Legal Chill and Other Threats

I’ve recently witnessed some examples of slightly threatening behaviour on the internets and I was reminded of a few of the previous spats I’ve seen covered on the various blogs I read. There have been lawyer’s letters, accusations both of libel and of copyright breach, and comments posted or letters sent by angry nutritionists (in the main – there has been the odd homeopath too).

John Briffa responded to a comment on a recent blog post by informing the poster that he (Briffa) checked up on IP details of commentors and then asked if the commentor would name themself on Briffa’s blog. This was the first time I noticed Briffa doing this sort of thing, but it wouldn’t be the last. In a later comment on the thread he asked about my background and in another he congratulated Anthony and Andrew for using their real names and said “I’d like to see a bit more of that here and elsewhere”. He almost seems to be more interested in who people are than in what they have to say. Perhaps that is because it is easier to threaten someone when you know their identity. Here, Briffa is calling a comment someone posted on my blog ‘defamatory’ and pointing out that, despite the fact the commentor is posting anonymously, they may be identified if they are a libellous poster. In his first comment on my blog post he had something to say about my anonymity and in his second, he complained of his reputation being besmirched by another commentor. The poster whose comment was deemed defamatory by Briffa later posted an indication of the evidence they possessed showing Briffa had indeed deleted comments. He must have known his threatening talk of libel was baseless, but it didn’t stop him making the threats. Similar tactics have been used by several others in the field of Alternative Medicine. I once had a visit from a homeopath who threatened to sue me for copyright breach.

The Society of Homeopaths sent the Quackometer’s hosting company Netcetera a complaint via their legal representatives and the page was taken down. Then mirrored by lots of other sites. The incident was covered by a huge number of blogs, but I think PJ had the best title. The post also included this quote:

The alternative medicine crowd are remarkably keen using the “chilling effect” of legal threats based on overly broad interpretations of libel law to get their way (cf. Prof. Colquhoun’s trouble), probably because they know they can’t win the argument based on the evidence, and because they are essentially just another business sector, albeit one without any regulation.

Ann Walker was able to have David Colquhoun’s blog* removed from the UCL server temporarily after he blogged about red clover and used the word gobbledygook to describe the term ‘blood-cleanser’. The story of DC’s excommunication was carried on the Bad Science blog under the headline “The Mighty David Colquhoun”.

The Quackometer, again, ran into trouble with legal threats when a Doctor working in the field of Alternative Medicine sent a lawyer’s letter to the hosting company and the Quackometer blog was taken down, which led the Quackometer blog to move to a decent hosting company, Positive Internet. This story was covered on The Register. And elsewhere.

DC’s Improbable Science* received more threats from media nutritionist Patrick Holford after he commented on Holford’s incandescently stupid remarks about Vitamin C, AZT and AIDS. See also this post on the Quackometer: No Comment.

Gillian McKeith’s husband, lawyer Howard Magaziner, told John Garrow that he was defaming Ms McKeith by remarking on the lack of published research carried out by McKeith – Garrow said “sue me”. Story here. McKeith’s legal threats are documented in this article in The Guardian. These were: a writ against The Sun newspaper; legal letters to PhDiva and google over a blog post; legal threats to a website called Eclectech; and the Garrow threat.

There is a common thread here. In most of these cases at least, people weren’t trying to protect their reputations against defamatory remarks – they were trying to silence criticism in a cowardly manner through threats, bullying, or attempts at censorship.

EDIT: An update to include Happy Jihad’s House of Pancakes (whose name I keep mangling on the internets – sorry HJHOP!) – HJHOP on Legal Chill. Here’s a link I forgot to make earlier: Brainduck on legal bullying and here’s the blog it refers to: http://www.cartoonchurch.com/blog/ (see the ‘page removed’ note for the only hint of legal threat – the legal bullying unfortunately seems to have necessitated this removal). There’s more about legal threats from the people at SPG here: http://spckssg.wordpress.com/

* Another Edit: DC Science now has details of legal threats from Chiropractors.