The U.S. court system is built upon the Sixth Amendment, which entitles Americans to a fair and speedy trial with an impartial jury. And now, thanks to the increasing use of Urban Dictionary in our courts, Americans also enjoy the right to a trial in the slang of their choosing. How else could county court handle a dispute between two "ratchets?"
The Newspaper of Record breaks it down:
Two weeks earlier, a court in Tennessee noted that a phrase used by a manager at a supply chain logistics company — "to nut" — was defined by Urban Dictionary as "to ejaculate." After weighing that and other evidence, it rejected a motion to dismiss a sexual harassment claim by female employees.
It can take years for slang terms to be included in traditional dictionaries, whose editors want to be certain that the words have staying power. By contrast, some new words rush into Urban Dictionary in less than a day. As a result, the site has cropped up in dozens of court cases in recent years, according to a Lexis database of federal and state cases, although the outcome rarely rests solely on a definition.
Understandably, the legal use of a website that allows its users to crowdsouce the definitions of "twerking" and "Eskimo brother" can be polarizing.
Slang dictionary editor Tom Dalzell says the use of Urban Dictionary in court is a terrible idea because it’s not an actual authority. But isn’t that the whole point of crowd sourcing?
As the Times points out, traditional dictionaries take much too long to adapt to the word on the streets.
If a discussion over who has to jump on the "grenade" ends up in, say, an assault charge, the courts can take advantage of the scores of "Jersey Shore" fans on the Interwebs and understand that the juiceheads were fighting over who had to take one for the team.