ESL Podcast 604 – Harming a Professional Reputation

Alex: Good morning. What’s with the gloom and doom?

Paige: Have you seen this morning’s newspaper?

Alex: No, I haven’t.

Paige: You’d better read this. It’s an article about our company.

Alex: Let me see that. This is outrageous! How can anybody print such lies? We’re not on the verge of going under. How did they get a hold of so much misleading and outright wrong information?

Paige: What I’m irate about is what it says about you, as the owner. The article is full of innuendos about your background. It’s nothing short of character assassination. We’ll sue the paper for defamation of character.

Alex: I’m not worried about my personal reputation. I’m more concerned about the company’s image. I’m going down to that paper and making them print a retraction.

Paige: How’re you going to do that?

Alex: After I call the reporter a no-good mudslinger, I’ll give him the facts, the ones he neglected to include in this story.

Paige: Be careful what you say to him, especially in front of his coworkers. You don’t want him suing you for slander!


Script by Dr. Lucy Tse
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gloom and doom 悲觀失望；前景暗淡；無望
gloom /glum/ 1.憂鬱；愁悶；無望 2.幽暗；黑暗；昏暗
doom 死亡；毀滅；厄運；劫數
outrageous 1. very shocking and unacceptable 2. very unusual and slightly shocking
on the verge of going under 瀕臨倒閉的
verge 瀕於；接近於；行將
outright 公開地；直率地；毫無保留地
irate 1. very angry
innuendo 暗指；影射
nothing short of 簡直可以說是
character assassination 毀謗名譽
defamation 誣蔑；誹謗；中傷
image 形象；印象；聲譽
retraction 撤銷；收回
mudslinger 揭發隱私者
neglected 被忽略的；被忽視的；未被重視的
sue 控告,對...提起訴訟
slander 口頭誹謗；口頭誹謗罪