By Justin Silverman

When singer Barbra Streisand found an aerial shot of her home in a Pictopia.com collection of California coastline photos several years ago, she sued citing privacy concerns. Because of the lawsuit, public interest spiked and more than 400,000 people viewed that photo during the next month.

So much for privacy.

The Streisand Effect, as it is now called, occurs when an attempt to prevent the public from viewing information compels more people to view that info than would have otherwise. It’s not quite the model display of damage control.

Want to prevent the public from thinking your apartments are mold-ridden? Sue the tenant who tweeted to 20 friends that she found mold and find yourself in a national discussion about one of the first Twitter libel suits. Just resigned as governor of Alaska and don’t want to be linked to a federal investigation? Threaten writers with legal action and inadvertently create the news du jour.

In the most recent case of what were you thinking, Glenn Beck of Fox News fame is seeking the cancellation of a domain name — and, obviously, the content on it — claiming the domain is, among other things, defamatory. Rather than defame Beck, the site intends to parody his apparent report-a-rumor-and-imply-it’s-true style of broadcasting. It does so by asking the question, “Did Glenn Beck rape and murder a young girl in 1990?” It then promotes this absurd and presumably false rumor by using the same tactics Beck is said to use. As explained on the site, www.glennbeckrapedandmurderedayounggirlin1990.com:

“Why won’t Glenn Beck deny these allegations? We’re not accusing Glenn Beck of raping and murdering a young girl in 1990 — in fact, we think he didn’t! But we can’t help but wonder, since he has failed to deny these horrible allegations. Why won’t he deny that he raped and killed a young girl in 1990?”

Here is an analysis of a defamation claim that may eventually be filed by Beck. Its success seems to hinge on whether or not readers of the website’s domain will take the accusation seriously. It is a statement of fact. It is false. But will anyone actually believe Beck murdered and raped a young girl in 1990? I don’t believe any reasonable person will. The site is covered in disclaimers and reminders that the content is intended to be a parody. Much of this was added after Beck’s grievances became known; still, I think the reasonable reader would eventually find the intended humor even without them.

Further, I’m wondering just how much Beck’s reputation is being harmed by this website and its domain name. The purpose of defamation law is to protect an individual’s reputation and given all the attention this lawsuit has received, it’s likely that anyone who may have believed Beck to be a murderer and rapist now understands otherwise. So, unless the suit is filed in a jurisdiction that recognizes libel per se, where would the damage be?

The damage, ironically, may be in the fact Beck’s lawsuit took a relatively small joke that started among message board users and shared it with the world. The final punchline isn’t the association of Beck with murder and rape like the website had hoped. No, it’s that in trying to keep that association from being made, Beck and his lawyers shared the joke with a larger audience than even Streisand could command.

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