Substack bloggers, do you have insurance for libel, slander, errors and omissions?

I Didn't Think So

Substack bloggers, do you have insurance for libel, slander errors and omissions?

I’m guessing at least 90 percent, maybe more, of the folks writing on here do not have such insurance. The big names, with big followings, who make money from their newsletters probably do. The average small-timers on Substack most likely can’t afford this kind of insurance or don’t even know they need it.

When you write for a publication, a newspaper, magazine, TV station, those outlets usually have such insurance and have lawyers.

You, as their employee, have some measure of protection.

That’s not true for Substack, YouTube or your WordPress blog. You are legally naked on these platforms.

The legal precedent set in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254 (1964) has long been targeted. It’s likely this precedent will be struck down by our new government. For those of you unfamiliar with this case, New York Times Co. v. Sullivan was a landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision ruling that the freedom of speech protections in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution restrict the ability of public officials to sue for defamation.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Times_Co._v._Sullivan

Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan wrote the unanimous opinion in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan. New SCOTUS justices are not like this man. Public Domain

I’ll let you read up yourself, but this case was directly related to the civil rights movement that sought equal voting rights for all. It is perhaps the right’s most-hated movement, even more so than legal abortion and birth control.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_rights_movement

Just an aside: What else happened in 1964 that right doesn’t like that has already been essentially nullified? In 1964, United States President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Republicans and conservatives across the right of the political spectrum despised this law. The enactment of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 kicked off a 60-year effort by Republicans to not only nullify it, but to roll back all manner of equal rights protections. This effort led directly to the election of our new government.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964

United States President Lyndon B. Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Among the guests behind him is Martin Luther King Jr. This law kicked off the 60-year effort by American conservatives to overturn laws providing equal rights. Public Domain

Platforms like Substack and YouTube provide centralized digital spaces that can be easily swept for opinions and people our new government doesn’t like. Many of the most vocal government critics are essentially all in just a few places.

It would be a failure of imagination to NOT think our new government, under the direction of someone like techbro-in-chief Elon Musk, could instigate what will amount to a reverse class action lawsuits, suing everyone on these platforms that they don’t like in big SLAPP suits to not only shut them up, but take all of their assets in damages and legal fees.

We already watched as the billionaire techbro owners of the Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times declined to endorse Harris for president (thus giving a tacit endorsement to her opponent) after months of barely-ever critical coverage of the Republicans.

Making criticism of public officials and wealthy public figures illegal is just one aspect of this all-encompassing subjugation of free speech.

Give Jerry Seinfeld or the Kardashians a bad review? Get sued, lose all you own, go to jail.

Corporations are also salivating at the prospect of the packed courts ruling that criticizing their goods and services is also illegal. Say something bad about a polluting oil company, food producer selling poison products or Facebook promoting lies, get sued, lose all you own, go to jail.

Jail is certainly not out of the question for those who speak out in opposition to our new government. In reality, it’s what they mean by “owning the libs,” since once in federal prison you’ll be rented out to work for free for the capitalists who worked to make actual free speech illegal. Free speech, as well as other laws, will soon only be only for those who can pay for them.

Think this can’t happen to you and your little blog or newsletter? Think again.

It won’t be the first time this has happened in America.

As Elon Musk has already threatened “prepare for hardship.” And losing your freedoms.

With University of Mississippi fraternity houses for a backdrop, US Army trucks loaded with steel-helmeted US Marshals roll across the University of Mississippi campus in the wake of the Ole Miss riot of 1962. Public Domain