[115]The depreciated value given in argument to invalidation on the grounds of privacy, treating it as a poor relation of equality, was a result of adopting an impoverished version of the concept of privacy itself. In my view, the underlying assumptions about privacy were doubly flawed, being far too narrow in their understanding, on the one hand, and far too wide in their implications, on the other. I will deal first with the undue narrowness of understanding.
[116]There is no good reason why the concept of privacy should, as was suggested, be restricted simply to sealing off from state control what happens in the bedroom, with the doleful sub-text that you may behave as bizarrely or shamefully as you like, on the understanding that you do so in private.[1] It has become a judicial cliché to say that privacy protects people, not places.[2] Blackmun J in Bowers, Attorney General of Georgia v. Hardwick et al[3] made it clear that the much-quoted “right to be left alone” should be seen not simply as a negative right to occupy a private space free from government intrusion, but as a right to get on with your life, express your personality and
- ↑ The judgment of Ackermann J above at paras 29–32 helpfully explains the context in which Cameron came to make the distinction between equality and privacy. It also contains trenchant observations on the importance of protecting private intimacy with which I fully associate myself.
- ↑ The phrase was first coined by Stewart J in Katz v United States 389 US 347, 351 (1967). See Mistry v Interim National Medical and Dental Council of South Africa and Others 1998 (7) BCLR 880 (CC) at para 21. See also n 18 below.
- ↑ 478 U.S. 186 (1985).
