnecessary and needed to be closed. It started to remind me of a certain internet-hate-machine. I think its fine to give an opinion about what someone did or said in an article or on the telly, but it got way too personal and that sort of stuff shouldn't stand. If a celebrity says something, does something or writes something for the public to view/read/hear then its open to opinions and criticism. Thats where it should stop. Its not open to "Look at this **** and her *** the ****." That's when people start suing.

Red Alert

Perhaps it's a lesson to avoid having your facebook profile public

K-9

Red Alert wrote: »

Perhaps it's a lesson to avoid having your facebook profile public

Everybody should have their profile private but Facebook wouldn't take over the world then.

Bonito

Red Alert wrote: »

Perhaps it's a lesson to avoid having your facebook profile public

I was going to say that but didn't in case someone came in with the "They shouldn't have/need to, people shouldn't stalk them/look at their profile without permission. They should be allowed put whatever they want on the internet" argument.

They can but if they don't make it private then people are going to find it and they've only themselves to blame.

K-9

Bonito wrote: »

They can but if they don't make it private then people are going to find it and they've only themselves to blame.

Yes, but looking at it from a Boards.ie view point, they can't be seen to facilitate that.

Away you go and post away if you so wish, that "right" hasn't been taken away and they can only blame themselves. The name is obviously in the public domain, so away you go.

Bonito

K-9 wrote: »

Yes, but looking at it from a Boards.ie view point, they can't be seen to facilitate that.

Away you go and post away if you so wish, that "right" hasn't been taken away and they can only blame themselves. The name is obviously in the public domain, so away you go.

OK from now on when there's a celeb bashing thread, lets PM the persons bebo/facebook/myspace rather than putting it on thread. Then we can rip the piss out of them behind closed doors.

Sounds crazy. So crazy, it just might work.

My name is URL

Bonito wrote: »

They can but if they don't make it private then people are going to find it and they've only themselves to blame.

Even boards have rules on what you can cross reference, from the site. If it seems underhanded or like bullying then we'd get an infraction for it.. if you go and post a pic of someone which they posted on another forum, and made fun of their looks just because they start shit threads, it wouldn't be acceptable, let alone posting their FB profiles and tearing into them.

Membership is only a few keystrokes, not really a buffer zone for being disallowed certain liberties.

K-9

Bonito wrote: »

OK from now on when there's a celeb bashing thread, lets PM the persons bebo/facebook/myspace rather than putting it on thread. Then we can rip the piss out of them behind closed doors.

Sounds crazy. So crazy, it just might work.

You aren't seeing the distinction. I can go and pm or post on that facebook/bebo page NOW, if I so wish.

Boards can't facilitate it. Boards has a certain responsibility, you don't.

Bonito

K-9 wrote: »

You aren't seeing the distinction. I can go and pm or post on that facebook/bebo page NOW, if I so wish.

Boards can't facilitate it. Boards has a certain responsibility, you don't.

I did see it. If 2 people enjoy bashing the same person then the other is hardly going to report a PM they receive with the persons facebook. Some people are friends in real life as well as on boards. So if they decided to PM links to each other and rip the piss out of the person then there's not much boards can do because they're not publically flaming them.

All boards has done is give them a different platform to do this on. They can do the same thing over email, text, private message on facebook/myspace/bebo etc etc etc etc.

So long as the person can't see boards members doing it, there's sweet fúck all they can do about it.

K-9

Private messages are private, not searchable, not on Google, not viewable by everybody.

Threads are. The poster or a friend or relative, could do a search on Google or Bing on a name and find it 3 years later.

Bonito

K-9 wrote: »

Private messages are private, not searchable, not on Google, not viewable by everybody.

Threads are. The poster or a friend or relative, could do a search on Google or Bing on a name and find it 3 years later.

What? That was my point. Take it off the thread and there's nothing that can be done about it.

K-9

Bonito wrote: »

What? That was my point. Take it off the thread and there's nothing that can be done about it.

Exactly and completely agreed. The issue here isn't what you do in your pm's! Nobody really cares same as you telling your neighbour what you think of Kevin Myers!

Nobody cares. Say it in front of an audience and it gets printed, different matter altogether.

DeVore

Private Messages between individuals are not considered "published" hence no defamation.

Go back and look at my list of 3 things to qualify as defamation.

DeV.

dr.bollocko

DeVore wrote: »

Sorry, I'm on hols so I'm going to keep this short.

A statement is defamatory when it fulfills all three of these criteria:

1. Its published. (thats a given on Boards)
2. Its untrue.
3. It lowers the target person in the eyes of their right-thinking peers.

Dav wrote: »

I've had to delete the Tom O'C thread due to a threat of legal action against the site.

After Hours posters need to understand that personal abuse of someone like this gets us in trouble. It has to stop. We've already had this discussion not that long ago in relation to a reporter who posted an article some found to be nonsense which turned into nothing but personal abuse of her as a person which had no relevance or bearing on the thread.

I don't get it.
And if I don't get it I can't moderate it.
I don't want to blanket ban the topic of celebrities and am unsure how to understand the idea of removing the concept of knocking celebrity idiots anonymously on after hours. Now we are getting reported posts if a poster farts near celebrities. So I haven't been moderating since this whole topic came to a head and I want to thank brummytom for bringing up the discussion here.
The rudest celeb you've met thread in celebs / showbiz cuts much closer to the bone than most of the bad stuff on AH and it's been open forever and ever.
I can handle and understand and help with specific lies about celebrities being removed. But the entire thread on

Tom O'C

was removed. All of it. Not some specific posts which indicate a pattern, just all of it.
Not really useful feedback for me tbh.

This is one of the most ridiculous arguments I've ever read on here and it's downright egotistical of boards to even think itself important enough to ban "slagging people". It's allowed on the biggest and best websites in the world but not here in lowly Ireland.

Slagging is not the same as defamation of character.. If I say that a journalist is a complete retard, I think that's fair game. If I say that John Smith from madeuptown raped a child, then it's not fair game. There's a big and very obvious difference there.

Tom Dunne

Deleted User wrote: »

This is one of the most ridiculous arguments I've ever read on here and it's downright egotistical of boards to even think itself important enough to ban "slagging people". It's allowed on the biggest and best websites in the world but not here in lowly Ireland.

Slagging is not the same as defamation of character.. If I say that a journalist is a complete retard, I think that's fair game. If I say that John Smith from madeuptown raped a child, then it's not fair game. There's a big and very obvious difference there.

Can I ask what legal training you have?

Tom Dunne

Tom Dunne wrote: »

Can I ask what legal training you have?

Just a bit in college not that it matters a shlte.. Disclaimers work on every other website in the world, why not here?

Tom Dunne

Deleted User wrote: »

Just a bit in college not that it matters a shlte.. Disclaimers work on every other website in the world, why not here?

I don't know the first thing about the legal system. What I do on Boards.ie, from a legal perspective, is determined by the legal advisers, whom, I am sure, know what they are talking about.

Unlike some people on this thread.

We are not asking people not to slag celebrities. We are asking people not to get nasty about slagging celebrities. I am not going to cite the numerous examples of what is/is not acceptable, but you have to remember we live in a very litigious society.

If only it was as simple as putting up a disclaimer.

Wibbs

dr.bollocko wrote: »

The rudest celeb you've met thread in celebs / showbiz cuts much closer to the bone than most of the bad stuff on AH and it's been open forever and ever.

Agreed. If this is an issue then that thread needs looking at. The title alone is a red flag.

I can handle and understand and help with specific lies about celebrities being removed. But the entire thread on Spoiler: Tom O'C was removed. All of it. Not some specific posts which indicate a pattern, just all of it.

+1 remove dodgy posts, not whole threads IMHO. The journo thread was relatively fine, until the persons bebo and others on it were dragged in. They should have been removed to protect the site from ambulance chasers. Then again an argument could be made about what constitutes privacy when the page was public.

Deleted User wrote:

Disclaimers work on every other website in the world, why not here?

Welcome to Ireland. I'm not trying to be a dick AbG, the level of protection in law this country this country gives to people in the public eye is pretty crazy. The only other European country I can think of thats worse is France. To quote David Bowie, "this is not America", though people really seem to think it is. We don't have anything approaching free speech. Of celebs I could give two hoots about, it's people in actual power that can get away with murder.

As this place and others like it get bigger and more widely read it's not a case of if they'll get sued, it's when. So I can understand not wanting to be the test case on this "new media". Boards has been before and it went in it's favour, but when someone has already been successfully sued over a blog in this country, to the tune of 100 grand, I can really understand their reticence TBH.

dr.bollocko

Tom Dunne wrote: »

I am not going to cite the numerous examples of what is/is not acceptable.

I think that going into the specifics is the only way of actually helping anyone know what's going on with this specific issue tbh.

oscarBravo

dr.bollocko wrote: »

I think that going into the specifics is the only way of actually helping anyone know what's going on with this specific issue tbh.

With my admin hat off, I can only reiterate that it surprises and disappoints me that people need to have their hands held to explain to them how to be critical without being abusive.

I mean, seriously. When did calling someone a complete retard stop being abusive? Have we, as a society, really stooped that low?

dr.bollocko

oscarBravo wrote: »

With my admin hat off, I can only reiterate that it surprises and disappoints me that people need to have their hands held to explain to them how to be critical without being abusive.

I mean, seriously. When did calling someone a complete retard stop being abusive? Have we, as a society, really stooped that low?

...
Helpful.
Just looking for something a little less woolly and more rooted in the specifics of the problem rather than how low society has stooped or how evil After hours is.
An entire thread has been deleted. I understand in this case a legal threat was issued and it's best the thread was pulled. However there were specific posts in a thread that were problematic. Not all of them. Where does that line fall. If it appears to be so black and white for you, great. Show me. Help me help you.

oscarBravo

dr.bollocko wrote: »

If it appears to be so black and white for you, great. Show me. Help me help you.

I don't (and couldn't) moderate After Hours. This isn't a black-and-white issue for me. I'm not trying to give you admin guidance on this issue. I haven't read the thread in question; I don't have a clue who we're talking about or why.

I'm just in shock that there are people who believe that calling someone a complete retard is valid criticism, and not abusive.

Tom Dunne

dr.bollocko wrote: »

...
Helpful.
Just looking for something a little less woolly and more rooted in the specifics of the problem rather than how low society has stooped or how evil After hours is.
An entire thread has been deleted. I understand in this case a legal threat was issued and it's best the thread was pulled. However there were specific posts in a thread that were problematic. Not all of them. Where does that line fall. If it appears to be so black and white for you, great. Show me. Help me help you.

I suppose there is a certain amount of difficulty in saying what is and is not acceptable, I fully agree it's not a case of black and white.

To me, here is what I would be ok with:

• I don't like him, he talks a load of crap
• Her article in the paper was complete nonsense
• He hasn't a clue what he is talking about

and here's what I wouldn't be ok with:

• He's a f**king retard
• She is a stupid cnut
• He is a clueless f**kwit

and add in there any kind of racist bigotry too. I am sure there is more.

Not a definitive list, but do you get the idea?

Tom Dunne

ROFL and me an OB using the "it's not black and white".

Straight from the Admin's for Dummies handbook.

Nevyn

I think that rule of thumb put up in AH covers it, if you'd be banned for saying it about another poster then you get banned for saying it about anyone else.