that imputation … being a standard common to society generally …"
(Citations omitted)
142 Later in their reasons, their Honours said that "[t]he concept of 'reputation' in the law of defamation comprehends all aspects of a person's standing in the community", including upon their character or their business or professional reputation. They continued (at 477 [36]–[37]):
It has been observed that phrases such as "business reputation" or "reputation for honesty" may sometimes obscure this fact. In principle therefore the general test for defamation should apply to an imputation concerning any aspect of a person's reputation. A conclusion as to whether injury to reputation has occurred is the answer to the question posed by the general test, whether it be stated as whether a person's standing in the community, or the estimation in which people hold that person, has been lowered or simply whether the imputation is likely to cause people to think the less of a plaintiff. An imputation which defames a person in their professional or business reputation does not have a different effect. It will cause people to think the less of that person in that aspect of their reputation. For any imputation to be actionable, whether it reflects upon a person's character or their business or professional reputation, the test must be satisfied.
The reference in the general test, as stated in Sim, to a plaintiff being "lowered in the estimation" of the hypothetical referee does not imply the exercise of a moral judgment, on their part, about the plaintiff because of what is said about that person. It does not import particular standards, those of a moral or ethical nature, to the assessment of the imputations. It simply conveys a loss of standing in some respect.
143 It was common ground that a statement which exposes a plaintiff in a defamation proceeding to hatred, contempt or ridicule satisfies the general test, namely whether the published matter is likely to lead an ordinary reasonable person to think the less of a plaintiff, because it is comprehended within it.
144 Here, Mr Greenwich contended that the primary tweet caricatured him and exposed him to ridicule by "reducing him to a filthy sex act" that led to a loss of standing.
145 As long ago as 1840, Parke B said in Parmiter v Coupland (1840) 151 ER 340 at 342 that "[a] publication, without justification or lawful excuse, which is calculated to injure the reputation of another, by exposing him to hatred, contempt or ridicule, is a libel".
146 As Dr Collins submitted, that statement acknowledges that a person may suffer a loss of standing when they are exposed to hatred, contempt or ridicule, "and that can often happen because a person is reduced to a form of reductionist caricature, someone to be reviled or pitied or laughed at".
147 A more recent case in which a plaintiff alleged that he had been exposed to hatred, ridicule or contempt is Berkoff v Burchill [1996] 4 All ER 1008.
