Guest Post by Morbo
If you want to know what the Rev. Jerry Falwell thinks about homosexuality, go to Falwell.com. If you want to know what Christopher Lamparello thinks about what Jerry Falwell thinks about homosexuality, go Fallwell.com.
It’s just one additional letter, but it makes all the difference. And it really got Falwell’s knickers in knots.
For an overweight dude, Falwell sure has thin skin. He also has an army of lawyers and likes to intimate people. Thus, when Lamparello, created his website in 1999 to criticize Falwell’s view on gay rights, the Lynchburg TV preacher was quick to act. He sued Lamparello in federal court.
I don’t know for sure, but my guess is that Falwell thought he could scare Lamparello off just by filing suit. After all, most people don’t have the money to hire high-powered law firms to defend themselves in a case like this. Falwell probably thought he would win by default.
Thankfully, the American Civil Liberties Union rode in to the rescue. The ACLU’s Virginia branch defended Lamparello in court, arguing that his website was a protected form of free speech.
Lamparello lost the first round, when a federal court ruled in favor of Falwell. But recently the U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously reversed that ruling, siding with Lamparello.
On his site, Lamparello makes it clear that his undertaking is in no way sponsored by Falwell. The main page includes a disclaimer in huge type stating that the site is not Falwell approved and providing a link to Falwell’s actual site. This was enough to persuade the appeals court.
“After even a quick glance at the content of the Web site at www.fallwell.com, no one seeking Reverend Falwell’s guidance would be misled by the domain name…into believing Reverend Falwell authorized the content of that Web site,” wrote Judge Diana Gribbon Motz for the unanimous court. “No one would believe that Reverend Falwell sponsored a site criticizing himself, his positions and his interpretations of the Bible.”
A Falwell spokesman, Ron Godwin, charged that the corpulent televangelist had been the victim of “an activist judge that did not rule on the merit” of his case.
Nice try. First of all, the case was heard by a three-judge panel, and they aren’t activists. The 4th Circuit, in fact, is widely regarded as one of the most conservative appellate courts in the nation.
Falwell just didn’t have a case. He’s a bully and a whiner. He also has a history of suing people who criticize or make fun of him. A few years ago, Falwell successfully sued an Illinois man who had registered the domain name www.jerryfalwell.com and was using to run a site satirizing Falwell. After winning in court, Falwell took control of the domain name. (And of course, there was the famous incident from 1983 when Falwell sued Hustler magazine publisher Larry Flynt over a rather graphic parody in that publication. That case went all the way to the Supreme Court, where Falwell lost in a unanimous ruling.)
This time it didn’t work. Falwell is not Fallwell, and the court saw through that. Now is the time to act. According to my research, someone has already registered fallwell.net, fallwell.org and jerryfallwell.net. However, fallwel.net and fallwel.org are still available. What are you waiting for? Buy them up and let the fun begin. Perhaps you too can be sued by a garrulous TV preacher.