Twitter Defamation

Brendan Burgess said:

But of all the posters on Askaboutmoney, I would say that you have the most experience of contacting solicitors?

Brendan

Click to expand...

That certainly appears to be the case. I had hoped that perhaps some solicitors frequent the "askaboutlaw" topic, in the way trades people frequent DIY topics. Perhaps not.

goosebump said:

That certainly appears to be the case. I had hoped that perhaps some solicitors frequent the "askaboutlaw" topic, in the way trades people frequent DIY topics. Perhaps not.

Click to expand...

They do but they tend to have better things to do than engage in nonsense. The rest of us are not so smart.....

I am sure someone will be happy to take thousands of euro off you eventually......

Well, that's certainly passed a few minutes, if not hours, of people's time - has life come down to this now?

goosebump said:

My difficulty arises from not being able to engage legal assistance.

Click to expand...

As before, the fact that they're not engaging may tell you all you need to know. Legal services and the courts are still operating.

Hi goosebumps,

Its obvious that this whole matter is causing you grave concern and therefore stopping you from stepping back from the whole situation and looking at it from a sensible point of view. As you have seen here most people would say 'let it go'.

Life is too short for this type of stress and it looks as if you go down the legal route the stress will only get a lot worse. It may further affect your job, certainly your finances and possibly your health in the long term.

If you heard tomorrow that you or yours had a serious case of Covid how important would this problem be then.

I doubt thousands of people have read it with anything more than a fleeting interest.
However,beware of the Streisand effect

vandriver said:

I doubt thousands of people have read it with anything more than a fleeting interest.
However,beware of the Streisand effect

Click to expand...

Thank you!!!!! I was thinking of that reading through this but couldn't remember the celebrity! No wonder Bette Midler searches weren't showing up the desired results

Goosebumps, legal directories like Legal500 and Chambers list the top specialists in the country in specific areas. Contact the defamation expert listed there. Every large firm lists a partner who deals with this topic.

DeeKie said:

Goosebumps, legal directories like Legal500 and Chambers list the top specialists in the country in specific areas. Contact the defamation expert listed there. Every large firm lists a partner who deals with this topic.

Click to expand...

With any luck, a quasi bidding-war might start with Arthur Cox, A&L Goodbody, McCannFitzGerald, Matheson, Mason Hayes & Curran and William Fry all vying to take this one on.

For what it’s worth, my own sense is that Lionel Hutz, Attorney-At-Law, might be the best hope of success:

Yeah but maybe he/she shouldn't have said something 'mean' in the first place and they wouldn't have found themselves in their current predicament!!! People in glasshouses and all that...

If the OP goes to court, perhaps the opinions of the 'jury' on AAM so far might dissuade them of the likelihood of success...

Ok. You can all double down on the OP. You all know better?! But the OP asked about how to get legal representation. Everybody deserves to have someone qualified advise them on the law. It is not fair if no one will take his case. I don’t necessarily agree with OP but I think people deserve an answer to questions that they legitimately raise in a forum like this without a lot of ridicule.
We do not know what was said, the facts are not available. What is interesting is the assumption that the reactions of others are paramount because they are potential defendants who are more powerful/ wealthy. Sure the employer has the balance of power, and so disturbing the attitude of the employer to the employee is potentially risky, but that is not to say that the employer’s view should be validated and upheld in every circumstance just because of that power differential. First work out if the op is correct as a point of law. Then decide whether commercial/ risk outweighs taking the action.

The advantage of going to a lawyer is that they will tell you, plainly and coldly, your chances of success. They will disabuse you of any notions that you have that you are entitled to your desired outcome.

Really?

I think that’s extraordinarily naive. If the OP meets the wrong lawyer, he or she could end up incurring significant costs unnecessarily. And it’s just reality that acting the goat outside of work can impact of one’s worklife.

If I worked for Facebook and somehow got in a punch-up in a bar with Mark Zuckerberg’s brother-in-law in a bar, do you think that would bode well or badly for my future career prospects?

Who knows , Gordon

Maybe Mark Z can't stand his b-i-l?!

Personally, I'm struck with the lack of empathy for the OP.

elacsaplau said:

Personally, I'm struck with the lack of empathy for the OP.

Click to expand...

I think most of us are trying to help the OP by offering advice which might not be what they want to hear but which we believe is in their best interest. I do sympathise with the OP and as SueEllen said it is clearly upsetting them. However pursuing this may end up upsetting them even more and they may well be overstating the amount of people who a) saw the tweet, b) paid any attention to it or gave it any credibility c) know the OP.
I do agree with DeeKie that there are some posts on here ridiculing the OP which are not helpful but such is the nature of anonymous forums. However the OP themselves doesn't sound like a stranger to mean comments either.

Apologies, Ceist Beag……..tá an cheart agat!

I should have written the lack of empathy for the OP by some posters! [I guess what prompted this comment is that some have mentioned that Twitter is a bit of a cesspit and it seems that some comments here would be better suited to Twitter?!]

elacsaplau said:

[I guess what prompted this comment is that some have mentioned that Twitter is a bit of a cesspit and it seems that some comments here would be better suited to Twitter?!]

Click to expand...

Actually this is more civilised than 90% of replies to an average tweet!

Ceist Beag said:

they may well be overstating the amount of people who a) saw the tweet, b) paid any attention to it or gave it any credibility c) know the OP.

Click to expand...

This is very true. The only person giving this any thought any more is the OP.

Twitter's search function is obscure and difficult to use, I think deliberately. I sometimes go searching for an old tweet but can't find it as I don't recall the precise twitter handle or wording.

Grown man acts like child and makes a mean comment on social media to some celebrity.
Grown man/celebrity reacts like child and responds and makes sure person's employer sees it.
Employer says stop engaging on twitter on that person and moves on with running the company.
Initial grown man who started all this refuses to let it go as his honor has been slighted
The grown man has decided that after consulting multiple solicitors who either tell him to forget it or refuse to engage even if they thought he had a case because like most people, they realise that this isn't worth the effort.
Instead of trying to get twitter or the celebrity to remove the tweet or even remove his own twitter profile, the grown man leaves everything all up there so that the lawyers (when he finds one) will be able to see it.
Everyone is pointing out spending thousands on some sort of legal action is pointless. What the celebrity did to he OP was wrong. It was ignorant. It was childish. It was also dangerous. But the OP is at risk of losing sight of what is important by hassling their employer to admit they were wrong to interfere, stressing about it and then looking to spend thousands of euro on protecting their good name when I am willing to bet that no-one even remembers the tweet and cares even less. Just a

Musk called someone a child abuser on Twitter and was let off. People and companies with much higher profiles than the OP are abused and defamed every single day. I have seen people accusing our politicians of personally causing the deaths of people, of taking bribes and everything else under the sun. Nobody unless you are Gemma O Doherty runs to the lawyers. People who get personally insulted by what is written on sites like Twitter and even AAM by people not even using their real names need to stop engaging with others on social media.

Twitter are notorious for tolerating the most egregious smears

OP, the reactions here are harsh, but you're best forget about it, doubt you're employer is too worked up about it

elacsaplau said:

Who knows , Gordon

Maybe Mark Z can't stand his b-i-l?!

Personally, I'm struck with the lack of empathy for the OP.

Click to expand...

Perhaps the Covid-19 crisis has reduced people’s tolerance for frivolous nonsense and ridiculous behavior?

Perhaps 2 months ago, people would say “aw, poor Johnny, would you like a hug and to hear that everyone’s dancing to the wrong step except you?”.

I think that now it’s more a case of a gentle slap across the face with the words “cop yourself on”.

Gordon Gekko said:

Really?

I think that’s extraordinarily naive. If the OP meets the wrong lawyer, he or she could end up incurring significant costs unnecessarily. And it’s just reality that acting the goat outside of work can impact of one’s worklife.

If I worked for Facebook and somehow got in a punch-up in a bar with Mark Zuckerberg’s brother-in-law in a bar, do you think that would bode well or badly for my future career prospects?

Click to expand...

Yes because that hypothetical is a fair comparison