
Elon Musk 'pedo guy' defamation trial to begin - new_realist
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-50641397
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jdpigeon
I love a lot of what Musk does but thought those tweets were just insane,
classless, and reprehensible.

Fortunately, he's seemed to have calmed down his social media game since 2018
(thank God), but he should still absolutely have to settle with this guy for a
lot of money.

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lawnchair_larry
The other guy _did_ insult him first. It doesn’t really matter which words
were used in either direction, they were both trying to engage in public
ridicule. But Musk has more money, so he isn’t held to the same standard. I
think they both look bad and the case should be thrown out.

Some convicted scammer claiming to be a private investigator who could get
dirt on Unsworth ended up baiting Musk and offering his services for $50k. He
sold him some lies about Unsworth, and Musk thought the guy was legit, so he
later doubled down in the private email to a buzzfeed reporter, which was
obviously promptly published.

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AndrewBissell
Unsworth was pissed because Musk's cave mini-sub white knight PR stunt was a
huge, impractical distraction thrust on him at a time when speed and decisive
action were of the essence. He used some choice words with an interviewer and,
more to the point, never made baseless claims about Musk's background to a
Twitter following of millions. To compare the two is just absurd.

~~~
lawnchair_larry
That’s a really bad excuse, and probably not true. If he didn’t want to be
distracted, he could have simply not looked at twitter. Musk’s offer was
obviously sincere, and if Unsworth found it unhelpful, the adult response is
to politely decline.

If you instead go to the media and pick a fight by using inflammatory claims
and insults, you should not be surprised if someone hits back harder. To then
go crying to the courts about defamation over a fight you started is just
being an opportunistic weasel.

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AndrewBissell
Dude, Musk actually showed up _in Thailand_ and was leaning on local officials
to insert himself into the rescue planning. Unsworth did not find out about
him from Twitter.

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nkkollaw
“Pedo guy was a common insult used in South Africa when I was growing up,” Mr
Musk said in a court filing as part of a failed request to have the case
thrown out of court. "It is synonymous with ‘creepy old man’ and is used to
insult a person’s appearance and demeanour, not accuse a person of
paedophilia.”

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randyrand
That actually seems like a good defense if true.

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mikestew
You know what was used “as a common insult when I was growing up” for black
people? And then to hear “oh, she doesn’t mean anything by it, it’s just how
she was raised.”

Nope, doesn’t let old racists off the hook, nor does it for Musk. Both
examples need to quit with excuses and clean up their act.

~~~
randyrand
The N word is a great example of an insult for insult sake. If anything
comparing ”pedo guy“ to the N word helps Elon’s case by implying it was just a
generic insult.

~~~
nkkollaw
You can't even write the insult you're talking about, how can you compare with
"pedo guy", who no one has a problem writing anywhere?

Obviously they're a bad comparison.

~~~
ben_w
Speaking for myself, the reason I’m not even writing the N word when
discussing it isn’t because it’s more severe. The other term is so loaded
that, in the early 2000s close to where I lived in the UK, a gang set about
the house of a _paediatrician_ because the mob didn’t know the difference — if
the N word is more severe than that, then please let me know so that I can
apologise for underestimating its effect.

Rather, the reason I’m avoiding the N word is that it targets an innocent
group who are essentially my equals and who are only poor because Western
Europe happened to go through the industrial revolution first (someone has to
be first) and thus conquered around a third of the planet between them.

