PRESS RELEASE: SavageStupidity.com Hails Victory in ‘Savage’ Lawsuit
PRESS RELEASE: SavageStupidity.com Hails Victory in ‘Savage’ Lawsuit
Sub-Head: Talk Radio Networks voluntarily requests dismissal for lack of jurisdiction
For Immediate Release
Contact: Thomas Leavitt, co-founder SavageStupidity.com, 408-591-3342 or info@savagestupidity.com
December 17th, 2003
SANTA CRUZ, CA - Talk Radio Networks, Inc. has filed a request to have the lawsuit it filed against the founders of SavageStupidity.com, Thomas and Gunilla Leavitt, voluntarily dismissed for lack of jurisdiction. “They never had a case, and they knew it,” said Thomas. “This filing is an acknowledgement of that fact. This was never anything but an attempt to intimidate us into silence by hanging a $1,000,000 plus price on our heads. Thankfully, Paul Levy and Public Citizen was there to defend us, as they’ve been time and time again when free speech on the ‘net has been threatened. We also wish to thank David Layden and David Bradford of Jenner & Block for acting as our Chicago area counsel.” The filing also included a request todismiss the cases against the two other sites named in the lawsuit, michaelsavagesucks.com, and TakeBackTheMedia.com.
Michael Savage’s “The Savage Nation”, syndicated by TRN to over 300 radio stations nationwide, is the among most highly rated radio talk shows in the nation according to Talkers Magazine. This is not the first setback for Savage in 2003: earlier this year, the National Arbitration Forum ruled that the SavageStupidity.com domain name is “not confusingly similar”, both due to the inclusion of “stupidity” in the domain name and the generic nature of the terms “savage” and “stupidity” (a similar decision was reached in a parallel case against michaelsavagesucks.com); MSNBC cancelled his show after widespread protests erupted when he told a caller to “get AIDS and die”; and he was temporarily taken off the air in his home market (and several others) when contract negotations with KGO-AM went south and he was forced to switch stations. “Supporting hatred and bigotry is bad business,and SavageStupidity.com exists to provide the general public with the information necessary to communicate this fact to the advertisers and sponsors of ‘The Savage Nation’ and any other endeavor Michael Savage engages in. We intend to continue hitting him where it hurts, until he crawls back underneath the rock from which he came,” said Thomas.
Savage has, among other well documented comments, labeled the ACLU a “terrorist organization”, called GLBT pride marchers “the brownshirts of the modern era” and claimed that “the gay and lesbian mafia wants your children”, called teenage kindnap/rape victims “sluts”, and said women should be denied the vote because “their hormones rage… they are too emotional”. These are not isolated statements, but characteristic of his show on a daily basis: as recently as June 9th, 2003, SavageStupidity.com documented him stating that for every one hard working farmworker taking jobs Americans don’t want, there are “four or five” illegal immigrants “sitting in front of the television” on welfare, “popping out babies like tasty bread”. More details about Michael Savage’s controversial statements can be found on the following web sites: SavageStupidity.com, michaelsavagesucks.com, and the GLAAD web site (www.glaad.org).
ABOUT SAVAGESTUPIDITY.COM - http://www.savagestupidity.com/
Founded in May of 2002, SavageStupidity.com’s goal is to raise awareness about Michael Savage’s hateful diatribes and the attitudes they foster and support among his listener audience. To that end, it has generated over 1,000,000 page views, published a wide selection of “hate mail” from Savage supporters demonstrating Savage’s noxious influence, and been repeatedly cited as one of the primary sources for information on Michael “Savage” and “The Savage Nation”.
A copy of this release in HTML format is available at http://www.savagestupidity.com/pr-12-17-2003-lawsuit-victory.html
