Yale Students' Lawsuit Unmasks Anonymous Trolls 668
palegray.net writes "Two female Yale law school students have used the courts to ascertain the identities of otherwise anonymous posters to an Internet forum, with the intent of prosecuting them for hateful remarks left on the boards. At a minimum, the posters' future legal careers are certainly jeopardized by these events. While I'm not certainly not supporting or encouraging hateful speech online, these controversial actions hold potentially far-reaching consequences for Internet privacy policy and free speech." According to the linked Wired Law article, "The women themselves have gone silent, and their lawyers — two of whom are now themselves being sued — are not talking to the press."
Internets... (Score:1, Insightful)
Technicality? (Score:5, Insightful)
Hateful speech is not illegal. False claims that substantially harm a person ARE illegal under slander/libel law. This law applies whether the comments are online or on the playground.
Someone fill me in here. (Score:2, Insightful)
I don't know... (Score:5, Insightful)
This is a pretty straightforward bit of libel...Even on the internets you have to be careful if you're explicitly slandering someone by name.
Illegal is illegal, and if these monkeys were dumb enough to put up all this crap under handles that they accessed from their homes, then they're screwed, and it's hard to see how they ought not be.
SLAPP! (Score:2, Insightful)
Hmmmm?
2 concerns (Score:4, Insightful)
Internet privacy policy
Expect none
Free Speech
Slander and libel are illegal
Just about covers those two concerns.
Comment removed (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Internets... (Score:5, Insightful)
Companies are going to great lengths to search for anything particularly incriminating on people that are applying for a job, and when you're starting out in a law firm - where your basically doing bitch work anyway, and your #1 job is fitting in - anything that they could find that could make a person look bad is going to be held against them. No one has any privacy left anymore, so things that used to get passed off as "kids being kids" have long-reaching consequences later in life. I cry for that.
With all that said, no, I don't think that this case sets a good precedent. The fault here is anyone that would listen to anonymous slander and use it against the women in question for any reason.
Re:The posters deserve to be unmasked (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Someone fill me in here. (Score:4, Insightful)
... they have no reasonable grounds to be suing.
If they have no reasonable grounds for suing, then their lawsuit will be rejected by the courts. If they do have a reasonable grounds for suing then the courts will hear their case. Most Slashdotters forget to put IANAL disclaimers in their comments when making legal claims.
Re:The posters deserve to be unmasked (Score:5, Insightful)
This wouldn't be too bad if potential employers and romantic interests weren't so damn nosey -- imagine kicking ass in a job interview for a good position only to discover that you were turned down because your psychotic, jealous ex with a lot of time on their hands gamed Google(or created a fake MySpace page) and made you out to be a drunk, zoophile, or worse!
Dosen't matter if the incendiary posts were written by people called "HitlerHitlerHitler" and "GoatseFan1" -- the hiring manager may think, "Hmm, he/she sure does have a lot of enemies" or "I'd rather not have all that controversy attached to somebody who works for me." Same applies to potential romantic interests.
Re:Technicality? (Score:5, Insightful)
That's for the court to decide.
Re:The problem is hate speech changes (Score:2, Insightful)
This classic "slippery slope" argument is baseless.
Calling for the rape of two women is hateful. There is no gray area here. There's nothing sacred about this "speech" that deserves to be protected, nor do the authors deserve any protection. Racism, sexism, homophobia and other forms of oppression need to be rooted out of society. Allowing these hateful ideas to be propagated anonymously is harmful to society and the oppressed minorities they target.
Revealing the identities of the authors isn't going to lead to the widespread revocation of people's free speech rights. However, it might just teach some neanderthals to keep their disgusting mouths shut.
Re:The posters deserve to be unmasked (Score:5, Insightful)
I think this points to how anonymity is *usually* used for evil, instead of good like most geeks think about it.
One lawsuit can't prove that something is "usually" true or false. What it shows is that in at least 2 cases (one for each of the trolls) anonymity is used for evil. You need a lot more than 2 cases to say that the majority of anonymous people on the internet are using it for evil
Re:Someone fill me in here. (Score:4, Insightful)
You should know by now that IANAL is implied for any post of legal opinion on slashdot. With rare exceptions (Ray Beckerman comes to mind), I'd assume the "IANAL" even if the poster writes "IAAL".
Hell, it's not just legal opinion. I take anything written on slashdot with a grain of salt. If it's a topic I know a good bit about, I can normally figure out if a poster is talking out their ass, or if they might have something to add to my understanding.
If it's a topic I know little about, I don't even bother trying to determine if someone knows what's going on. I figure I'm better off at wikipedia for decent base-level information.
IANAL. Of course.
Re:womens' rights more important OR NOT? (Score:4, Insightful)
Using that logic I can make any speech illegal and exposed to retribution. Either Free Speech is an absolute right, or it is no right at all -- there is surprisingly little gray area in -between.
Anthony Ciolli was always a self righteous twat (Score:2, Insightful)
Even before Autoadmit was around and he was in HS and college. Talk about someone who should be sodomized. If you can get the stick out of the way first.
When this came around the first time, I was not at all surprised he was involved.
Re:Someone fill me in here. (Score:3, Insightful)
The comment wasn't that "some women should be raped", it was what a reasonable person would construe as saying that the plaintiffs should be raped.
Re:2 concerns (Score:3, Insightful)
For something to be called slander or libel, I think the accuser should have to show at least ONE person who believed it, AND damage done. If they can't, it's just derogatory remarks.
If I said that Chief Justice John Roberts is an arsehole, that's clearly an opinion.
If I said that Roberts has a forked tongue, that is clearly not libel either, because it's rather obvious that he doesn't (in a purely physical sense).
If I said that Roberts has impregnated 74 women, it's not libel either, because the claim is obviously bogus.
If I said I'll send my pet poodle to rape him, it's not a threat, because it's not believable.
If I said that he raped a woman in Ohio in his youth, it may be libel, depending on whether someone believed it or not.
If I said that he has a mole on his butt, it's not libel even if someone believes it, unless he (a) doesn't have one, and (b) can show how this belief caused him damage.
I recommend that we grow a skin before we start prosecuting people for thought crime. Only when there has been real damage due to remarks should prosecution be pursued. Otherwise, it will be detrimental to free speech, and abused by those who want to hush someone up or arrest them for their opinions.
We may not like it when we're attacked by words, but in my opinion that's much preferable to being attacked by nightsticks.
Re:Someone fill me in here. (Score:5, Insightful)
seriously?
Maybe because she doesn't want her name further associated with scurrilous rumors...
Re:The posters deserve to be unmasked (Score:1, Insightful)
The hell they wouldn't.
Example: Yesterday I turned on the radio and heard a rap singer threaten to kill someone.
Example: Last week at the bar, a lady told me she was going to "Rape my dick with her mouth".
Example: I heard a group of athletes say that they were going to "Kill the other team".
Example: I was playing an online video game and several people said they were going to kill me, rape me, or do other very nasty things. I called them 'tasty cakes' and said I was going to shove pinecones up their asses.
So you see, this is entirely situational. There is, from what I can tell, no proof of WHO actually posted the comments, just that the comments were posting using the accounts/user names that were registered to those people. There is a big difference.
At the end of the day, you do NOT have any right to Not be Offended. Especially on the internet.
Re:womens' rights more important (Score:2, Insightful)
What does being a woman have to do with anything? Isn't that a bit sexist in itself? Why aren't *all* people's rights more important? Why only women?
Re:Internets... (Score:5, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:2, Insightful)
Ahem. (Score:1, Insightful)
Fuck you, Lawyers.
Love, AC.
Re:Internets... (Score:5, Insightful)
I personally can't wait until the top entry in google on their names will be "got sued by Jane Doe for defamation", together with a link to their highly professional statements. I'm sure it will greatly enhance their careers in the fast food industry.
Re:Bitches (Score:2, Insightful)
Fucking bitches.
Re:Isn't there a matter of intent? (Score:5, Insightful)
Granted, hate speech is a somewhat subjective issue,
What body is going to decide what exactly is hate speech on the Internet?
Oddly enough, there is a body whose job is to determine the facts on matters that are somewhat subjective, and alledged to be harmful. That body is called "a jury."
Re:Technicality? (Score:4, Insightful)
And people do Google their applicant's names; I do it all the time, even if I'm just trying to find published papers. But I'd sure notice if the first page results are littered with odd stuff like it must be in this case.
Re:Internets... (Score:5, Insightful)
No one has any privacy left anymore
Privacy starts at home, kids. If you don't want a future employer seeing pictures of you drunk and naked at a frat party, don't put them on the internet!
Seriously, the biggest privacy problem we have these days is people thinking that everything is private unless they explicitly make it public, but reality doesn't work that way. Nobody goes walking down the street naked, then claims their privacy was violated when people looked at them. Well, the internet is no different. If you want something on the internet kept private, you have to make it private, otherwise it's public.
Exactly (Score:3, Insightful)
...please be careful with phrases like "womens' rights to not feel threatened."
No one has the right to not feel threatened. Under most circumstances you have the right to not be harmed, and under some circumstances you have the right to not be threatened. But there is a lot of jurisprudence about "true threats" that suggests a threat must be credible (among other things) before you have a right to silence someone or claim damages against them.
I don't know the context of this "threat", not having read the forum in question, but what do these women do when someone says "Fuck you" to them at a party or driving a car? Do they go running for a lawyer? In both cases, the threat would be much more credible than some anonymous net poster.
Re:Technicality? (Score:5, Insightful)
Making hateful statements against a particular identifiable group is illegal in Canada.
Does it depend on the group? Can I hate lawyers, politicians, and statisticians?
What about pirates, Real Pirates (the board-a-ship-and-kill-people kind), rapists, serial killers, or nazis?
All of those are pretty identifiable groups. Which ones can I explicitly say that I hate? I want to be sure I can get through customs next time...
Re:I think not. (Score:3, Insightful)
I think you are missing the point. This isn't about suing for being offended, or using the law to hit back at someone for saying something mean. The anonymous postings in question clearly meet the legal threshold for libel (accusing someone of having an STD is automatically considered libel without proof of damages in most jurisdictions, I believe), and may meet the legal threshold for threats. These are actions which have been illegal, and legally punishable, for centuries. That they take place on the Internet makes no qualitative difference, and shouldn't.
It is standard and reasonable for courts to issue subpoenas in order to ascertain the identity of someone who has broken the law.
The main differences here from printed libel to online libel are 1) that the publisher (owner of the web site) is, in many cases, likely to be off the hook, because hosts of online forums are not usually considered responsible for what those forums contain unless they control their contents (or fail to respond to DMCA requests); and 2) the reasonable expectation of damages is actually higher than it would be in print-- consider that, say, a New York Times op-ed that appeared only in print form and accused you of something vile and damaging to your reputation might be read by a few hundred thousand people and remain forever unread by all 6 billion or so people who never happen to encounter that day's paper. With the expectation that any potential employer will Google your name to see what turns up, however, the audience for online public libel is unlimited.
I don't see anything unreasonable or controversial here; the only thing wrong was originally including the host of the web site in the lawsuit, which probably was an understandable mistake given that we don't have many years of precedent yet for who is responsible in what sorts of online offenses.
Re:The posters deserve to be unmasked (Score:3, Insightful)
No such thing. A woman, or a man, for that matter, has a right not to *be* threatened, and if you believe that statement to be actual threat, that is one thing. But you cannot seriously make us legally responsible for other people's feelings.
Re:Internets... (Score:2, Insightful)
"so things that used to get passed off as "kids being kids" have long-reaching consequences later in life. I cry for that."
Have you ever considered, that's exactly what human beings need? Human beings are so repressed, shallow, and cheap that perhaps it finally force us to come to terms with our darker side, and passions other people would consider vile. I'm sure there is a lot of unpopular sexual fantasies, not to mention forms of social organization out there that people want to realize.
Re:The posters deserve to be unmasked (Score:1, Insightful)
Fuck that. Anonymity is usually used for good. I generally post anonymously and do not do any of the negative things ascribed to those in the article. I also do not try to use the courts to obtain information about other posters on the internet, even when I find their commentary offensive, threatening, and of questionable legality were I to press charges. But, then again, I am not a law student trying to make a name for myself at the expense of freedom of expression. It is sickening that this was allowed in a civil case.
Re:Internets... (Score:3, Insightful)
It is a post to an online web forum. If anything the people running that forum should be the ones being sued. If the comments were that far out of line they should have been removed by the people running that forum.
People in general need to grow up and realize that not everyone in the world is going to agree with you or like you. Many will even hate you for what ever their reason. That is life, get used to it.
If an online forum can trash your chances of getting your career going, then that speak volumes for society. And not in a good way.
Flame away.
Think bombs (Score:4, Insightful)
If you leave a bomb anonymously we'd all want you tracked.
Both hate speech and the bomb are an attack. So why not, freedom of speech shouldn't really enter into it unless what is said is true.
So if they posted something true as a judge that would be my requirement. Show me that it is a lie in which case I'll pass the order to bring them to be held accountable. Otherwise if it is truth well pants you can't sue over the truth (can you?)
Besides when was it freedom of anonymous speech?
Re:Technicality? (Score:5, Insightful)
From TFA:
"I think I will sodomize her. Repeatedly"
This particular quote does not fall under hate speech (the legality of which varies), but this is a clear threat to physically harm a person. In this case IMHO law enforcement have every right to ascertain the identity of the person so as to better protect his/her potential victims.
If you're not an assclown, your identity on a forum is safe. Nobody is going to pursue your identity in court for calling them "shitface".
Re:Internets... (Score:4, Insightful)
No, you got it wrong. You can post whatever you want, full stop. Which part of "Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech" you don't understand?
Every aspect of the Bill of Rights comes with a big ole asterisk. (Freedom of Speech/*Hate Speech, Right to Bear Arms/*Fully Automatics, etc. etc.)
Thomas Jefferson's advice on use of the Internet (Score:5, Insightful)
"Whenever you do a thing, act as if all the world were watching."
Re:The posters deserve to be unmasked (Score:3, Insightful)
Whats the EEEEEVVVVIIIIILLLL you can inflict in an internet forum?
Terrorist threats? Exposing personal id-related information of an enemy, such as their SSN, bank account passwords, etc? What about posting where a controversial politician's children play after school?
Re:Technicality? (Score:5, Insightful)
If you were one of 3 blond women in the 8:30 Legal Research class & had someone on the college message board repeatedly saying "I'm going to ass rape the blond bitch in my 8:30 Legal Research class", you would probably take it a bit more seriously than a whiny anime complaint. This wasn't "hey she's got nice tits", these were comments which started out as libel, labeling them 'whores who fucked their way into college', & progressed into threats when they took a stand against the libel.
Libel isn't a protected form of speech under the constitution, neither are threats of physical or mental harm. Being anonymous is fine, using that anonymity to break the law and then whine when people try and find you is stupid.
The guys who posted this crap were over the line, the admin should have handled it - he was a 3rd year law student and should have been able to see that it wasn't protected speech. His waving the 1st amendment flag here is an insult to it's purpose.
I certainly won't lose any sleep over a bunch of frat boy jocks getting bitch slapped over their behavior.
Re:Internets... (Score:2, Insightful)
No it doesn't. That is why we are in the FUBARed situation we are in. The Founding Fathers forgot to say that they meant the rights to be absolute. Unfortunately, the anti-Federalists were right and should be revered for their wisdom.
Re:The posters deserve to be unmasked (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:The posters deserve to be unmasked (Score:5, Insightful)
People just need to learn that just because you said it on the internet doesn't mean the statement carries no weight.
Re:The posters deserve to be unmasked (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Not disagreeing, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not sure those two are analogous. Without having reread the case, I seem to recall that the women in question did not seek out the forums in question. Their pictures were put on the board, and then the comments started flying. When they then joined the board, (again, afair) seeking to have the pictures removed, they were then subject to even harsher comments, including the rape ones.
You, on the other hand, have joined the game yourself, and aditionally you have joined the chat, which is an optional extra, of your own volition. Aditionally, while "I'm going to rape you" might be a breach of conduct on Xbox Live (I don't know if this is the case), in most fps' this is the 'norm' where you attempt to psyche out your opponent. No adult of a reasonable mind will expect the speaker to seek out your address (is this even possible through Xbox Live?) and hunt you down.
However, on this board, not only were the women's pictures posted, their names and addresses were posted, and considering the vitriol spewed forth on the boards, even I, being a VERY common sense kind of guy, would not put it beyond the assholes and idiots* on the boards to actually following through on their threats**
Of course, I'm not in any way, shape or form a lawyer or had any law training. Hell, I'm not even from the US.
* In my humble and non-medical/-psychological opinion, since I am not refering to mental retardation
** Considering the writing, the constant agitation by the other posters etc, I do not consider the comments "innocent", "joking", "ironic", "sarcastic" or even "humourous"
Just as important - the court found in favour of the plaintiffs, so obviously the judge (jury?) found the threats to be credible and the derogatory comments to be libel. If you do not like that ruling, you need to write your congressmen and tell them why. Don't email, don't fax. Send them a physical letter, preferably handwritten. At least that's what the usual comments on the subject around here advices.
Re:womens' rights more important OR NOT? (Score:3, Insightful)
There's whole books written on commercial speech - what's true (100 calories per serving), what's false (microsoft eats babies) , and what's puffery (Ford trucks are the greatest). Commercial speech gets less protection because it's used to sell things - not further the public discourse.
The New York Times Supreme Court Case re: Free speech held that when a public official was being criticized, the newspaper only had to refrain from saying things that it knew or should have known were false. Other cases have said that when the defamed person wasn't a public figure (i.e. a public official, a celebrity, or a person who sought the public eye), the bar against defamation was lower than when considering defamation against a non-public figure. And simply saying "Joe has herpes" may not be libel, depending on the context. Someone doing a comedy routine making jokes about Joe who says that Joe has herpes wouldn't be libel because no one would take it seriously - there's no "defamatory sting". You say that Joe has herpes in the middle of a medial report on NPR and it's probably defamation. That's why Howard Stern always has someone laughing at everything he says, to get people to thing it's a joke. And just stating that something's an opinion doesn't remove the slander - it's what people actually think that matters.
And don't forget, the truth is always a defense to a charge of defamation - if Joe has a cold sore and I write a story about how Joe has herpes, well, too bad for Joe, because it's true that Joe has herpes.
Regarding the threats, the common law varies from state to state, but you usually need a pattern of harassment or the imminent threat of harm. Standing in front of someone with a gun saying "I'm going to kill you" would likely be threatening, whereas saying it on the internet probably wouldn't because there's no imminent threat of bodily harm. (In New York, the person actually has to make some physical motion indicating that they are about to harm you - as my Torts professor used to say "words alone are not enough").
Re:Internets... (Score:3, Insightful)
How is their right to freedom of speech being violated? They're not being censored. As noted above, freedom of speech does not mean freedom of consequences, but you seem to be ignoring that and saying it does.
And you just insulted them. I think you're proving their point. you seem to think you can hide behind anonymity and say whatever you want. What if you couldn't? I can guarantee you that if you called me a bitch on an internet board and lived anywhere near me you'd get punched in the face. Clearly, what you're advocating is that your identity be protected. That has nothing to do with freedom of speech.
Why not? Just because you'd rather it wasn't? What if a lot of other people don't feel the same way? Because a lot of people don't. And before you start calling everyone who disagrees with you stupid and trying to make out like they're morally wrong for not allowing you to get off scot-free with abusing people online anonymously, I have to wonder why you so apparently want to make sure that you can still troll others and keep your identity a secret.
In short, grow up. If you don't have the guts to say something and let it be known that you said it, you should keep it to yourself in the first place.
Re:Internets... (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, I'm sure the day will come that even fast food joints will check up on their applicants. Just how many places do you think will want to hire someone to work alongside women and serve food to women, when they have repeatedly not only shown themselves to be womenhaters, but actively threatened to rape them repeatedly in the ass?
My guess is "not many".
Re:Internets... (Score:5, Insightful)
If you don't want a future employer seeing pictures of you drunk and naked at a frat party, don't put them on the internet!
And what's to stop someone else from posting that pic of you drunk and naked at the frat party?
Re:Internets... (Score:3, Insightful)
That's the best analogy I've ever seen on /. that didn't involve a car. Seriously.
Re:Internets... (Score:2, Insightful)
If you're not willing to put your name on it, it is probably not worth writing.
Re:Not disagreeing, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
This story has been on slashdot a few times. Here's what really happened, if I remember correctly:
- Guys posts pictures of women and comment on the forum (she's a 9! she's a 4! such a bitch i'd rape her! etc.)
- Women ask site owner to remove pictures and offending comments
- Site owner laughs at them, and informs posters that the women in question asked for the pictures to be removed
- Guys don't like it ; they literally start stalking these girls, take more pictures of them (at the gym?), and start posting threats.
- Women sue.
Read this again. These girls got stalked and threatened. I don't care if it's on the internet or elsewhere ; when someone stalks you, takes pictures, and threatens to assault and rape you, it is wrong, and these women have a case. The whole thing about it affecting their career etc was only true at the beginning (the first pictures and comments posted). This thing got a lot more serious afterwards.
Re:Internets... (Score:4, Insightful)
Privacy starts at home, kids.
What if you are home and Google Street View is in your driveway looking in your backyard or your window?
Re:Internets... (Score:4, Insightful)
Hate speech is fully protected speech, unless uttered in a way as to provoke immediate violence (and even then, it's not the speech per se, but the intent to incite violence, that is the crime). Fully automatic weapons would have been protected by the second amendment in any rational world, since the context is clearly the right to bear military arms.
The big ole asterisks are flagrant violations of the constitution, not exceptions to it.
If we don't want people walking down the street with AK-47s and RPG7s and surface-to-air missiles, we should amend the constitution, not pretend it doesn't say what it obviously says.
Re:Internets... (Score:5, Insightful)
Anonymity can be used to prevent otherwise unlawful repercussions. It doesn't much matter that Congress makes no law if the moment you blow the whistle on the local police department, you get indefinitely harassed with bogus, trumped up charges.
Anonymity can be an important part of free speech. The line between it being necessary and harassment is very fine, indeed. Usually, it depends upon who the speaker is talking about.
In order to claim slander, there are two prerequisites: first, the allegations must be false, second, someone must believe the allegations to be true. Unless they can prove there is someone somewhere stupid enough to believe in anonymous posts they read on the internet, there are no consequences to that trolling.
That's oversimplifying to a huge degree.
First of all, there are slightly different laws in different states. I'm not sure what the laws in this case are. If they are as you say, then fine, ignore the rest of this post.
A defamation claim can be made for just about any reason. If someone says something negative about you, you can take them to court for it. You've laid out the common defenses to a defamation claim--if it's the truth, in the US, you'll probably lose the case. If it's not true, generally, you have to prove that there was malicious intent. Believability is only one aspect of malicious intent. A statement could be slanderous without being believable ("Jane Doe kills puppies for Satan!"). Of course, if you are a celebrity, you have a higher burden of proof. Now, the alleged slanderer must have knowingly lied. If the guy heard from another guy that I (a celebrity) fucked a goat, and they publish it, I probably won't win the suit.
One of the most common defenses against such suits is that the person was stating an opinion. That's a whole separate can of worms. It's all really quite complicated.
In this case, it sounds like the trolls were making statements with the intent to defame competition, so that the trolls would get opportunities that these Jane Does would otherwise have received. I have no doubt that the Janes will win, unless the trolls made it quite clear that they were expressing opinion, and weren't attempting to state facts about the Janes.
Re:Internets... (Score:4, Insightful)
Facebook is a horrifying example of this. I have a friend who's facebook photos are nice and clean and show him as he (99% of the time) is. Shown right below that are the 300+ photos in which friends have tagged his face in so that people know they are of him. So... the 1% of his life in the last 3 years in which he made mistakes and did things that look ridiculous (wearing a bra on a dare, that type of stuff), are now plastered on the internet, and he cannot do anything about it.
So... yes, true privacy is dead. Long live the False Sense of Privacy.
Re:blaming the wrong person (Score:5, Insightful)
Huh? Okay, let's do a little experiment here. You must have a female relative or acquaintance somewhere who can get online. Now, send her an email or post on a forum she visits a lot of insults and threaten to assault/rape her. Indicate that you know who she is in real life. See how she reacts.
Now, try to imagine how you'd feel if exactly that happened to a woman you happen to care about, like, say, your mom or a sister. "Idle threats"? Sure, a threat to rape your mom or sister might be idle, but I'd bet you'd take it seriously. I know that if it were me and I found out who he was, I'd want his ass in jail for threatening me with bodily harm. It's little different from a guy calling you and telling you he's coming to your house to rape you. Simply put, it's not a matter of childish threats. It would be pretty damn scary, in fact.
Christ, the number of guys here defending these guys rights to threaten women online makes me wonder how many wannabe-rapists there are on slashdot. If I ever meet any of you in real life, keep in mind that I'm a redneck from the southern US and I will shoot you if you try anything. Yeah, we get a little upset when rape threats start flying around. What did you expect, them (or me) to just giggle and ask if we can get you another beer? Jesus.
Re:Slashdot sucks (Score:5, Insightful)
AC's name is Dave Bubbleshits & he lives over in the blue house behind the college. He's a dumb bitch-ho who should be raped daily.
There's a huge difference between anonymous flamebait directed at other anonymous people. These guys weren't directing it that way. They were giving specifics, in some cases names. This wasn't your normal trolling, this was cyberstalking & cyberbullying at it's worst. Done in person, it would be bad enough, but 4 years later, those comments are still the first thing anyone - including a prospective employer - sees when they Google these women's names. A libel is definitely called for here.
Right on, except that... (Score:3, Insightful)
Most of the time the person who is drunk and naked at a frat party isn't the one posting pictures on the internet. It would be impossible to count the number of times an ex-boyfriend post a passionate private video to an online porn site, or a passerby post a youtube video of an embarrassing moment.
Of course, people need to be careful about where and when they get drunk and stupid (never?) and who they allow to video them doing the nasty (no one,) but that doesn't make it right to post private moments, nor does it mean that the victims of that kind of invasion of privacy deserve the consequences.
If anything, I think it's a problem with our society that we are so ready to ostracize someone for being human. Most of us have done some stupid things we regret. Those that have not are either lieing or boring as hell. Few of us were caught on video doing it.
Re:Internets... (Score:4, Insightful)
Libel != freedom of speech.
If you damage someone because you knowingly made false statements about them, they can sue for compensation of those damages.
Re:Internets... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Internets... (Score:2, Insightful)
You must be new here...
Re:blaming the wrong person (Score:2, Insightful)
If I ever meet any of you in real life, keep in mind that I'm a redneck from the southern US and I will shoot you if you try anything.
Now who's making threats? Should you go to jail?
Re:Internets... (Score:1, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:The posters deserve to be unmasked (Score:3, Insightful)
While I can see your point, I don't think that bringing up a scenario of what you can or cannot do in an airport demonstrates a valid counter point.
I think it addresses both points brought up by the GP. See this quote:
1. There are a lot of women with those names. So this could not be considered a threat against any specific person.
My example statement is not a threat against any specific establishment.
2. It does not say they will be, or imply that they will be. The word "should" implies a statement of opinion, not intent.
My example statement does not state that any crowded place will be bombed, just that it should be.
The example is not specific to an airport, either. You could say such a thing within earshot of just about anyone and be considered threatening.
Re:Internets... (Score:5, Insightful)
And what's to stop someone else from posting that pic of you drunk and naked at the frat party?
Errr....I dunno, perhaps you taking charge for your own actions and not getting drunk and naked at a frat party?
One thing we should have learned by now, damned cameras are everywhere. Either take responsibility for your own actions, or expect the inevitable to happen.
Re:Internets... (Score:3, Insightful)
It is pretty serious.
While I'm not certainly not supporting or encouraging hateful speech online[...]
I think the writer wrote this because they're a covetous Jew and they don't want anyone stealing their Jew gold.
Re:The posters deserve to be unmasked (Score:4, Insightful)
It's your right to be offensive. There are no laws against that.
True. But there are laws against slander, libel, stalking and assault. All of which were, arguably, committed by the posters under an assumption of anonymity. I read a lot of their posts a year or so ago when this hit /. the first time, and these guys were definitely over the line of offensive.
This has nothing to do with privacy (Score:5, Insightful)
Freedom of speech is the right to say what you think if you don't thereby infringe on other people's higher valued rights (by committing libel). It's not the right to hide behind a false identity and make libelous claims.
It is also not "privacy" to go out in public, use a fake name and yell something, independent of whether it's true or not.
Privacy is the right to decide for yourself how much of the "things you don't do in public" becomes public (that's a vague definition, given).
There is no reason to protect the identity of trolls. There is a reason to protect their right to say their honest opinion, however stupid it may be -- but not their wish to make libelous claims and go unpunished.
Exactly... wrong (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't know the context of this "threat", not having read the forum in question
There's your first problem - before passing judgment, it would be good to do at least a bit of cursory research.
but what do these women do when someone says "Fuck you" to them at a party or driving a car? Do they go running for a lawyer? In both cases, the threat would be much more credible than some anonymous net poster.
And there's your second problem - in spite of admitting that you've read nothing about this, including apparently the article, you're ready to make ad hominem attacks.
On the off chance you read this, the grandparent poster was wrong - the threats were graphic and specific, listing the girls' names, photos, and class and gym schedules. That becomes a credible threat.
Re:Internets... (Score:3, Insightful)
"unless uttered in a way as to provoke immediate violence "
Which is exactly why it should always be protected.
As soon as an argument starts, someone says what the other person said is hate speech to get off the hook of attacking them.
Re:Internets... (Score:3, Insightful)
You've got the dumbest interpetation of freedom of speech I've ever seen.
If certain speech isn't regulated, then how can one be punished for it? If it's not censored, then how come you're being charged? It's axiomatic. In order to punish someone for saying something, their free speech must be abridged, or no infraction took place. In order for free speech to be abridged, you must have punishment for violations, or no abridgement took place.
Better yet, don't get drunk and naked at parties. (Score:3, Insightful)
Other people will put pictures of you, drunk and naked, on THEIR web pages.
The right way to keep your reputation clean is not to try to hush up everything you do, but not to do things that reflect badly on you in the first place... duh.
Re:Internets... (Score:4, Insightful)
All bans on weapons(guns or otherwise) have done throughout history is create a victim society, mainly due to the fact that the people they are trying to keep from getting said weapons will have them anyways. They aren't going to care that they aren't supposed to have them.
This part I would call "wishful thinking". Allowing weapons to everyone has never minimized the number of victims. Theories saying that it should do so have been brought forward several times, and some of them actually sound pretty logical. But they all have collided with that strange thing named "reality" and crashed badly.
Re:Internets... (Score:2, Insightful)
Yes, but we are talking about people attending law school at an Ivy League university. Such people tend to be extremely ambitious and will often do pretty much anything to get what they want. They'll throw tantrums if anything gets in their way (because they see themselves as so deserving).
Everyone in this case seems to have a major entitlement complex. All of them should end up working as janitors to teach them some humility.
Re:Just Because You Can Enter a Phony Name... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Total 100% hypocrisy (Score:4, Insightful)
The damage is greatly worsened when you know both the anonymous troll and victim are related in some way geographically or attending the same university. That's when the threats become elevated from stupid trolling to a real threat because the troll has demonstrated he has the desire, ability, and means to carry out that threat. Then consider the troll has the advantage of surprise because the victim has no idea who that person is. It could be a lab partner, a teaching assistant, the person sitting next to her in class. There's no way to know. At this point we're way past harmless trolling. We're in the realm of felony behavior.
There is a very long history of men sexually victimizing women. Idiot trolls, such as these, use that knowledge to magnify the hurtful effects of their threats. It demonstrated they were consciously and willingly performing this behavior. Conscious intent plays a huge factor when determining if something is a crime. It clearly was in this case.
And finally, even if these trolls weren't intending to carry out these threats, one could argue they were acting to recruit others to do it on their behalf. So now the victim has to worry about not one individual, but all individuals.
I'll tell you this: for those women, that situation was a fucking scary place to be in.
Re:Internets... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Internets... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:The posters deserve to be unmasked (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:The posters deserve to be unmasked (Score:4, Insightful)
What's really, really annoying is that these right-wingers who think it's OK to threaten to rape women because it's "not actually a threat", are probably the VERY SAME people who think that the police should be allowed to arrest someone at an airport for having a suspicious-looking beard and praying in Arabic.
Really? (Score:3, Insightful)
Let's see if I can follow your logic here. Pseudo-Anonymous people on a blog post photos, home address, email addresses, telephone numbers, and full legal names, of women accompanied by death threats and rape threats. That's perfectly ok.
The women seek to have the identities of the people who posted their identities revealed, that's horrible and makes them asswipes?
Can you explain where you're coming from here, because honestly I'm not following you. Why is it ok for the "let's rape the bitches" crowd to post the names and other personal information of the women, but it isn't ok for us to know the identities of the people doing the posting?
Re:B.S. founding fathers anonymous broaddsides (Score:2, Insightful)
First they came for the trolls and I was not a troll so I said nothing...
Re:Internets... (Score:2, Insightful)
No it doesn't. That is why we are in the FUBARed situation we are in. The Founding Fathers forgot to say that they meant the rights to be absolute. Unfortunately, the anti-Federalists were right and should be revered for their wisdom.
So you've interviewed Mr. Jefferson have you? Mr. Adams told you from the grave "d'oh! I knew there was something I left out!!".
Forgive the sarcasm, but I'm trying to point out that you are making an assumption of the Founding Fathers intent was based on what your personal desires are.
IMO our Constitution is so amazing not for what it says, but for what it leaves out and makes us figure out for ourselves, every decade or so. This ensures it is a living document, continually updated by those living under its authority, never a dead document forced on the living by those long dead.
IMO, Ben, George, James and the rest forgot nothing, least of all that they were doing an incredibly dangerous thing -- trying to predict the future, and how that future might best be governed. They knew that every word could just as easily be a noose as a gift.