I may disagree with your characterization of that meat, sir, but I will defend to the death your right to so mischaracterize it:
PHILADELPHIA - In a case that involves issues as lofty as the First Amendment and as basic as which cut of meat was served, a restaurant critic is being sued for libel for describing a $15 piece of beef as "miserably tough and fatty."
The restaurant is seeking unspecified damages. But the stakes for Philadelphia Inquirer critic Craig LaBan have been raised immeasurably by a judge's ruling that forced LaBan to give a deposition on camera.
If the footage becomes public, LaBan could be unmasked for all the city's chefs to see.
Restaurant reviews, like other forms of criticism, are considered opinion and mostly immune from libel laws. The restaurant gets around this by alleging that there is a misstatement of fact in the review. Was it a strip steak, as the reviewer wrote, or a "steak sandwich without the bun," as the restaurant initially said, or a ribeye, as it now claims? One lesser-known aspect of libel law is that you can't sneak a disputable fact in the middle of an opinion and be protected. I'm not covered if I write, incorrectly, that, "in my opinion, you've been beating small puppies and lying about it." More editorial writers should know that, and it wouldn't hurt bloggers to think about it, either.
The other interesting part of the story is the potential unmasking of the reviewer, which raises the,um, steaks for him. It doen't matter if people know what book, music and movie reviewers look like. The product is what it is and can't be changed. But a restaurant is likely to improve both its meal and its service if the employees know it's a reviewer at the table instead of an ordinary customer. Some reviewers try to stay anonymous, and some don't. I suspect the ones who do are trying for peace of mind as much as an honest review. I've seldom seen angrier letters than the ones from restaurant owners who feel trashed by a review.
I get their anger. Restaurant reviews are fine, as long as you take them for what they are, fun reads of one person's subjective taste expectations, usually based on just a couple of dining trips. A lot of people will stay away because of one bad review and might miss a dining experience they would like. I tend to be more forgiving of places I already go to -- I'll shrug off a bad experience and give them another chance. If it's someplace I've never been, I'm more likely to write it off. The reviwer has the power to get people to write a place off when they've never even been there.
