Qualified privilege has the same result as absolute privilege, but does not protect statements that can be proven to have been made with malicious intent (Pember, & Calvert, 2005).
The church would argue that they had a qualified privilege to communicate Steve's personal indiscretions due to the fact that they have the right to practice their religion. They will say that the disclosing of personal indiscretions is somehow a religious practice in their church and that everyone must disclose their indiscretions to them so that they can then make these public so that other people can help the person with their problems. They would argue that the statements were important facts to be known in the public interest in the carrying out of their religious practices.
d. Is there a legal difference in disclosing personal indiscretions to other elders, to members of the church, or to members of the public?
In trying to determine if a statement has violated defamation law it is important to consider the following things. Has the statement been published? In other words has it been intentionally...
All of these people would be considered third parties. The statements about Steve were made intentionally in order to cause harm to Steve's reputation. A reasonable person would be thought to know that anything that has to do with personal indiscretions would not be information that a person would want just anyone to know. And especially those people who are neighbors or employers to a person. It is people in these situations knowing that can have the most affect on a person's reputation in the community and in the workplace. It is in these types of situations that a person's reputation can suffer the most and have long lasting, irreversible damages.
References
Pember, D., & Calvert, C. (2005). Mass Media Law. New York: McGraw-Hill.
