CAVEAT: Bashers Beware
by Lawrence Lesangke
Netizens, social media, fans, likers, haters or whatever we call them has contributed part and parcel to the success of any showbiz personality. In every minute a star shines in the entertainment industry and with that same minute a star losses its shine. Looking back to our entertainment industry, we can see the difference on how to gain immense popularity and how to lose a career in the blink of an eye. It is of no difference to a politician being thrown with different black propaganda if their detractors wanted to throw harsh critic to them. In this modern era, it would only take seconds to take down artists as compared before that tabloids and well-known showbiz programs undertaking blind items and intriguing issues would still be required for an artist to be disliked. Through the power of the internet and the rise of different social networking sites, it is now the society per se that crushes and slams an actor or actress. These haters who dish a person or a person who assaults another were called as bashers. They were the ones responsible creating a media frenzy online if they don’t patronize a showbiz personality or is linked to an issue having their judgment as discontentment or scandalous or sometimes just for the purpose of only creating an angry mob. Though we live in a democratic society exercising the freedom of speech and of the expression; Does it mean to say that bashers of an artists were exempted or clothed with the legal shield to humiliate or a license to have an unruly behavior online against an artists? Unfortunately, the answer would always be in the negative. Any malicious imputation, slandering a person or damaging the persona of a public personality falls squarely to libel under the Revised Penal Code and under the Cybercrime law. The link that you will share online involving a sex scandal can be prosecuted under the said laws and the anti-child pornography act if the victim is a minor. The penalty for these crimes would be fine and imprisonment and damages also would be afforded by the winning victim. So before you make a side comment in the internet it is always best to think before you click. Not convinced? Try revisiting some of our laws:
Under Article 353 of the Revised Penal Code of the Philippines, libel is defined as a public and malicious imputation of a crime, or of a vice or defect, real or imaginary, or any act, omission, condition, status or circumstance tending to discredit or cause the dishonor or contempt of a natural or juridical person, or to blacken the memory of one who is dead. Thus, the elements of libel are: (a) imputation of a discreditable act or condition to another; (b) publication of the imputation; (c) identity of the person defamed; and, (d) existence of malice.
[Daez v. Court of Appeals, G.R. No. 47971, 31 October 1990, 191 SCRA 61, 67]
In libel cases, the question is not what the writer of an alleged libel means, but what the words used by him mean. Jurisprudence has laid down a test to determine the defamatory character of words used in the following manner, viz:
“Words calculated to induce suspicion are sometimes more effective to destroy reputation than false charges directly made. Ironical and metaphorical language is a favored vehicle for slander. A charge is sufficient if the words are calculated to induce the hearers to suppose and understand that the person or persons against whom they were uttered were guilty of certain offenses, or are sufficient to impeach their honesty, virtue, or reputation, or to hold the person or persons up to public ridicule. . . . ”
[Lacsa v. Intermediate Appellate Court, 161 SCRA 427 (1988) citing U.S. v. O’Connell, 37 Phil. 767 (1918)]
An allegation is considered defamatory if it ascribes to a person the commission of a crime, the possession of a vice or defect, real or imaginary, or any act, omission, condition, status or circumstances which tends to dishonor or discredit or put him in contempt, or which tends to blacken the memory of one who is dead.
There is publication if the material is communicated to a third person. It is not required that the person defamed has read or heard about the libelous remark. What is material is that a third person has read or heard the libelous statement, for “a man’s reputation is the estimate in which others hold him in, not the good opinion which he has of himself.”
[Alonzo v. Court of Appeals, 241 SCRA 51 (1995)]
Penalty: fine, imprisonment and damages.
In posting and making comments in your social media accounts, try not to attack other persons feelings. Whether an artist or an ordinary person, everyone has an innate to be respected and protected from ridicule and malicious imputation.
