Sticks and stones can break your bones, but tweets could break your bank account.
It’s a lesson being strongly felt south of the border, where incautious outbursts on the micro-blogging service Twitter are landing their authors in court. It’s amazing the trouble 140 characters can get you into.
Rocker Courtney Love made headlines over her Twitter spat-turned-lawsuit when she called one fashion designer a liar and a thief. Love has since closed her Twitter account, as did her daughter Frances Bean Cobain, who shut down after tweeting some sharp words for Lindsay Lohan’s sister, Ali Lohan.
Gossip blogger Perez Hilton is embroiled in social media spats with several celebrities, including Demi Moore, who is threatening legal action and has tweeted her anger over Hilton’s publication of provocative photos of her teenage daughter.
It isn’t always just celebrities getting in Twitter trouble. In another American case, a tenant was sued for $50,000 by a landlord angered when she tweeted about her mouldy apartment.
And recently a pizza restaurant in the U.S. has found the heat turned up on it for comments posted on Facebook and Twitter, with the marketing firm that was the subject of the criticism launching a $2-million U.S. lawsuit.
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We blog at our own peril… and Twitter is no better…
This is merely the result of irresponsible personal behaviour threatening our freedoms, rights and privileges.
Is it possible to legislate a solution without restricting them?
This affects freedom of speech. The issue being that online lying is harmful.
Can we legislate that lying is a crime without opposing freedom of speech?
Free speech is already limited where it causes harm, like uttering threats. Who supports threatening behaviour?
Lying causes harm by witholding knowlege, opposing the spreading of knowlege in free speech and misdirecting the decisions of others.
Therefore lying already opposes free speech and because it also causes harm it can be legislated a crime without stealing our freedom of speech.
Lying supports all hatred, corruption, evil behaviour and generally frivolous wastes of time and money in our justice system.
Lying is a crime so criminalize it.