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Here’s a link where someone much more versed than me explains it. It echoes the other responses to your post.

[1]https://www.quora.com/Can-a-U-S-President-sue-a-comedian-for...

you can sue anyone for anything you can convince a lawyer to take a case for. Doesn't mean you can win, and I certainly haven't seen cases where the butt of a joke sued and won. I would definitely be interested in reading about the case that proves me wrong.

This is a thread about libel and slander really. Not just being the butt of a joke. I included some links, one on civil tort and one on criminal defamation. The criminal defamation article has links from a variety of states and time periods.

edit: yes, just like in Brazil or Canada, there are some circumstances in some states with some judges where both comedy and offending someone can result in civil and criminal penalties, when those circumstances fit the criteria for libel, slander or defamation. the circumstances may be narrower in those United States than those particular countries due to the first amendment, or perhaps they may be broader because I don't know the particulars of those specific countries.

You replied to a comment specifically about being the butt if a joke (making fun of Brazilians)

Yes, I did. If that joke satisfies the criteria of libel, slander or defamation then you can face civil or criminal penalties in the United States as well.

You "can", however case law in the US is very deeply anti-plaintiff, due to centuries of supreme court justices voting in favor of free speech. A joke would not satisfy the criteria for libel.

You can be sued by anyone for ANYTHING. That doesn't mean you can win. The statutes you site are extremely hard to win at because of first amendment protections; even at the unlikely outcome that you win a court case (you'll probably lose at summary judgement) you're most likely going to be overturned on appeal, even in the most conservative circuits.

You can sue for just about anything. Do you have an example of a case where the plaintiff won?

Eminem won a case where he portrayed a childhood bully negatively in one of his songs: https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/judge-drops-em...

I guess Eminem has more resources than the average person, but it’s something I remembered.

Eminem was the defendant

This is the opposite of the plaintiff winning

No and I am not invested enough to prove this reality for you. I added some links that could help. Just realize that if this reality is true, then this knowledge is advantageous in maintaining your status and appropriating resources, and the people that already have those things already have this knowledge and take advantage of an unsuspecting population that was raised on a fictional social contract that doesn't really exist.

> No and I am not invested enough to prove this reality for you.

Seems like a cop-out. Extraordinary claims and all that.

> Seems like a cop-out. Extraordinary claims and all that.

Deducing this has almost nothing to do with the specific topic of how your speech can be sanctioned, but only how the court systems function.

This isn't one of those situations where it makes sense for me to dig and post tort case law just so people can dissect whichever one I post to either be surprised at how reality works, or find a way to carve an exemption about why it doesn't apply at all. Backing up claims this way is not an effective way to synchronize our realities, and it is sillier to conclude that it is an unfathomable reality simply because I don’t feel the need to don’t carry the responsibility of changing your (or other's) mind in this way.

Your response seems like denial to me, as if you need your social contract to be true.

So, here is a more effective way of deducing what you need to know:

A judge will take libel and slander cases from private persons. Which means the judge didn’t dismiss the claim, and civil cases can result in summary judgements, at the discretion of the judge.

A judge will take criminal defamation cases from the state.

You can face civil or criminal liability in the United States for offending people, making fun of them in ways that fit the criteria of libel, slander or defamation. This means you have to defend yourself if in this circumstance or face disruptions to your way of life and freedom, in the United States.

This isn't an extraordinary claim and I would put the ball in your court to disprove it, because this is just an explanation of how the court system works and has almost nothing to do with whether it damaged your ideals about how speech can create liability.

>This isn't an extraordinary claim and I would put the ball in your court to disprove it...

That's not how this works. You make a claim, you back it up. If you don't, you're just adding noise.

Fortunately for you, I did post a link which contains criminal defamation cases in the United States, which is the same level of speech liability that these examples from other countries experience.

I won't be searching for civil tort cases for you, and I did provide you a framework for how to determine this reality already. So yes, that is how this works, by understanding how the civil and criminal court system function.

So no, you're not aware of anyone actually being successful in such a suit. Good to know.

I am aware and dont keep case law on file for every topic that runs counter to the collective conscious, but logically does your decision path make sense?

If I decide not to prove something in the most arbitrary way anyone asks then the different world view does not exist?

Are you sure?

I could see how you might be used to that in other topics, but in case law it wouldnt