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It wasn't frivolous, in the sense that I understand why the judge agreed to let a jury hear the case, but it was always going to be a high bar to clear. As you say:
True, but these claims were made in the context of, as you put it, a goofy music video. The real question was whether a normal person listening to the lyrics would treat them as statements of fact. Officer Lisa may have to deal with ridicule about her supposed love for cunnilingus, but I doubt anyone making those jokes seriously believes that she licked every pussy in town. It's the Falwell case all over again. It didn't help when the defense called family members of the officers to the stand and asked them if they took similar claims made in other rap songs seriously.
I think you're mostly right there, but there is a reason that most forms of media that talk about real events will do that whole "Any similarity to actual persons living or dead is purely coincidental" disclaimer.
Had Afroman come to me before making his videos and described what he wanted to do, I would have advised him to hedge his risks. "Don't make a song about any particular cop/person, but you can make a song about corrupt cops in general" of "hire body doubles and make strong allusions to who you're talking about, but never stick their actual name or image in the song or video."
Shows what I know.
What he did is just a couple steps below this parody Grinch Song, calling them out with such precision and making it clear he's hoping people believe it. Or at least to make it a popular rumor.
Justified? I think so, he chose targets who had already done him harm, and was quite proportionate in response.
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But Larry Flint didn't film an actor who looks like Jerry Falwell having sex with his mother in an out-house in a candid looking video. He just wrote a fake Campari ad in his own known-to-be-transgressive porn magazine claiming it was from Falwell.
Does the fact that it's video matter? I think so. Afroman repeatedly flips between footage of the real officer and an actress that looks like her. He puts himself into the scene and apologizes to her, and then shows himself and the officer (the actress) having sex and also going down on other actresses. The sex videos are all done in amateur style, further implying they're candid footage. Though the video has farcical elements, he's also clearly trying to confuse the fact that it's parody[1]
NSFW: https://youtube.com/watch?v=7wWQxSV8CK8?si=zzuL3IqUoaJGOIys&t=700s
Are we sure everyone picks up the satire?
Me, I just don't have a lot of sympathy for this. I could see some people coming away believing this. Are they reasonable people? I don't know, reasonable person is doing a lot of work I guess. To me it seems like you have to be fairly media literate to navigate this all.
Keep in mind there are people who believe grainy amateur "homemade" sex videos are really amateur sex videos of the couple alone in an unscripted intimate moment and can't quite understand that there's a third person moving the camera around to film them. I would like to believe this population is tiny but I'm not so optimistic.
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