These both protect a person's interest in his reputation . A state's freedom to define these torts as it wishes is sharply curtailed by the First Amendment . It must simply be the case that, if the statement had been believed , it would have injured P's reputation. Where this is the case, the statement is defamatory if any one of the interpretations which a reasonable person might make would tend to injure P's reputation, and P shows that at least one of the recipients did in fact make that interpretation.
Some statements become defamatory when certain extrinsic facts are known.
But P does not necessarily have to show that D intended to refer to him, rather than to someone else. If D's statement concerns a group , and P is a member of that group, P can recover only if the group is a relatively small one . A statement is not defamatory if it is true . At common law, it is always the defendant who has had the burden of proving truth. But if a statement of opinion implies undisclosed facts , and a statement of those facts would be defamatory, then the statement will be itself treated as defamatory.