Douchebag Companions Lose Lawsuit Over Claim That They Accompanied Douchebag
In November, Justin Levine told us about the lawsuit filed by a guy who had been labeled a “douchebag” in a book titled “Hot Chicks with Douchebags” (see the related web site here). Apparently the guy thought he had some kind of legal claim based on being called a douchebag.
Now, via Popehat, comes a link to a Smoking Gun entry that breaks the news that three women accompanying a douchebag have lost their own similar lawsuit. The Smoking Gun has the actual text of the amusingly earnest opinion; as Ken from Popehat says, “the joy of the opinion is in seeing staid and stodgy legal analysis applied to something very unserious.” Indeed. Witness:
The opinion could have been much more brief. It could have been decided by reference to the well-known maxim that “truth is a complete defense to defamation claims.” Again, the evidence:
Case closed. [Sound of a decisive gavel strike. Exeunt omnes.]
UPDATE: I originally wrote that this was a lawsuit brought by one of the douchebags, but instead it was brought by three of the women who accompanied douchebags. I have lightly reworked the post to reflect this fact.
After looking at that photograph of the Federbag, now you know why justice is blind!
Nevertheless, a good day for Justice and Karma.
Comment by Joe — 2/13/2009 @ 9:32 pm
You are known by the company you keep. That’s why the women were pissed off, nothing more.
De-douchification Step 1: Leave New Jersey – Love it!
Comment by daleyrocks — 2/13/2009 @ 9:37 pm
http://www.hotchickswithdouchebags.com
Comment by JD — 2/13/2009 @ 9:37 pm
Yeah, the link is already in the post.
See it there?
Comment by Patterico — 2/13/2009 @ 9:39 pm
Dammit, I really want to do a live blog tonight. But apparently the damn version of WordPress I use won’t accommodate the code without tweaking which I don’t know how to do.
Comment by Patterico — 2/13/2009 @ 9:40 pm
Yeah, I know, Patterico. I just wanted to type it all out. It makes me laugh. This post is epic.
Comment by JD — 2/13/2009 @ 9:45 pm
Patterico – A clarification. It was three chicks hanging out with douchebags who lost their lawsuit in summary judgement, not the douchebag Justin was talking about.
Comment by daleyrocks — 2/13/2009 @ 10:07 pm
Indeed. I somehow missed that. Let me fix.
Comment by Patterico — 2/13/2009 @ 10:19 pm
There remains pending in Las Vegas a separate suit brought by one of the alleged you-know-whats. See bottom of this post:
http://copyrightsandcampaigns.blogspot.com/2009/02/nj-court-first-amendment-guarantees.html
Comment by Ben Sheffner — 2/14/2009 @ 12:00 am
I think my favorite part of the decision is on the last page:
‘In count eight, plaintiffs allege a claim for “humiliation”. This cause of action is not recognized in New Jersey.’
Of course. Who would you find still living in Jersey that recognizes humiliation?
Comment by Apogee — 2/14/2009 @ 12:30 am
We were all talking about how hilarious this site was during our dinner in Chicago – he came out with a companion book as well.
Comment by Dmac — 2/14/2009 @ 6:47 am
On a more serious note, when women don’t value men for their “male contributions” you tend to get further infantilization of men. Evidence.
What is worse is women who seem to encourage this behavior by lauding these guys all the while to behave like well, D-list sluts.
Cream Pie Nation.
Comment by Obama über alles!!!!! — 2/14/2009 @ 6:53 am
We were all talking about how hilarious this site was during our dinner in Chicago
Is that anything like My Dinner with Andre?
Comment by Joe — 2/14/2009 @ 7:29 am
Justice is done in New Jersey (go figure) but justice still needs to be done in New Hampshire.
This litigation and criminal prosecution abuse will make you so fucking mad! God it is fucking douchbag lawyers like this who give lawyers a bad name.
Live free or fucking die as they say!
Comment by Joe — 2/14/2009 @ 10:32 am
[...] via Joe in the comments, companions of douchebag lose suit over characterization of said douchebag as douchebag Posted by Dan Collins @ 11:34 am | Trackback SHARETHIS.addEntry({ title: “Asshat to Bombardier [...]
Pingback by Asshat to Bombardier [Dan Collins; UPDATED] — 2/14/2009 @ 10:39 am
Perhaps that property owner excercising his own constitutional rights on his own property should have called that interfering busybody with his stupid dog this?
I vote for number one.
Comment by Joe — 2/14/2009 @ 11:05 am
The net sure has lowered standards on books. I have been on the WWW since the mid-’90s and encountered the apparently popular I Can Has Cheezburger? collection of cat pictures for the first time at a bookstore checkout counter. I asked if people were actually buying that book, and the clerk told me they move quite a few.
It’s embarrassing to me when I hit “Submit Comment” or “Send” and discover too late that I misspelled a word or botched revising modifiers in a sentence. I’m wondering who the genius editor was who left the dependent clause “His reappropriation of a culturally validated image.” in the final publication.
Comment by L.N. Smithee — 2/14/2009 @ 1:15 pm
Is that anything like My Dinner with Andre?
Having seen that film a long time ago, I can assure you that neither of those characters would’ve lasted more than two minutes at our table that night.
Comment by Dmac — 2/14/2009 @ 1:17 pm
Great opinion, and there is an Easter egg for any lawyer who gets to the end of it.
The idiot plaintiff’s lawyer obviously had never filed a defamation claim, so he copied one from a California lawsuit. In doing so, he included a cause of action for violation of B&P Code 17200, which is a California statute (the New Jersey state court judge referred to it as “non-existent”, but no one expects people in Jersey to know anything happening west of the Appalachians). Doing stuff like that is an invitation for a malpractice suit.
The author of the book is on potentially shaky ground if he can’t prove consent to photographs taken in states like California, which have statutory protection for commercial exploitation of one’s likeness. With this group, however, it seems pretty clear that consent was impliedly given by the posing for the photograph.
Comment by Cyrus Sanai — 2/14/2009 @ 5:01 pm
My Dinner With Andre?
Two minutes? They would not have lasted 2 seconds. Especially when I busted out the free-ballin’ kilt.
Comment by JD — 2/14/2009 @ 6:28 pm
Well…how do TMZ, Perez Hilton, and others do what they do with people’s images all the time? Under California statutory law you cannot take a picture of someone in a public space and satirize it?
Comment by Joe — 2/14/2009 @ 7:25 pm