Infamy

Infamy is notoriety gained from actions considered dangerous, disrespectful, immoral, unethical, or otherwise perceived in a negative manner.

The Proto-Indo-European root of that word is *bhā- meaning to tell (as in blab or megaphone)[2] In Roman law, infamy was a form of censure on individuals pronounced by the censors on moral grounds, in which the censure was the result of certain actions they had committed which did not rise to the level of an actual crime, or for pursuing a lifestyle that was considered technically legal but nonetheless immoral.

According to the Catholic Encyclopedia of 1913, infamy in the canonical sense is defined as the privation or lessening of one's good name as the result of the bad rating he has, even among prudent men.

This kind of infamy is incurred chiefly by those guilty of duelling (whether as principals or seconds), rape (as likewise those who co-operate in it), attempt to marry during the lifetime of the actual consort, heresy, real simony, etc.

Infamy of fact is the result of a widespread opinion, by which the community attributes some unusually serious delinquency, such as adultery or the like, to a person.

'A statue of George Washington , in the Smithsonian . The bare chest was generally considered disrespectful of the great statesman, which earned it the epithet infamous