No rebuttal for abortion critics
According to the Federal Supreme Court, the Swiss Foundation for Mother and Child Aid (SHMK) has no right to a counterstatement in the weekly newspaper Zeit. A journalist had claimed to be unintentionally pregnant and had sought advice from the SHMK.
Before the article was published at the end of August 2013, the Zeit journalist informed the President of the Foundation by email that a text about the SHMK's counseling services would be published. She listed eight points that she would address and gave the President the opportunity to comment. This was attached to the text practically verbatim.
The content of the published text is about the experienced counseling session in which the supposedly unwanted pregnant woman is warned against an abortion with drastic descriptions of the procedure and the consequences. It is described how the woman is advised to carry the child to term with references to financial assistance. The journalist compares the advice provided by the SHMK with neutral information and advice from state-recognized agencies, which are always conducted in an open-ended manner. One of the reasons given by the Federal Supreme Court for its decision is that the requested counterstatement contains incorrect information, which means that it can be rejected. For example, the foundation writes that it is "independent of any other organization". This could not rightly be claimed, as the foundation was established by theMamma association, whose president is identical to that of the foundation. The mission statements of the two organizations are almost identical and the SHMK website is linked to that of the association.
In addition, the foundation had already had the opportunity to comment on the professionalism of the consultations in the president's email. In her article, the journalist also criticized the fact that the SHMK consultation always referred to the child and not the embryo or foetus. According to the foundation, she was unable to comment on this. The average reader would understand the criticism of the choice of words as an expression of opinion by the author. According to the law, a counterstatement is not possible. (SDA)
