The Savita Halappanavar affair I discussed last night is so grim and awful and infuriating because it was always so predictable after 1992 that Ireland's head-up-ass abortion attitudes were going to get some woman killed.
Follow that last link. Read up a bit on the X case. Then let me focus on this -- from Wikipedia, just basic information.
In late 1983 the eighth amendment had passed, to ensure that abortion would not be introduced by the judiciary, in a similar manner to the US case of Roe v. Wade. The X case resulted in three proposed amendments to the Irish constitution on the issue of abortion, which were submitted to three referenda all held on 25 November, 1992. These were the
- Twelfth Amendment – on the so-called substantive issue. This proposed that the prohibition on abortions would apply even in cases where the pregnant woman was suicidal.
- Thirteenth Amendment – specified that the prohibition on abortion would not limit the freedom of pregnant women to travel out of the state
- Fourteenth Amendment – specified that the prohibition of abortion would not limit the right to distribute information about abortion services in foreign countries.
The thirteenth and fourteenth amendments were ratified but the twelfth was rejected.
All hail the moral seriousness of the Irish Republic.
Is abortion murder, or isn't it?
If it is murder, then why have the Irish laws allowing Irish citizens to travel abroad for the purpose of hiring hit men to shoot their Irish enemies never been subject to any constitutional referendum?
If it isn't, then what's the problem?
The answer to that would of course be women behaving perhaps autonomously. Have I ever told you about the fascinating episode of John Charles McQuaid and the tampons?
McQuaid, by now archbishop of Dublin, was still concerned about the movements of Irish women. In April 1944 he wrote to Dr Conn Ward, parliamentary secretary to the Minister for Local Government and Public Health, and informed him that at the ‘Low Week meetings of the Bishops, I explained very fully the evidence concerning the use of internal sanitary tampons, in particular, that called Tampax. On the medical evidence made available, the bishops very strongly disapproved of the use of these appliances, more particularly in the case of unmarried persons.’
Conservative Irish Catholicism has many interesting features, none of which include "a learning curve."
And then we have this abomination, a vile eruption from Paddy Wingnut.
I can't hack it right now in detail. Too disgusted. But I will observe that they are so distressed about the poor unfortunate death of "Savita Halappanaver" that they couldn't be bothered to fucking spell her name right.