system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: Why are grocery store tabloid magazine allowed to slander celebrities on the cover nation wide without being sued?

It seems to me like it's the original "fake Facebook news" It shouldn't be allowed to just flat out lie on the cover of a magazine to millions of people everyday. I would hate to be the celebrity and see some random lie posted with my face on the cover.
gpt
For it to be libel or slander it must:

1) Be known by the author to be false.

2) Malicious intent to harm one's reputation or career.  

3) Actually cause some kind of harm to the celebrity, their reputation, career, emotional stability, etc.  

All of these are very difficult to prove in court.  With the first one, the magazine can virtually always claim that they simply heard the story from a source and published it.  They'll usually put stuff into the story like "a source claims..." or here's an example from today's *Enquirer*: 
> "**Insiders** told The National ENQUIRER that the actress — currently hiding out in LA’s exclusive Hidden Hills with her six kids — is furious at how she’s being painted as a wicked witch in the divorce!" 

This way, the claim ISN'T even that Angelina Jolie is angry about the divorce.  The claim is that *insiders told them she was*.  Those insiders can be anybody, so as long as *someone* told them Angelina was upset about the divorce, it's NOT the Enquirer lying, it's the insiders!

For the second point, it is also difficult to prove.  The motivation of these magazines are to sell copies and catch people's eye at the impulse rack, not to harm celebrity reputations.  

For the third point, it rarely happens.  Plenty of celebrities have stories in the tabloids.  No one cares.  Suing them or tweeting about it just draws MORE attention to the fake story, and if the celebrity is seen addressing some fake tabloid story.... well it makes it seem more real and less fake!  If it was so fake why would they give a shit?  Thus, the best thing for these celebrities is to just ignore tabloids altogether.  Done.