Thousands flying home for Irish abortion vote
THOUSANDS of Irish voters are travelling home from as far away as Latin America and Asia to cast their votes in today’s abortion referendum.
Voters took to Twitter to have their say on the eighth amendment to the Irish constitution – a clause that in effect outlaws abortion by giving equal rights to the unborn.
Weeks of campaigning ahead of the abortion referendum have polarised opinion across the country.
If people vote yes, the government intends to allow terminations within the first 12 weeks, subject to medical advice and a cooling- off period. It would only be allowed between 12 and 24 weeks subject to restrictions. All would be prohibited after 24 weeks.
This week the #hometovote hashtag has seen a burst of activity as men and women flag up their journeys.
Aisling Hayes journeyed from Singapore to make it back. She tweeted: “Starting the long journey home from Singapore to vote. Worth every penny to create a better, fairer and equal Ireland. #hometovote #repealthe8th”. Ciaran Gaffney, based in the Argentina capital Buenos Aires, spotted four of his countrymen on a plane home to vote. He tweeted: “Was actually so humbled and relieved to meet four other Irish people on the flight from Buenos Aires to London, all of them flying onwards to Dublin today or tomorrow to # voteyes.”
Aoife Bennett, 25, an editor with a travel magazine based in Dortmund, Germany, will journey back to Dublin to vote and return in less than 24 hours. She tweeted: “I’m flying home for not even 24 hours to vote. This is the most important referendum we may ever face. Of course I was coming home.”
Author Paraic O’Donnell decided to travel from his home in Wicklow to act as a free taxi service from Dublin airport to reduce costs for people who had made it back to vote. He said: “This is a historic moment for us. It’s an opportunity to correct a historic injustice and I don’t want to look back and wonder if there was more I could have done.”
However, musician Jim Corr has been a vocal No voice. The 53- year- old, who found fame in Irish folk- rock band the Corrs, claimed the vote was a means for the pharmaceutical industry to profit from abortion.
He criticised the proposals to allow abortions up to 12 weeks, branding them “too extreme”.
A group of 120 Irish GPs has said that asking doctors to carry out abortions without reason cannot be described as healthcare.
Those opposed to the repeal of the Eighth Amendment say that proposals to liberalise termination laws would amount to “abortion on demand”.
THE little pink line, when it appeared on the pregnancy test stick, was the start of one of the greatest adventures I’ve ever had. Three years on I am mother to a toddler who astounds me every day – most recently with a glass- shattering ability to hit high C with equal gusto whether she is enraged or delighted.
But it could have been different. My family has a history of a condition called anencephaly, which affects the development of the brain and spinal cord. It happens soon after conception and is almost always fatal. The brain can be exposed, tiny, or missing altogether. Sometimes living children are born and in very rare cases they live for a few years with no hope of overcoming their fatal flaw.
It can be genetic, and it can be linked to a lack of folic acid in the first days of pregnancy. Half of all pregnancies in the UK are unplanned so most mothers don’t even realise that the risk exists until it’s too late to avert it.
My pregnancy was planned and I knew the facts, so took folic acid long before I conceived. There remained a small chance this little pink line would have a problem so severe she’d never draw breath, and if she did those breaths would be few and painful.
SO IN the weeks waiting for my first scan I thought about what I would do if it showed her brain was deformed. And I realised that as a mother my choice was clear.
My prime responsibility was to care for my child so if she suffered, I should stop it. If she died, I should make sure it was painless. So I would terminate the pregnancy before the child had a worse trauma.
Luckily the scan was perfect. Her heart fluttered, her brain looked reassuringly big and I stopped worrying. It was good to know there was a safe, socially acceptable and caring alternative.
Yet British women have had that only since 1967 and the women of the Republic of Ireland have never had it at all. Abortion in that country was outlawed in 1861 and in 1983, after a religious panic about relaxation of abortion laws worldwide, the constitution was amended to ensure a child’s right to life was protected unless that of the mother was in danger ( despite the fact that every mother’s life is at some risk, even in the healthiest of pregnancies and births).
The amendment was passed following a referendum and 35 years on there will be another – today – on repealing it. The result will show whether Irish society has reversed its attitude in a single generation and if humans can learn to be humane.
The argument for those who want to keep it is based on emotion, horror stories and dogma. They quote scripture, talk of murder by sinful women and say if you knew what an abortion involved, you’d never go ahead with it. Well, if people knew what a colonoscopy looked like we’d never do that either but it’s still a good idea to offer them.
The arguments for repeal use logic which isn’t as gripping but is a lot more convincing. No one can force a woman to carry a child she does not want. A victim of sexual abuse should not have to bear the fruit of it. The poorest, who cannot afford to leave the country, will suffer the worst. And the ease with which you can order abortion pills online makes the amendment redundant.
But the most convincing point is that abortion, despite being banned, still happens. Doctors who consider it unjust help when they can, women take illicit drugs with no idea of the ingredients or risks and others take matters into their own hands in age- old ways best not described here.
All of the women – and girls, remember – who have those illegal abortions have every reason to stay away from doctors if things go wrong, because in Ireland abortions carry a 14- year prison sentence. The harm they can then suffer, be it physical or mental, is crippling in every sense.
And if caught, it means that a rape victim could be in jail longer than her rapist. Quote scripture if you like, but tell me what Jesus would think of that. None of those who wrote the Bible knew about online purchases or, as one woman told a TV debate this week, “walking around Birmingham for six hours with a hot water bottle against me, alone, in a country and city that I didn’t know”.
And none of those who wrote the Bible was a woman. They didn’t know how, from the moment you know you’re a mum, that fluttering life is foremost in all your calculations. Of course life begins at conception – and it is 100 per cent the mother’s responsibility, day and night, until it is born. After that it’s just 99 per cent, and I’m assured it decreases only slightly even when they leave home.
AMUM who has hope that a disabled child can live and laugh will move heaven and earth to make it reality; a mum who has no hope will do the same to ensure their child never knows how bad reality is.
To keep the amendment means keeping the harshest laws of Mother Nature. It means severe disability beyond the ken of medical help and the tearing grief of watching your child suffer and die.
But to repeal it is to offer that thing which Mother Nature doesn’t give often enough: hope. Hope is a little pink line. Worth fighting for, worth protecting, and worth giving to every woman and girl who has none.
‘ Can humans learn to be humane?’