I have just discovered I've been attacked - in an ill-spelled diatribe, by a self-appointed internet vigilante.
What's it like?
I cannot fully describe my shock and anger – the feeling that I had been personally violated in public. Everything that was said about me was distorted, false, and completely unfair. Anyone who knows me or has done business with me will know that, while I may make my share of mistakes, I am honest, careful and genuine.
I knew I had acted throughout with decency and honesty, and not broken any laws – yet I stood publicly accused of dishonesty, lying and deceit, right there where everybody would be sure to see it. It made me sweat and feel physically sick, and it was two days before I felt able even to tell my wife. I still have not told my children, though I’ll have to soon, before they discover for themselves.
Libel on the Internet is not the same as libel in a newspaper, it’s much, much worse.
That’s the first of the painful things I have discovered.
Even a front page spread in The Times will be bin-liners tomorrow. It hurts, but one can shrug one’s shoulders and try to ignore it. On the Internet the lying words hang around forever, and sit right there, between you and anyone who is interested to find out more about you. New friends, new businesses, new agents – everyone.
Aided by the search engines, the libel pops up on Google whenever someone enters my name. Though I only discovered it last month, (not being one who regularly googles his own name – normally about as exciting as ringing your own telephone number) – this page of false and damaging allegations had already been hanging there for five months, sitting at second position on the first page of the Google search results, and seen by I don’t know how many people who might otherwise have wanted to do business with me but now might not.
This holier-than-thou vigilante, who pretends he is a member of the British aristocracy, though I've discovered that in real life he is plain 'Mr' like you or I, had made sure it was listed under my name, and under my business name and (surely this can only be out of spite) under my pen name as a writer. Just in case anyone should miss it. There isn't anybody who won't see it if they ask about me on Google.
Imagine that someone has printed billboards with a big picture of you, calling you a liar and a cheat, and pasted them up all round your home, your place of work and everywhere else that people might possibly look for you. It is loathsome.
What makes it worse is that, unlike an article in The Times, it is not written by a journalist of reasonable integrity and overseen by an editor with an eye to avoiding unnecessary court damages. Anyone can write a blog, set themselves up as an expert, and smear whomever they like, in the belief that they are immune from any responsibility, retribution or prosecution.
I’m not a celebrity (chance would be a fine thing); I’m a normal honest small businessman trying to become a writer. I had not expected to be a subject for unprovoked and scurrilous attack.
Now what happens?
More next post...I admire Giles Corey as a stubborn martyr, standing out against the malicious madness of the mob three hundred years ago. These events are happening today --------- Garth Notley
