This is a general reminder about an important point in our guidelines.  All
of us are aware of the need to obtain permission from clients when posting
about them.  Few of us are as careful when posting about third parties in
general.  Remember that whatever you post should be something that would not
discomfit you (or put you in a vulnerable position re: a lawsuit for libel)
if the same text, with your name under it, were to appear on the front page
of the NY Times.  You should be prepared for the person you have written
about, to read what you have written.  For all you know, they subscribe to
Lactnet too.  In the case of colleagues, you should actually be hoping they
do!

This means that when posting about challenging colleagues or difficult work
situations, you need to have your facts absolutely straight.  It means that
when posting about possible malpractice by a colleague, financial conflicts
of interest, or connections between companies doing less than nice business
and people doing research on breastfeeding, you must be able to document
your claims as thoroughly as though you were going to court about them -
because before you know it, you might be doing just that.

It is laudable to post about the efforts by ABM sales reps to insinuate
themselves into your workplace, as long as you provide factual information
about their activities.  If you are between a rock and a hard place at work,
sometimes blowing the whistle publicly in a forum such as this, is actually
protective.  But it is less laudable to bring a specific and detailed gripe
about a "multi-resistant" co-worker into the Lactnet archives, before you
have confronted that person using the channels available to you in your
workplace.  Sometimes it helps just to write the post, and then think
through what it is you want to achieve.  Do you want to improve your
relationship with the person at work?  Do you want them to be open to your
ideas?  Or do you just need to vent, in which case you may want to couch the
post in more guarded terms?

Finally, of course it is not acceptable to smear anyone on Lactnet.  My
trusty old Funk & Wagnalls from 1947 defines the verb smear thusly: "To
cover or bedaub with any thick or viscous substance: often implying that the
substance or the manner of applying it is offensive or soiling; hence, to
pollute; contaminate morally; to attack or represent unfairly as base or
undesirable."  A smear is by nature an unfair attack.  That is different
from pointing out the truth.  Inference and implication are not evidence, at
least not in court.  Please keep all this in mind when posting to the list.

For the listmothers
Rachel Myr
Kristiansand, Norway

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