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Consider the way things were before Thiel showed up. Gawker destroyed lives[1] with impunity because their victims didn't have deep enough pockets to fight back in court. Thiel is just leveling the playing field.

[1] http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3488027/Gawker-edito...

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I'm not defending Gawker; I'm saying there's a better way to have this debate.

We don’t have to accept or excuse Gawker’s worst stories to protest Thiel’s dangerous playbook for attacks on institutions of civil society.

You're free to propose that we outlaw the funding of lawsuits by non-parties, as was done historically (google 'maintenance' and 'champerty' if you want more history on that) but you're going to shut down the ACLU and company when you do so. So it's a matter of which is more important to you, really.

Hm, that's an interesting point that I'll have to noodle over. Thanks for pointing it out.

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