DETRAZIONE. - I. DEFINITION
Detraction (from the Latin detrahere = “to take away”) is the unjust denigration of another’s reputation, by spreading true or false reports of hidden faults of one’s neighbor.
For detraction to exist, the following are required: 1) an injury to reputation; 2) the absence of a proportionate cause
that would justly require the disclosure of those vices; 3) the absence of the person defamed.
Detraction is formal when there is an intention to defame; it is material when it is caused solely by thoughtlessness, frivolity, or excessive loquacity. The unnecessary disclosure of genuinely existing hidden faults is simple detraction or defamation; the dissemination of false defamatory reports is calumny.
II. VARIOUS WAYS OF D
St. Thomas, in 2ᵃ-2ᵇᶜ, q. 73, a. 1, ad 3ᵐ, enumerates six different ways of defaming: 1) by slandering, 2) by exaggerating defects in recounting them, 3) by revealing an undisclosed fact, 4) by attributing evil intentions, 5) by denying another’s goodness, 6) through malicious reticence. Other authors add two further ways: 7) by belittling another’s goodness, 8) through studied coolness in praising. In the first four, defamation is explicit and positive, whereas in the remaining ones it is veiled and indirect, by denying or belittling a good quality. It should be noted that certain forms of veiled defamation are often more malicious and harmful than direct methods, e.g.: «If I were to tell everything I know... It is better to keep silent about certain other facts...». Moreover, certain silences deliberately maintained—still worse when accompanied by a smile or a movement of the head, while someone is questioning us about a third party’s honesty—are genuine acts of d.III. THE RIGHT TO REPUTATION
The gravity of detraction is readily understood when one considers how necessary reputation is in relations with other men: to gain trust and friendship, and to obtain positions, employment, and loans.Reputation may be « true » when a good name is founded upon the actual existence of the good qualities attributed; « apparent » when one enjoys a good name without possessing the qualities attributed by public opinion. Whoever has not publicly committed wrongdoing ordinarily has a right to a good name and must be regarded as honest. The right to a good name belongs above all to persons who enjoy a true reputation, the fruit of their honesty. With regard to this good, they have an absolute and universal right, which must always be respected by everyone. It follows that it will always be sinful to damage the good reputation of the virtuous, even when it has been marred by public calumny. The right to a reputation extends also to a false reputation; therefore, men who commit faults and know how to appear honest in public ordinarily have a right to a good name. This right is not of the same nature as that belonging to the virtuous: it is not demanded by an inner goodness that does not exist, but by the disadvantages that, otherwise, would arise against the public and private good. If all private faults could be published, the public good would suffer: the person defamed would lose all authority over his subordinates; his word would become ineffective, and even his relatives would be dishonored; an interminable series of lawsuits and hatreds would ensue, with the consequent disturbance of private and public peace and tranquility. Other disadvantages would oppose the private good: reputation, even for one who has transgressed, is a safeguard against worse vices, since fear of losing one’s good name induces the guilty person to restrain his faults. This right to reputation ceases when a proportionate cause arises to justify or require the publication of hidden faults.
IV. MALICE OF CALUMNY AND DEFAMATION
Calumny by its very nature is more serious than simple defamation, because it adds falsehood. Calumny and simple defamation have in common the malice of offending against justice and charity. 1) They offend against justice, because they deprive one’s neighbor of a good that belongs to him, namely, reputation, to which all those whohave not publicly committed evil are entitled. 2) They offend against charity, which forbids harming one’s neighbor in any way. S. Tommaso, in the 2ᵃ-2ᵇᶜ, q. 73, a. 2, judges defamation to be the gravest sin against one’s neighbor after murder and adultery, and therefore graver than theft. He explains the reason with the words of Holy Scripture: « Melius est nomen bonum, quam divitiæ multae » (Prov. 21, 1).
Both calumny and simple defamation constitute sin. S. Paolo places this sin among those that exclude one from the kingdom of God (cf. Rom. 29-30; I Cor. 6, 10). S. Tommaso, in the 2ᵃ-2ᵇᶜ, q. 73, a. 1, states that defamation is a sin « valde grave, quia inter res temporales videtur fama esse pretiosior, per cuius defectum impeditur homo a multis bene agendis ». S. Bernardo presents the defamer as the slayer of three souls: he kills himself, he kills the one who listens to him, and he kills the person defamed (cf. Serm., XVII, de diversi, n. 4, 5).
V. GRAVITÀ DELLA DIFFAMAZIONE
The gravity of the sin of detraction depends on the extent of the harm inflicted upon another’s reputation and on the malice of the detractor’s intention. A long series of factors contributes to determining the extent of the harm: the nature and importance of the defects or vices revealed; the dignity and standing of the detractor; the moral character, credulity, malevolence, loquacity, and number of the listeners; the condition, authority, and office of the person defamed; the depth of the impression produced by the defamatory words; the anticipated distress of the person defamed; the material and pecuniary damage caused; and the loss of advantageous opportunities and of the ability to do good” (cf. A. Thouvenin, Médicance, in DThC, X, col. 491). One must also consider the weight of the motives that prompt defamation: hatred, revenge, jealousy, or the mere need to speak. For a grave fault, it is not necessary that defamation arise from perverse sentiments; it is enough that it produce grave consequences for the esteem in which one’s neighbor is held, consequences that were foreseen; for grave responsibility is also incurred through a voluntary act in causa.VI. WHEN IT IS LAWFUL TO REVEAL HIDDEN DEFECTS
Whereas calumny is always illicit, because it is contrary to the truth, the disclosure of genuine hidden defects may be lawful whenever it is justified by a proportionate cause. This may be: 1) the duty to defend religion and its principles (a member of the faithful is obliged to inform priests of the clandestine dissemination of heretical or immoral doctrines; of the existence of a hidden impediment to the administration of a Sacrament); 2) the duty to act according to justice (an inspector must report the defects found during inspections); 3) the duty to provide for the good of society (to publish the defects of a candidate in order to prevent public offices from falling into the hands of an incompetent person); 4) the interest of the guilty party (to disclose a child’s vices to the parents for correction); 5) the good of a third party (to warn someone to abandon the company of a corrupter who appears to be good); 6) the interest of the speaker (to disclose to the judge hidden offenses suffered in order to obtain protection and redress, to seek advice, or to relieve oneself).VII. THE DISCLOSURE OF PUBLIC CRIMES
A fact already known to the public, or which will soon become known, is said to be notorious. It is notorious « de iure » if it has been notified by a judge’s sentence; it is notorious « de facto » if, although no sentence has been issued by a judge, it is known to the public or will soon become known. A fact may be notorious in one place and not in another. The report of a crime already condemned by the judge may lawfully be disseminated, because by the condemnation the judge has deprived the offender of the right to his good name. It is not forbidden to speak publicly of a crime in places where it is notorious « de facto », because there the person’s good name has already been lost; but if the crime has already been forgotten by most people, it may not be recalled without sufficient reason, because the offender has already regained the right to his good name. It is illicit to disclose a crime in places where it is not notorious, because the person defamed still has the right to his good name.VIII. D. BY MEANS OF THE PRESS. — The same norms by which private individuals are bound apply to the press, bearing in mind that, in the case of the press, the circumstance of public utility, which legitimizes the dissemination of defamatory news, occurs very often. 1) It is illicit to disseminate calumnies, even if they have already been disseminated by other newspapers and are known to many. 2) The publication of defamatory news whose truth has not been ascertained is always illicit. 3) It is licit to disseminate notorious defamatory news; it is also licit to disclose concealed private matters if there is a just and proportionate reason. 4) Defects in public administration may legitimately be stigmatized by the press, provided that no greater harm results.
IX. COOPERATORS IN D
It is important to know the ways in which one cooperates in defamation, because responsibility and any obligation to make reparation fall to a greater or lesser extent upon the cooperators. 1) Direct cooperators are those who incite others to defame and provide the occasion for it, or steer the conversation toward the faults of one's neighbour, or express praise precisely in order to move others to criticism, or approve defamatory judgments. By their incitement and approval they cooperate in an unjust action: they are bound to make reparation by retracting the reports if they are false, and by speaking well of those persons if they have merely been defamed. 2) Cooperators also include those who inwardly take pleasure in hearing one's neighbour defamed. They are not bound to make reparation; nevertheless, they sin because they take pleasure in the harm done to their neighbour and in an unjust action. 3) Indirect cooperators are those who, when able to do so, fail to prevent the defamation: they sin by omission, gravely, when there is certainty that the defamation is grave and unjust, there is a real possibility of preventing it, and no serious difficulties stand in the way.X. REPAIR OF REPUTATION
1) The calumniator is bound to restore the person’s reputation by openly confessing that he has lied. 2) The mere detractor must employ suitable means useful for restoring the good name, bringing the good qualities of the defamed person to the fore. 3) Both the calumniator and the mere defamer are bound to repair all material damage resulting from the defamation and previously foreseen.Whereas, however, the calumniator is bound to make total reparation, the mere detractor seems obliged to make only partial reparation, because the damage derives from two factors: the dissemination of the report and the reality of the offense. 4) One is dispensed from repairing the reputation: a) if the defamed person pardons the offense; b) if the offense becomes publicly known through the intervention of other causes; c) if the defamation has been forgotten; d) if the defamation has been repaired by other means, such as, for example, by the judge’s acquittal; e) if reparation is materially or morally impossible, as in the case in which the detractor making reparation would suffer much more serious harm than the defamed person (v. RESTITUZIONE).