Sunday, August 15, 2004 Malilong: Calling somebody names By Frank Malilong, Jr. The Other Side
What’s in a name?
We used to have a neighbor in Masbate whose name was Doctor Yanson. No, he did not own any degree; I don’t think he even finished high school. But everybody addressed him “Doctor” including us, a generation younger, who called him “Noy Doctor.” To his credit, he never practiced medicine, not even quackery, despite his name.
I was reminded of the late “Noy Doctor” because of an item in the local papers this week about a complaint for falsification having been filed by a Regional Trial Court (RTC) judge against a fellow whose middle name was “Abogado.” It seems that the chap represented himself as a lawyer (“Atty. Abogado”) to a hotel security officer and convinced the latter to hire him in a case for annulment of marriage. The “lawyer” reportedly got P70,000 in fees, in exchange for which he gave his client, a copy of the decision in his case, purportedly signed by the RTC judge.
Is that how much a name is worth these days?
No, it’s a lot more – P10 million, to be exact – if you ask Talisay City Prosecutor Mary Ann Castro. That’s the amount that she says she will claim as damages in each of the five libel cases that she intends to file against Nanan Yu and his lawyer. And all because Yu, in his counter-affidavit, called her names such as “insidious and machinating opponent,” a “congenital liar” and a “termagant fish vendor.”
Castro complained that in using “abrasive and offensive language,” Yu and his lawyer violated the law. There seems to be no doubt that Yu did use strong language but whether that is sufficient to justify the award of P10 million in damages is for our courts to decide.
Calling somebody names can be a very dangerous exercise. One of the first cases I handled was in behalf of a client who stabbed his drinking buddy for calling him “putot” (pygmy). He pleaded guilty and was treated leniently by the court, which said that he acted in “passion and obfuscation.” I would have been happier if he had been declared to have acted in defense of honor, but the court would have none of that argument.
Even the Good Book has something to say against the use of harsh and intemperate language, describing it as a vice that must be avoided. In his letter to the Ephesians, Paul counseled against letting evil talk pass your lips. “Get rid of all bitterness, all passion and anger, harsh words, slander and malice of every kind,” he said. In place of this, be kind to one another, he added, be “compassionate and mutually forgiving.”
Alas for Yu and his lawyer, compassion and forgiveness may be farthest from Mary Ann’s mind right now.
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