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The following abstract was prepared by the Federal Constitutional Court and submitted for publication to the CODICES database maintained by the Venice Commission. Abstracts published by the Venice Commission summarise the facts of the case and key legal considerations of the decision. For further information, please consult the CODICES database. | |
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Please cite the abstract as follows: | |
Abstract of the Federal Constitutional Court’s Order of 11 December 2013, 1 BvR 194/13 [CODICES] | |
Third Chamber of the First Senate Order of 11 December 2013 1 BvR 194/13 | |
Headnotes (non-official):
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Summary:I. II. The Federal Constitutional Court decided that the contested decision violated the applicant’s general right of personality under Article 2.1 in conjunction with Article 1.1 of the Basic Law. It thus reversed and remitted the decision. The decision is based on the following considerations: Calling the applicant a “whacko woman” violates her general right of personality. Pursuant to Article 2.1 of the Basic Law, the general right of personality is limited by the constitutional order, including the rights of others, which include the freedom of expression under the first sentence of Article 5.1 of the Basic Law. The courts are called to understand the different interests affected and the extent to which they are impaired. They must give effect to the opposing positions and balance them in a way that does justice to the specific aspects of the individual case at hand. The Higher Regional Court does not accord sufficient weight to the applicant’s general right of personality. It overlooks the right to personal honour, which is expressly mentioned as a limit in Article 5.2 of the Basic Law. By requesting from the defendant to refrain from calling her a “whacko woman”, the applicant opposes this statement as a summary of the previous paragraph. In that paragraph, the defendant moves the public debate about the applicant to purely speculative claims about the core of her personality as a private person. It bases this speculation on assessments that relate to the innermost private sphere, without having any factual core. It is true that they are linked to the applicant’s behaviour, who posed for a society magazine and thus has to accept public discourse about this. The defendant may thus comment on the applicant’s behaviour even in an exaggerated or polemic way. However, the defendant’s conclusions, which are summarised in calling the applicant a “whacko woman”, are not based in any way in the applicant’s conduct. Rather, the defendant seeks to deliberately discredit the applicant not only as a public figure and because of her behaviour, but denies her in a provocative and intentionally hurting way any claim to respect as a private person. Considering this behaviour, the freedom of expression cannot prevail. It should also be noted that in the case at hand, the text was deliberately written and meant to hurt, and not a spontaneous utterance in connection with an emotional discussion. |