Blake Lively- Jason Baldoni and NYT - False Light claims

[Anonymous]

The poster has a point that the woman always seems to be on the losing end of these kinds of controversies.
Here though, BL filed first and my doing that is opening herself up to people picking sides. People are reacting to what she said/he said, and now public. It is human nature.
Second, did she learn anyting from the recent Heard case, which was a monstrosity. And note that Depp sued HER for defamation (after she published a generic op ed).
Where were BL and RR PR people in all this? This was dumb dumb dumb. Over some bad PR she perceived an no one else cared. So she thought it would be better to tee up WW3 and force people to look at all her text with JB, her past, etc, and take sides?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m not saying this is true, but it makes a lot of sense:

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8FogudV/


And if it is true, The NY Times was played.

You know what doesn't make a lot of sense? That lady's eyebrows. Or the concept of a person whose career is to "create content" on TikTok that amounts to mindless speculation based on... random Facebook posts she read?

But sure, yes, the NYT "got played." Let's go with that.

The NY Times definitely got played, that’s not really up for debate. But that’s the danger of basing an article on one sources who turns out to be not truthful. Oh well.

It's really up for debate. That's the purpose of this thread. Not just to rag on Lively lol. Lots of debate in this thread defending the NYT article as based on factual texts that they cited and printed. Even if they focused on the texts/comms that supported Lively, you can't say those aren't truthful. They're there in black and white, sorry ma'am.

Actually in the podcast, they acknowledge Justin’s claim that surrounding texts which were not included could give the published texts a different meaning.

Did they say why they didn’t include them?

And should they even be admitting to that?? That's basically Justin lawsuit. That they had all the text messages but purposefully excluded context to defame him. Let's say that's not enough for defamation. That admission is enough to wreck their reputations and that's simply will not go away.

From reading the context of the texts in Justin's claim, I am not sure any of the texts that were omitted significantly changed the meaning or gave a completely different context. A lot of the omitted texts were more about logistics. I didn't think they told a different story or created a false case compared to the full text chains. Whether any of it is sufficient is a different question.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Have Blake and Ryan yet fired the lawyers, MBAs, and PR airheads who war-gamed this scheme which is backfiring into their faces and destroying their careers?

Two ego maniac dummies talked into this by educated seasoned professionals.

I safely assume they wish this would all just go away at this point. What a massive unforced error. Oops!

This comment and the one before it are just gross — someone posting their 🤮

This sort of thing is what sounds like PR people posting to infect popular opinion, and that’s why I object to it. Also it’s stuff like this that got prior threads closed.

Someone who was posting stuff like this said why not, in light of the Bezos girlfriend threads. I don’t read those, but if I did I’d object to that too. Post your 🤮 🤮 🤮 somewhere else. It doesn’t belong here. Last time you insisted on it the thread closed, so if this thread is so important to you, DO BETTER.

DP

My opinion of BL is based on her interviews. I hadn’t given this much thought about any of this until the NYT article. Now I think she’s a jerk who lies. You can’t blame that on Baldoni.

One theme I have seen with her in a few of those interviews that is interesting in light of this lawsuit, is that several times she is asked a fairly innocuous question by an interviewer and she has the most twisted interpretation of the intent that was meant. Like, almost out of touch with reality reaction to the person sitting there as if she has no idea how people generally communicate. She brings the tone from like a 5 to a 100 and goes after the person FAST, but not in a particularly sharp way. But it's like it is her default to jump to being seriously offended.

(Meaning to say, I don't even know that she per se, but her version of the truth and interpretation of others' communication does seem to be frequently pretty warped...)

* that she lies

She sure does. She should have walked away from this mess after Baldoni filed. I am somewhat convinced by the argument that Reynolds won’t let her back away. They’re insane for this.

I think it's perfectly fair to argue that she should not have escalated the conflict at various points. Like I think depending on what it was really like on set (and no way for me to know), maybe she should have tried harder to just promote the movie normally with Baldoni or not unfollowed him on social media. Maybe she could have worked things out via lawyers after she found out about the PR campaign and gotten a quiet settlement on that instead of filing a lawsuit and going to the NYT. I think it's fair to second guess those choices, though hard to know what I would have done in that situation because I don't have all the facts and maybe never will.

But it's insane to argue that Lively should have "walked away" after Baldoni filed his complaint. Baldoni's complaint and the behavior of his lawyer has been go-for-broke. At that point, she has no choice but to fight back. I'm sure much the way Baldoni felt after the NYT's piece and Lively's complaint came out. One someone shoots across the bow like that, you're in it whether you want to be or not.

Her best chance to bow out was before he filed her complaint. Once it was clear that he was going to do so and had recorded pretty much everything, she should have done exactly that.

Only they know the truth. Nothing Baldoni has released so far is particularly damning for her case. He has no response at all to many of her allegations, like whether they pressured her to do nudity in the birthing scene or if he repeatedly told her he was communing with her dead father even after she asked him not to. Some of his defenses don't actually vindicate him.

He has not come out with anything that I would say is going to torpedo her legal case. The bigger risk is that he just attacks her in the press long enough that it destroys her reputation. But... that's what was already happening, right? That's what made her sue him in the first place.

So she really doesn't have anything to lose by continuing. She might win her case, and the only way for her to keep fighting back on him trying to trash her in the press is to have the lawsuit.

You do understand that communing with her dead father is not sexual harassment, right?

I also think, regarding some of the SH allegations that he hasn’t defended, it’s his word against hers. He’s only released texts/video, not he said/she said stuff.

I can almost guarantee he did bring up his porn addiction, as I think that’s something he talks about a lot as forming his current feminist personality (genuine or not)—but I’m more skeptical of how she framed the other claims (in the worst possible light versus what was perhaps intended, sorts like the “it so smells good” thing). But I think maybe there are witnesses for those who can be deposed.

But I think they did both cross boundaries, though, and for that he will probably pay. If he is a feminist, as he claims, hopefully he learns some lessons about promoting a professional workplace. It’s not group therapy; it’s a work place.

Many of the incidents Lively alleges include reference to other people being present. Her assistant was supposedly present in the car when he told her about having had sex with women without consent in the past. Her nanny and multiple makeup artists were supposedly present in the incident where Heath allegedly came into the makeup trailer while she was topless against her objections. Presumably these people would all be deposed. You an argue that the people in Lively's employ have reason to back up her version of events, but people like the makeup artists or other crew members were actually employed by Wayfarer.

I also think the other actors on the set will be deposed, in particular to describe how Baldoni and Wayfarer handled nudity and intimacy on the set, and to attest to Baldoni's demeanor. And based on the fact that not only has the rest of the cast backed Blake, but the actors guild has backed her, I think this could be damning. I think even Baldoni knows he crossed lines on the set -- in those texts with his PR people, he wanted to do an interview to talk about his neurodivergence as a way to explain some of the stuff he said to or about Lively on the set (they correctly dissuaded him from doing this). He basically wanted a way to explain or scapegoat some of his behavior. That means he knows some of his behavior was problematic. To me this is a red flag for his case, and I think one reason his attorney's approach has been to go so hard and flood the zone now. It might also explain why they released that 2am voice memo, which I don't think made him look good. I think if it gets to the point where we are actually delving into what happened on the set and what the experience was like, not just for Lively, but for other cast and crew, he knows he's going to have to explain a lot of behavior that will sound quite bad when you have Brendan Sklenar and Jenny Slate and the makeup people and actor's assistants and craft services all agreeing that his behavior was a problem. If that's the case (and I think it's likely it is), this really undermines their argument that Lively is oversensitive or trumping up these concerns, and he'll need another argument (like that he's neurodivergent and can't be held responsible for the behavior).

There is no need for testimony when the incidents in dispute were filmed or otherwise recorded. I don’t know why people, perhaps you, that are allegations of sexual harassment that were not addressed by him. That’s untrue. He has explained that anything sexual in nature was discussed in the context of developing the intimacy scenes. Perhaps the intimaccoordinator may have some relevant testimony but others are unlikely to be present.


Furthermore, there is a difference between vague statements of supports and actual knowledge. When a woman brings allegations of sexual harassment, it is pretty much required that people credit them initially, particularly in more liberal parts of the country.

The vast majority of alleged incidents were not filmed. Most of what Lively references in the complaint took place in trailers or off camera, not during the filming of scenes. And we haven't even seen all the footage. We don't have footage that would show whether Lively asked for a cover during the birthing scene and then was ignored (and that might not exist because presumably she asked between takes). We don't have footage of the kissing scene where Lively alleges Baldoni added kissing and intimacy that wasn't in the choreography for the scene, nor do we have footage of the scene where Baldoni alleges Lively did the same thing? Was it the same thing? How bad was it either time? Does Lively audibly object when he does it? What's his reaction? We don't know. And plenty of this likely happened between takes too -- they don't just leave cameras rolling 100% of the time on movie sets.

And yes of course testimony will be needed. This is essentially a he said/she said. There may be some footage of the two on set when cameras were rolling and that could also be useful, but yes of course the testimony of the principals as well as any witnesses will be relevant. The other actors and crew members may have to testify, under oath, and will not be able to just offer vague statements of support but will need to testify to what they actually experienced or witnessed. There may also be additional evidence such as text messages or emails among the cast and crew discussing their experiences in real time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don’t know how anyone could read the article or listen to the podcast and say this is a pr story. Twohey couldn’t get a sentence out of her mouth on the podcast without adding the qualifier “ according to the complaint”

The Times has been in decline for a few decades. In recent years, they’ve been taken over by former Politico reporters who practice access journalism. The Twohey article is just another example of a Times reporter taking a famous source at her word without regard to truth.

no, that’s because there’s a defamation shield for citing to complaints filed in court. But yeah, also crap reporting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The poster has a point that the woman always seems to be on the losing end of these kinds of controversies.
Here though, BL filed first and my doing that is opening herself up to people picking sides. People are reacting to what she said/he said, and now public. It is human nature.
Second, did she learn anyting from the recent Heard case, which was a monstrosity. And note that Depp sued HER for defamation (after she published a generic op ed).
Where were BL and RR PR people in all this? This was dumb dumb dumb. Over some bad PR she perceived an no one else cared. So she thought it would be better to tee up WW3 and force people to look at all her text with JB, her past, etc, and take sides?

+1. she got everything she wanted and still wasn’t happy. she wanted more credit and to punish Baldoni. The theory that she was trying to get the rights from Hoover actually does not sound that far fetched.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m not saying this is true, but it makes a lot of sense:

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8FogudV/


And if it is true, The NY Times was played.

You know what doesn't make a lot of sense? That lady's eyebrows. Or the concept of a person whose career is to "create content" on TikTok that amounts to mindless speculation based on... random Facebook posts she read?

But sure, yes, the NYT "got played." Let's go with that.

The NY Times definitely got played, that’s not really up for debate. But that’s the danger of basing an article on one sources who turns out to be not truthful. Oh well.

It's really up for debate. That's the purpose of this thread. Not just to rag on Lively lol. Lots of debate in this thread defending the NYT article as based on factual texts that they cited and printed. Even if they focused on the texts/comms that supported Lively, you can't say those aren't truthful. They're there in black and white, sorry ma'am.

Actually in the podcast, they acknowledge Justin’s claim that surrounding texts which were not included could give the published texts a different meaning.

Did they say why they didn’t include them?

And should they even be admitting to that?? That's basically Justin lawsuit. That they had all the text messages but purposefully excluded context to defame him. Let's say that's not enough for defamation. That admission is enough to wreck their reputations and that's simply will not go away.

From reading the context of the texts in Justin's claim, I am not sure any of the texts that were omitted significantly changed the meaning or gave a completely different context. A lot of the omitted texts were more about logistics. I didn't think they told a different story or created a false case compared to the full text chains. Whether any of it is sufficient is a different question.

+1, their argument is that there were a couple places where the context casts doubt on whether the PR people actually did certain things (like whether they planted a story or were just happy when a story ran without them having to plant it). Yes that might be exonerating in specific instances and if there is more context the NYT should print it and explain how it changes the meaning.

But it's not like the context reveals that Baldoni did not in fact hire a PR team and crisis manager to go after Lively in the press in order to get ahead of any potential harassment allegations. The texts are full of actual proof that they did this work, including hiring Jed Wallace to astroturf/seed social media with anti-Lively sentiment and stories, which is the biggest and most damning allegation. The texts explicitly credit the work that "Jed and his team" are doing on this front and celebrate the success of their efforts with helping turn internet sentiment against Lively. There is no additional context that undermines that narrative. That's what happened.

There's no defamation here. These people really wrote these texts, they largely mean what they say. Here and there someone might be using irony or sarcasm that doesn't get picked up without context, but there are too many examples for that to be the case with every single one. Like you really think Baldoni and his team texted back and forth about destroying Lively in the press for months without actually doing anything? No. The story was accurate with perhaps a couple places where additional context would make a specific incident less damning.

Baldoni filed the defamation suit as a PR move to cast doubt on the whole narrative. But the narrative is like 99.9% true with a small amount of inaccuracy that does not actually change what they did. Baldoni hired them to smear Lively in the press and make him look better in comparison, and they did that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The poster has a point that the woman always seems to be on the losing end of these kinds of controversies.
Here though, BL filed first and my doing that is opening herself up to people picking sides. People are reacting to what she said/he said, and now public. It is human nature.
Second, did she learn anyting from the recent Heard case, which was a monstrosity. And note that Depp sued HER for defamation (after she published a generic op ed).
Where were BL and RR PR people in all this? This was dumb dumb dumb. Over some bad PR she perceived an no one else cared. So she thought it would be better to tee up WW3 and force people to look at all her text with JB, her past, etc, and take sides?

+1. she got everything she wanted and still wasn’t happy. she wanted more credit and to punish Baldoni. The theory that she was trying to get the rights from Hoover actually does not sound that far fetched.

Alternatively she was harassed throughout the filming of this movie and it only stopped when she asked Baldoni and Wayfarer to sign a document promising that she could have an intimacy coordinator with her at all times and to prevent her from every being alone with Baldoni or Heath again, and to also promise not to retaliate against her for raising these issues. And then they hired a crisis management team to ruin her reputation so that if she ever publicized these allegations, no one would believe her.

You'd rather believe an internet conspiracy theory that this whole thing is a long con to gain the rights to book that isn't even very good so she can make a moderately successful movie even though she's already rich AF and is developing a movie with Richard Gere and Lin-Manuel Miranda right now? Does that really make sense?

Maybe it's literally just what she says and she was harassed and then her harasser smeared her in the press and she sued because she didn't want to be taken advantage of like that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m not saying this is true, but it makes a lot of sense:

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8FogudV/


And if it is true, The NY Times was played.

You know what doesn't make a lot of sense? That lady's eyebrows. Or the concept of a person whose career is to "create content" on TikTok that amounts to mindless speculation based on... random Facebook posts she read?

But sure, yes, the NYT "got played." Let's go with that.

The NY Times definitely got played, that’s not really up for debate. But that’s the danger of basing an article on one sources who turns out to be not truthful. Oh well.

It's really up for debate. That's the purpose of this thread. Not just to rag on Lively lol. Lots of debate in this thread defending the NYT article as based on factual texts that they cited and printed. Even if they focused on the texts/comms that supported Lively, you can't say those aren't truthful. They're there in black and white, sorry ma'am.

Actually in the podcast, they acknowledge Justin’s claim that surrounding texts which were not included could give the published texts a different meaning.

Did they say why they didn’t include them?

And should they even be admitting to that?? That's basically Justin lawsuit. That they had all the text messages but purposefully excluded context to defame him. Let's say that's not enough for defamation. That admission is enough to wreck their reputations and that's simply will not go away.

From reading the context of the texts in Justin's claim, I am not sure any of the texts that were omitted significantly changed the meaning or gave a completely different context. A lot of the omitted texts were more about logistics. I didn't think they told a different story or created a false case compared to the full text chains. Whether any of it is sufficient is a different question.

+1, their argument is that there were a couple places where the context casts doubt on whether the PR people actually did certain things (like whether they planted a story or were just happy when a story ran without them having to plant it). Yes that might be exonerating in specific instances and if there is more context the NYT should print it and explain how it changes the meaning.

But it's not like the context reveals that Baldoni did not in fact hire a PR team and crisis manager to go after Lively in the press in order to get ahead of any potential harassment allegations. The texts are full of actual proof that they did this work, including hiring Jed Wallace to astroturf/seed social media with anti-Lively sentiment and stories, which is the biggest and most damning allegation. The texts explicitly credit the work that "Jed and his team" are doing on this front and celebrate the success of their efforts with helping turn internet sentiment against Lively. There is no additional context that undermines that narrative. That's what happened.

There's no defamation here. These people really wrote these texts, they largely mean what they say. Here and there someone might be using irony or sarcasm that doesn't get picked up without context, but there are too many examples for that to be the case with every single one. Like you really think Baldoni and his team texted back and forth about destroying Lively in the press for months without actually doing anything? No. The story was accurate with perhaps a couple places where additional context would make a specific incident less damning.

Baldoni filed the defamation suit as a PR move to cast doubt on the whole narrative. But the narrative is like 99.9% true with a small amount of inaccuracy that does not actually change what they did. Baldoni hired them to smear Lively in the press and make him look better in comparison, and they did that.

Assuming for the moment this is true, it is absolutely criminal to present it out of context. And the context is that he hired the crisis firm because Blake and Ryan were in the midst of a campaign to destroy his career.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The poster has a point that the woman always seems to be on the losing end of these kinds of controversies.
Here though, BL filed first and my doing that is opening herself up to people picking sides. People are reacting to what she said/he said, and now public. It is human nature.
Second, did she learn anyting from the recent Heard case, which was a monstrosity. And note that Depp sued HER for defamation (after she published a generic op ed).
Where were BL and RR PR people in all this? This was dumb dumb dumb. Over some bad PR she perceived an no one else cared. So she thought it would be better to tee up WW3 and force people to look at all her text with JB, her past, etc, and take sides?

+1. she got everything she wanted and still wasn’t happy. she wanted more credit and to punish Baldoni. The theory that she was trying to get the rights from Hoover actually does not sound that far fetched.

Alternatively she was harassed throughout the filming of this movie and it only stopped when she asked Baldoni and Wayfarer to sign a document promising that she could have an intimacy coordinator with her at all times and to prevent her from every being alone with Baldoni or Heath again, and to also promise not to retaliate against her for raising these issues. And then they hired a crisis management team to ruin her reputation so that if she ever publicized these allegations, no one would believe her.

You'd rather believe an internet conspiracy theory that this whole thing is a long con to gain the rights to book that isn't even very good so she can make a moderately successful movie even though she's already rich AF and is developing a movie with Richard Gere and Lin-Manuel Miranda right now? Does that really make sense?

Maybe it's literally just what she says and she was harassed and then her harasser

It isn’t an internet conspiracy theory, Ryan has tried to buy the rights to the second book from Justin.
smeared her in the press and she sued because she didn't want to be taken advantage of like that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The poster has a point that the woman always seems to be on the losing end of these kinds of controversies.
Here though, BL filed first and my doing that is opening herself up to people picking sides. People are reacting to what she said/he said, and now public. It is human nature.
Second, did she learn anyting from the recent Heard case, which was a monstrosity. And note that Depp sued HER for defamation (after she published a generic op ed).
Where were BL and RR PR people in all this? This was dumb dumb dumb. Over some bad PR she perceived an no one else cared. So she thought it would be better to tee up WW3 and force people to look at all her text with JB, her past, etc, and take sides?

+1. she got everything she wanted and still wasn’t happy. she wanted more credit and to punish Baldoni. The theory that she was trying to get the rights from Hoover actually does not sound that far fetched.

Alternatively she was harassed throughout the filming of this movie and it only stopped when she asked Baldoni and Wayfarer to sign a document promising that she could have an intimacy coordinator with her at all times and to prevent her from every being alone with Baldoni or Heath again, and to also promise not to retaliate against her for raising these issues. And then they hired a crisis management team to ruin her reputation so that if she ever publicized these allegations, no one would believe her.

You'd rather believe an internet conspiracy theory that this whole thing is a long con to gain the rights to book that isn't even very good so she can make a moderately successful movie even though she's already rich AF and is developing a movie with Richard Gere and Lin-Manuel Miranda right now? Does that really make sense?

Maybe it's literally just what she says and she was harassed and then her harasser smeared her in the press and she sued because she didn't want to be taken advantage of like that.

I think Baldoni has make a very strong showing that her claims of “harassment” were all in her head. And her conduct that triggered Baldoni’s PR campaign was *not* her (spurious) complaint earlier but her conduct in publicly humiliating him during the film marketing and premiere.

And remember, one main incident in the story is her outsized reaction to having her edits on the script rejected. her whole demented “Khaleesi” rant was triggered because she desperately wanted to be in the creative/producer role. So yes, I do think it is entirely possible she was motivated at least in part by getting the movie rights.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m not saying this is true, but it makes a lot of sense:

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8FogudV/


And if it is true, The NY Times was played.

You know what doesn't make a lot of sense? That lady's eyebrows. Or the concept of a person whose career is to "create content" on TikTok that amounts to mindless speculation based on... random Facebook posts she read?

But sure, yes, the NYT "got played." Let's go with that.

The NY Times definitely got played, that’s not really up for debate. But that’s the danger of basing an article on one sources who turns out to be not truthful. Oh well.

It's really up for debate. That's the purpose of this thread. Not just to rag on Lively lol. Lots of debate in this thread defending the NYT article as based on factual texts that they cited and printed. Even if they focused on the texts/comms that supported Lively, you can't say those aren't truthful. They're there in black and white, sorry ma'am.

Actually in the podcast, they acknowledge Justin’s claim that surrounding texts which were not included could give the published texts a different meaning.

Did they say why they didn’t include them?

And should they even be admitting to that?? That's basically Justin lawsuit. That they had all the text messages but purposefully excluded context to defame him. Let's say that's not enough for defamation. That admission is enough to wreck their reputations and that's simply will not go away.

From reading the context of the texts in Justin's claim, I am not sure any of the texts that were omitted significantly changed the meaning or gave a completely different context. A lot of the omitted texts were more about logistics. I didn't think they told a different story or created a false case compared to the full text chains. Whether any of it is sufficient is a different question.

+1, their argument is that there were a couple places where the context casts doubt on whether the PR people actually did certain things (like whether they planted a story or were just happy when a story ran without them having to plant it). Yes that might be exonerating in specific instances and if there is more context the NYT should print it and explain how it changes the meaning.

But it's not like the context reveals that Baldoni did not in fact hire a PR team and crisis manager to go after Lively in the press in order to get ahead of any potential harassment allegations. The texts are full of actual proof that they did this work, including hiring Jed Wallace to astroturf/seed social media with anti-Lively sentiment and stories, which is the biggest and most damning allegation. The texts explicitly credit the work that "Jed and his team" are doing on this front and celebrate the success of their efforts with helping turn internet sentiment against Lively. There is no additional context that undermines that narrative. That's what happened.

There's no defamation here. These people really wrote these texts, they largely mean what they say. Here and there someone might be using irony or sarcasm that doesn't get picked up without context, but there are too many examples for that to be the case with every single one. Like you really think Baldoni and his team texted back and forth about destroying Lively in the press for months without actually doing anything? No. The story was accurate with perhaps a couple places where additional context would make a specific incident less damning.

Baldoni filed the defamation suit as a PR move to cast doubt on the whole narrative. But the narrative is like 99.9% true with a small amount of inaccuracy that does not actually change what they did. Baldoni hired them to smear Lively in the press and make him look better in comparison, and they did that.

Assuming for the moment this is true, it is absolutely criminal to present it out of context. And the context is that he hired the crisis firm because Blake and Ryan were in the midst of a campaign to destroy his career.

That isn't context, that's opinion and speculation.

And the article did provide the context of what was happening around the time he hired the PR firm, including that the public had become aware of a rift between Baldoni and Lively due to them not doing press together and Lively unfollowing him on social media. Those facts were reported. Your editorializing that it was "a campaign to destroy his career" was not because that's not a fact.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m not saying this is true, but it makes a lot of sense:

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8FogudV/


And if it is true, The NY Times was played.

You know what doesn't make a lot of sense? That lady's eyebrows. Or the concept of a person whose career is to "create content" on TikTok that amounts to mindless speculation based on... random Facebook posts she read?

But sure, yes, the NYT "got played." Let's go with that.

The NY Times definitely got played, that’s not really up for debate. But that’s the danger of basing an article on one sources who turns out to be not truthful. Oh well.

It's really up for debate. That's the purpose of this thread. Not just to rag on Lively lol. Lots of debate in this thread defending the NYT article as based on factual texts that they cited and printed. Even if they focused on the texts/comms that supported Lively, you can't say those aren't truthful. They're there in black and white, sorry ma'am.

Actually in the podcast, they acknowledge Justin’s claim that surrounding texts which were not included could give the published texts a different meaning.

Did they say why they didn’t include them?

And should they even be admitting to that?? That's basically Justin lawsuit. That they had all the text messages but purposefully excluded context to defame him. Let's say that's not enough for defamation. That admission is enough to wreck their reputations and that's simply will not go away.

From reading the context of the texts in Justin's claim, I am not sure any of the texts that were omitted significantly changed the meaning or gave a completely different context. A lot of the omitted texts were more about logistics. I didn't think they told a different story or created a false case compared to the full text chains. Whether any of it is sufficient is a different question.

+1, their argument is that there were a couple places where the context casts doubt on whether the PR people actually did certain things (like whether they planted a story or were just happy when a story ran without them having to plant it). Yes that might be exonerating in specific instances and if there is more context the NYT should print it and explain how it changes the meaning.

But it's not like the context reveals that Baldoni did not in fact hire a PR team and crisis manager to go after Lively in the press in order to get ahead of any potential harassment allegations. The texts are full of actual proof that they did this work, including hiring Jed Wallace to astroturf/seed social media with anti-Lively sentiment and stories, which is the biggest and most damning allegation. The texts explicitly credit the work that "Jed and his team" are doing on this front and celebrate the success of their efforts with helping turn internet sentiment against Lively. There is no additional context that undermines that narrative. That's what happened.

There's no defamation here. These people really wrote these texts, they largely mean what they say. Here and there someone might be using irony or sarcasm that doesn't get picked up without context, but there are too many examples for that to be the case with every single one. Like you really think Baldoni and his team texted back and forth about destroying Lively in the press for months without actually doing anything? No. The story was accurate with perhaps a couple places where additional context would make a specific incident less damning.

Baldoni filed the defamation suit as a PR move to cast doubt on the whole narrative. But the narrative is like 99.9% true with a small amount of inaccuracy that does not actually change what they did. Baldoni hired them to smear Lively in the press and make him look better in comparison, and they did that.

Assuming for the moment this is true, it is absolutely criminal to present it out of context. And the context is that he hired the crisis firm because Blake and Ryan were in the midst of a campaign to destroy his career.

There is still a lot of evidence to be seen but I think it will be quite difficult to prove that she was never uncomfortable on set and that her only intention in creating her list of uncomfortable situations and desire for action was to destroy his career. Even in the released clip, it is clear she was uncomfortable and trying to get him to touch her less. To say there was no context of discomfort on her behalf and that it was all an orchaestrated campaign from the beginning to destroy him and get the rights will really be an uphill battle.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The poster has a point that the woman always seems to be on the losing end of these kinds of controversies.
Here though, BL filed first and my doing that is opening herself up to people picking sides. People are reacting to what she said/he said, and now public. It is human nature.
Second, did she learn anyting from the recent Heard case, which was a monstrosity. And note that Depp sued HER for defamation (after she published a generic op ed).
Where were BL and RR PR people in all this? This was dumb dumb dumb. Over some bad PR she perceived an no one else cared. So she thought it would be better to tee up WW3 and force people to look at all her text with JB, her past, etc, and take sides?

+1. she got everything she wanted and still wasn’t happy. she wanted more credit and to punish Baldoni. The theory that she was trying to get the rights from Hoover actually does not sound that far fetched.

Alternatively she was harassed throughout the filming of this movie and it only stopped when she asked Baldoni and Wayfarer to sign a document promising that she could have an intimacy coordinator with her at all times and to prevent her from every being alone with Baldoni or Heath again, and to also promise not to retaliate against her for raising these issues. And then they hired a crisis management team to ruin her reputation so that if she ever publicized these allegations, no one would believe her.

You'd rather believe an internet conspiracy theory that this whole thing is a long con to gain the rights to book that isn't even very good so she can make a moderately successful movie even though she's already rich AF and is developing a movie with Richard Gere and Lin-Manuel Miranda right now? Does that really make sense?

Maybe it's literally just what she says and she was harassed and then her harasser smeared her in the press and she sued because she didn't want to be taken advantage of like that.

I think Baldoni has make a very strong showing that her claims of “harassment” were all in her head. And her conduct that triggered Baldoni’s PR campaign was *not* her (spurious) complaint earlier but her conduct in publicly humiliating him during the film marketing and premiere.

And remember, one main incident in the story is her outsized reaction to having her edits on the script rejected. her whole demented “Khaleesi” rant was triggered because she desperately wanted to be in the creative/producer role. So yes, I do think it is entirely possible she was motivated at least in part by getting the movie rights.

Has he shown that though? At all? Here in the very early stages of these lawsuits when (to my knowledge) not a single witness has been deposed and the only things the public knows about what happened are their two competing narratives, some text messages, and a single piece of footage which can be used to back up both of their narratives but doesn't really prove either?

I don't know if he harassed her but neither do you. Why are you so eager to declare an outcome in a case that has barely begun and about which you know next to nothing? Why is this so important to you?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m not saying this is true, but it makes a lot of sense:

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8FogudV/


And if it is true, The NY Times was played.

You know what doesn't make a lot of sense? That lady's eyebrows. Or the concept of a person whose career is to "create content" on TikTok that amounts to mindless speculation based on... random Facebook posts she read?

But sure, yes, the NYT "got played." Let's go with that.

The NY Times definitely got played, that’s not really up for debate. But that’s the danger of basing an article on one sources who turns out to be not truthful. Oh well.

It's really up for debate. That's the purpose of this thread. Not just to rag on Lively lol. Lots of debate in this thread defending the NYT article as based on factual texts that they cited and printed. Even if they focused on the texts/comms that supported Lively, you can't say those aren't truthful. They're there in black and white, sorry ma'am.

Actually in the podcast, they acknowledge Justin’s claim that surrounding texts which were not included could give the published texts a different meaning.

Did they say why they didn’t include them?

And should they even be admitting to that?? That's basically Justin lawsuit. That they had all the text messages but purposefully excluded context to defame him. Let's say that's not enough for defamation. That admission is enough to wreck their reputations and that's simply will not go away.

From reading the context of the texts in Justin's claim, I am not sure any of the texts that were omitted significantly changed the meaning or gave a completely different context. A lot of the omitted texts were more about logistics. I didn't think they told a different story or created a false case compared to the full text chains. Whether any of it is sufficient is a different question.

+1, their argument is that there were a couple places where the context casts doubt on whether the PR people actually did certain things (like whether they planted a story or were just happy when a story ran without them having to plant it). Yes that might be exonerating in specific instances and if there is more context the NYT should print it and explain how it changes the meaning.

But it's not like the context reveals that Baldoni did not in fact hire a PR team and crisis manager to go after Lively in the press in order to get ahead of any potential harassment allegations. The texts are full of actual proof that they did this work, including hiring Jed Wallace to astroturf/seed social media with anti-Lively sentiment and stories, which is the biggest and most damning allegation. The texts explicitly credit the work that "Jed and his team" are doing on this front and celebrate the success of their efforts with helping turn internet sentiment against Lively. There is no additional context that undermines that narrative. That's what happened.

There's no defamation here. These people really wrote these texts, they largely mean what they say. Here and there someone might be using irony or sarcasm that doesn't get picked up without context, but there are too many examples for that to be the case with every single one. Like you really think Baldoni and his team texted back and forth about destroying Lively in the press for months without actually doing anything? No. The story was accurate with perhaps a couple places where additional context would make a specific incident less damning.

Baldoni filed the defamation suit as a PR move to cast doubt on the whole narrative. But the narrative is like 99.9% true with a small amount of inaccuracy that does not actually change what they did. Baldoni hired them to smear Lively in the press and make him look better in comparison, and they did that.

Assuming for the moment this is true, it is absolutely criminal to present it out of context. And the context is that he hired the crisis firm because Blake and Ryan were in the midst of a campaign to destroy his career.

There is still a lot of evidence to be seen but I think it will be quite difficult to prove that she was never uncomfortable on set and that her only intention in creating her list of uncomfortable situations and desire for action was to destroy his career. Even in the released clip, it is clear she was uncomfortable and trying to get him to touch her less. To say there was no context of discomfort on her behalf and that it was all an orchaestrated campaign from the beginning to destroy him and get the rights will really be an uphill battle.

+1, especially because it sounds like she made numerous complaints to Wayfarer about his behavior. Like that incident where Heath is alleged to have entered the makeup trailer while she was topless over her objections? According to her complaint, he was there to discuss the fact that she had complained to Wayfarer about Baldoni's behavior on set. On Day 2 of filming.

If they really want to argue that Lively was complaining about Baldoni's behavior on the second day of shooting due to a long con to destroy the career of the person whose movie she was currently making, they are going to need a lot more than what they have offered so far. Sure, some people on the internet who seem to have a bizarre need to believe the absolute worst about Blake Lively might believe it. But a judge? A jury? I am skeptical.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m not saying this is true, but it makes a lot of sense:

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8FogudV/


And if it is true, The NY Times was played.

You know what doesn't make a lot of sense? That lady's eyebrows. Or the concept of a person whose career is to "create content" on TikTok that amounts to mindless speculation based on... random Facebook posts she read?

But sure, yes, the NYT "got played." Let's go with that.

The NY Times definitely got played, that’s not really up for debate. But that’s the danger of basing an article on one sources who turns out to be not truthful. Oh well.

It's really up for debate. That's the purpose of this thread. Not just to rag on Lively lol. Lots of debate in this thread defending the NYT article as based on factual texts that they cited and printed. Even if they focused on the texts/comms that supported Lively, you can't say those aren't truthful. They're there in black and white, sorry ma'am.

Actually in the podcast, they acknowledge Justin’s claim that surrounding texts which were not included could give the published texts a different meaning.

Did they say why they didn’t include them?

And should they even be admitting to that?? That's basically Justin lawsuit. That they had all the text messages but purposefully excluded context to defame him. Let's say that's not enough for defamation. That admission is enough to wreck their reputations and that's simply will not go away.

From reading the context of the texts in Justin's claim, I am not sure any of the texts that were omitted significantly changed the meaning or gave a completely different context. A lot of the omitted texts were more about logistics. I didn't think they told a different story or created a false case compared to the full text chains. Whether any of it is sufficient is a different question.

+1, their argument is that there were a couple places where the context casts doubt on whether the PR people actually did certain things (like whether they planted a story or were just happy when a story ran without them having to plant it). Yes that might be exonerating in specific instances and if there is more context the NYT should print it and explain how it changes the meaning.

But it's not like the context reveals that Baldoni did not in fact hire a PR team and crisis manager to go after Lively in the press in order to get ahead of any potential harassment allegations. The texts are full of actual proof that they did this work, including hiring Jed Wallace to astroturf/seed social media with anti-Lively sentiment and stories, which is the biggest and most damning allegation. The texts explicitly credit the work that "Jed and his team" are doing on this front and celebrate the success of their efforts with helping turn internet sentiment against Lively. There is no additional context that undermines that narrative. That's what happened.

There's no defamation here. These people really wrote these texts, they largely mean what they say. Here and there someone might be using irony or sarcasm that doesn't get picked up without context, but there are too many examples for that to be the case with every single one. Like you really think Baldoni and his team texted back and forth about destroying Lively in the press for months without actually doing anything? No. The story was accurate with perhaps a couple places where additional context would make a specific incident less damning.

Baldoni filed the defamation suit as a PR move to cast doubt on the whole narrative. But the narrative is like 99.9% true with a small amount of inaccuracy that does not actually change what they did. Baldoni hired them to smear Lively in the press and make him look better in comparison, and they did that.

Assuming for the moment this is true, it is absolutely criminal to present it out of context. And the context is that he hired the crisis firm because Blake and Ryan were in the midst of a campaign to destroy his career.

There is still a lot of evidence to be seen but I think it will be quite difficult to prove that she was never uncomfortable on set and that her only intention in creating her list of uncomfortable situations and desire for action was to destroy his career. Even in the released clip, it is clear she was uncomfortable and trying to get him to touch her less. To say there was no context of discomfort on her behalf and that it was all an orchaestrated campaign from the beginning to destroy him and get the rights will really be an uphill battle.

“uncomfortable” is not sexual harassment. And what I saw in that clip and even Lively’s characterization of it was truly unprofessional behavior on her part. I can’t see any jury anywhere thinking that (checks notes) a fellow actor kissing you *during a romantic slow dancing scene* is assault.