{"id":41600,"date":"2015-06-18T01:40:09","date_gmt":"2015-06-18T08:40:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/?p=41600"},"modified":"2015-06-18T01:40:09","modified_gmt":"2015-06-18T08:40:09","slug":"avoiding-libel-small-penis-rule","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2015\/06\/avoiding-libel-small-penis-rule\/","title":{"rendered":"Avoiding Being Sued With the “Small Penis” Rule"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"libel-suit\"<\/a>The law is a funny thing and when it comes to defamation and libel, it\u2019s notoriously murky. As such, writers often have to be careful when they\u2019re trying to create characters \u201cinspired\u201d by real people to avoid a lawsuit. For writers who don\u2019t care about that though, there\u2019s always the small penis rule.<\/p>\n

In essence, the small penis rule is a way of avoiding a claim of libel by describing the libellous character as having a penis of comically underwhelming size. The idea being that few men would be willing to sue if it meant having to stand up in court and say that the character in the novel who\u2019s seriously deficient in his nether regions is clearly based on them.<\/p>\n

The earliest mention of the rule can be traced back to a 1998 New York Times<\/em> article by Dinitia Smith, though the description itself is attributed to libel lawyer Leon Friedman who describes it as a \u201csly trick\u201d used by writers looking to avoid a law suit for basing a character on someone who portrays them in a less than flattering manner by simply giving them a quality or attribute nobody would want.<\/p>\n

Yes, the undesirable trait doesn\u2019t have to be limited to one’s manhood, and other techniques for avoiding claims of libel may involve things like:<\/p>\n