Hate mail about Chancellor Angela Merkel and refugees. – Does this still fall under freedom of expression?

You can probably still say that. " - Not always. The Munich Higher Regional Court has now decided that posts with inciting content can be removed from Facebook.

Attack on Facebook against Merkel and refugees

In the post in question, Angela Merkel was attacked and refugees were portrayed as criminal, murderous and raping. According to the Munich Higher Regional Court, it was inflammatory, so Facebook deleted the post.

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This decision overruled a previous ruling by the Munich I Regional Court, which Facebook had appealed against. “Procedural reasons” were now given for the OLG’s verdict, but the post not only contained hate messages, but through “individual statements it even constituted the objective offense of incitement to hatred.”

To what extent is freedom of expression covered on Facebook?

Another shared post from spring 2018 was also addressed in the appeal process. A quote from Viktor Orbán in which he called refugees “invaders”. In this case, the Higher Regional Court decided that it would not be permissible to delete this post and remove the profile because it was not a direct attack on people or groups of people. And so this post is covered by freedom of expression.
Furthermore, the Higher Regional Court decided that the plaintiff could now demand that the deleted post be reinstated in the exact place in his profile where it was originally posted.

Munich Regional Court pleads for freedom of expression

The Munich I Regional Court considered the posts mentioned to be covered by freedom of expression. That's why the first instance ruled that the posts were unlawfully deleted.

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Another case, which involved a post that refugees in Germany had “sharpened knives,” also falls under freedom of expression, according to the Munich Regional Court. Here the same court decided similarly: Facebook had to release a profile again despite these statements about refugees.

Source: zeit.de
Article image: Shutterstock / By Lukasz Stefanski


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