When does having an opinion and a right to express it cross the line of expressing an opinion at the expense of someone else? Since joining the blogosphere in August of 2004, I have generally stuck to the world of infertility blogs. Lately though, I've been venturing outside that insular world to see what other topics folks write about.
I have a real interest in the field of social work and public administration. In fact, that's what I do professionally. It's a humbling and complex world to try to get your head around. So when I stumbled across Angela's blog several months ago, I became a regular lurker. I've worked as a caseworker in the type of system she sometimes writes about, and have had the good fortune of having some of the women I worked with become both friends and coworkers. But we rarely talk about the truth of what they experienced in our system. We can talk about the system itself, what worked, what didn't ... but really getting a chance to hear how they felt about being a part of it doesn't come easily. It's such an intensely personal thing, and after all, don't we all save our intensely personal sharings for the anonymity of the internet? I, for one, seem to do that!
So I have felt humbled and honoured to have been able to peek in on her world - the emotions of which are not so very different from other moms with kids, daughters with families, working parents with jobs, citizen in a community, that I have met....or my own emotions.
The challenges of her world, however, are totally different. She faces challenges daily around access to resources, dealing with stereotypes, people judging without any basis upon which to form the judgment, and feeling like you're swimming upstream against the tide of people in society. She juggles children, a part time job, school. In short, I think she's pretty amazing.
So when I logged on the other day to find that someone had decided to exercise her right to "free speech" by trashing Angela's lifestyle and choices, I couldn't help but go visit that someone's blog. Turns out she claims to be a government worker employed in the social service sector. That scares me. Edited to note that the blog entry I was linking to and had referenced in this post has now been closed down by the blog owner. I'm hoping it's out of respect although I sense from the tone of the vague entry thanking for the fish/traffic, it's not.
So tell me....when does the blogger's right to free speech turn into libel?
4 comments:
Trolls are the price we pay for freedom of speech on the net.
Like we use the veil of (relative) anonymity to share intimate details of our lives, other people use it to criticize, badmouth or offend others without any sense of shame.
The golden rule of the net is don't feed the trolls.
Hi. I'm not going to answer your question, but I did want to say Hi and that I'm glad I found your blog by the comment you left on Angela's. I've read back through your archives a way and am so sorry to hear about your dog. I like your writing. I'll be back.
I hope/assume it was through me that you found Angela. It makes me proud to call her friend. I keep thinking she should change the name of the blog because it has brought her so much pain and antagonism but then I think that she shouldn't back down from trolls/idiots like Jenny. No matter what she does I admire her because I was once a single mom on social assistance myself and our voices need to be heard.
Hey Lala:
Yep, it was through your blog that I found hers ... thank you! And I totally agree - the voices need to be heard!
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