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With Abortion Vote, Ireland Commited Suicide with a Smile on Its Face
Ireland’s referendum on abortion on demand ended in the repeal of the eight amendment. As a result, Ireland will now have abortion on demand for 12 weeks, allow abortions from 3-6 months if mental health issues allow (vague) and allow terminations for any fatal fetal anomalies past that. In short, Ireland became the first country in human history to embrace abortion on demand by referendum, i.e., by people voting for it.
My heart is filled with sorrow. All day I have been numb. All day I have felt shock at the huge landslide victory, 67-33. Two-thirds of the population thought it acceptable for any reason under the mantra according to the exit polls of choice. That is it was a woman’s right to terminate her baby if she feels she wants to. That even took preference over hard cases. The hard cases I can understand. But to say a woman has right to kill her unborn is unnatural, that many Irish now think that’s okay is terrifying.
Sadly, that wasn’t the worst thing about the vote. The above picture was taken in Dublin Castle where the referendum result was read out. Although our Prime Minister had asked them to be respectful, that didn’t happen. He himself, of course, later showed up for a photo op along with his health minister smiling at the crowd as they sold their souls to the camera. I would hate to be his advocate on the day he dies.
Although he wasn’t the worst. No the crowds of young people in their 20s and 30s — my age — were. They cheered as the result became known. They shouted. They sang. Yes, they sang two old Irish songs with no irony. One was “Alive, Alive, Oh” from “Molly Malone” and the other was “The Fields of Athenry,” which is a song about emigrants and awful death in Ireland. They did all this with a smile on their face.
I have never felt so ashamed to be Irish in all my life. They are clueless. They are ignorant and, worse, proud. They will think now that abortion is a moral right from now until end times. Alas, they are deluding themselves.
Ireland will now see a rise in its abortion rate naturally, will see a rise in its female suicide rate, will see the beginning of the end for disabled children who are so common in Ireland. It will see the rise of women being pressured into killing their children on behalf of deadbeat fathers. It will lead to malpractice cases. It will lead to a collapse in our birth rate. It will shorten families and ensure the agonising deaths of many children whose only sin was the wrong mother. It will inevitably lead to huge social consequences that have happened everywhere else. It will murder Ireland’s soul.
This was done today to Ireland in part for many reasons, which I will write about soon. But it was done now by liberal, very anti-religious or lapsed Catholics — with a smile.
Published in General
From what I’ve heard a lot of the people that voted yes don’t actually live in Ireland. I don’t think this affected the result but perhaps Ireland is more divided on this issue than it first seems.
That Video was chilling. I don’t know Ireland anymore. I guess us in the US have to keep traditional Irish culture alive. But in the US we didn’t vote for abortion so we still maintain a kind of moral high ground. It is much easier to fight a law imposed on you from a higher authority, I believe, than oppose a law duly voted on by the majority of the country.
Doug, I got your differentiation; the hometown situation I referenced, that was perpetrated by people who equated certain visible external markers with internal holiness, makes my blood boil. Your nuanced description would be lost on most of these folks, I’m afraid.
This morning at a Congregational church in Yarmouth, I gave a very modified version of a sermon I posted here a few months back. No mention in it of abortion, just lots of descriptions—passionate and scientific—of fetal development. Jesus’, my grandchild’s, all human beings’.
Afterward, one congregant told me “before having an abortion, every woman should hear that sermon.” Most did not make that connection, nor did I necessarily expect them to, but I did choose my subject with Ireland in mind.
That this is regarded not as a sorrowful necessity because of the harshness and complexity of life, but rather as a good thing to be affirmed with jubilation..that is discouraging indeed. How brazenly, mindlessly pitiless we have become.
Don’t give up hope. The Church is more than Europe and America:
As one of the battle-hardened who’s been fighting the cause for life for over 40 years, I applaud you, @Paddy S, and all your comrades who fought the good fight. As painful as it is to know that 2/3 of your countrymen rejected the culture of life, it’s time to begin the hard work of rebuilding it. Know that we “veterans” in this fight are with you.
One of my favorite scenes from my favorite film, A Man for All Seasons, offers me great consolation in times like these. It’s the one in which More is returning to his home and his daughter Margaret informs him there’s an oath that he’s being required to sign. He lets her know he’ll sign it if his conscience will allow it:
“Listen, Meg. God made the angels to show Him splendour. He made animals for innocence and plants for their simplicity. But man He made to serve him wittily in the tangle of his mind. If He suffers us to come to such a case that there is no escaping… then we may stand to our tackle as best we can. And yes, Meg, then we can clamour like champions if we have the spittle for it. But it’s God’s part, not our own, to bring ourselves to such a pass. Our natural business lies in escaping. If I can take this oath, I will.”
Here’s to clamouring like champions!
You can’t make this up.
This is the dynamic: the GOP legal threats have driven abortion to Planned Parenthood. This jacks up their fixed overhead. They literally have abortion quotas for this reason. They literally need people to screw up when they are fornicating. They also have to come up with the money to pay K Street to protect them and get them government funds. It also drives women to vote Democrat.
I forget what the figure is, but Tina Smith, who replaced Al Franken in the Senate, sucked millions of dollars of wages out of Planned Parenthood before she became Chief of Staff for the Minnesota governor.
I’ve had two different GOP political guys explain to me, in separate conversations, it’s far better to just make the moral case. That is one way you’re going to get a more conservative country.
Also, look at photos of the Houston planned Parenthood. Check out the articles. Very educational.
Yes we do. The culture of life must always be ready to advance, everywhere.
That’s interesting. Do you have third party sources?
This is a film done by a researcher in the 50s, on “abortuses” (apparently that’s a technical word) obtained by hysterotomy.
We didn’t have to wait for ultrasound. They knew what an 8 week old fetus was. They’ve known for decades.
Every time I look into this, it gets more and more depressing.
There is…well, not hope. But a possibly interesting challenge, at least as explicated by Holly Scheer in The Federalist today, who argues that this was a referendum on first trimester abortion.
“It’s important to note this distinction from other countries’ abortion laws. Ireland plans to require all abortions past the point of viability, typically around 22 weeks of gestation, to be delivered instead of aborted, and for doctors to try to save these babies’ lives.“
It is possible, at least, that the pro-life forces might be able to hold Ireland to this principle—that a woman may have the right to evict even a viable baby from her body, but she does not have the right to the death of that baby.
By the way, a woman can have the “right” to evict a baby from her body, but she doesn’t have the right to someone else’s complicity in it. Are there large numbers of Irish doctors and nurses standing ready and willing to perform abortions? Will their consciences—nourished by remnant Catholicism, perhaps?—withstand the sight of little hands and legs and faces emerging in pieces?
If they are smart, they won’t drive it all into an effective for-profit abortion monolith that literally can’t survive without abortion quotas and the government.
It’s still better than Canada, which has no restrictions on abortion whatsoever.
There’s actually no explicit provision in the draft legislation for early delivery. “Termination of pregnancy” is defined solely as ending the “life of the fetus”. It also appears that a “mental health emergency” could lead to termination (by death or early delivery? I’m not sure) without time limits. The risk of life-long health problems for the child due to forced early delivery has not been part of the discussion.
Abortion will be available on physical or mental health grounds up to viability which here is considered to be 24 weeks. The mental health ground is the basis for about 97% of all abortions in the U.K.
An alarming development is that some politicians who declared themselves opposed to repeal are now saying that they won’t oppose the legislation. The whole point of the Referendum was supposed to be to take the issue out of the Constitution and put it in the legislature where it could be debated like any other issue but now legislators are abdicating their responsibility!
The vociferous celebration of the result has been unseemly but nothing compared to the bile and vitriol poured upon prominent No campaigners with calls to exclude them from the airwaves, etc. Many say that they are unelected and unrepresentative but the point is that in our homogenous media/political culture most politicians are cowed into silence for fear of the baying mob so citizens who make the arguments without fear of the personal consequences are heroic and are crucial to our democracy.
Better than what?
I agree about that, but I still think 3D sonogram footage of the termination itself could have a big impact.
Personally, I think that developmental dividing lines are inconsequential except as a tool for appealing to hearts and minds. You can get people to see what abortion are willing to support and if it repels them, that opens the door to make them think about why- and what difference the number of weeks really makes. As a practical matter, it’s not very important. Only a small portion of surgical abortions are after 12 weeks, and medical abortion is increasingly the method of choice.
I don’t think that is what happened here. Aside from the social stigma and potential for being protested, most doctors don’t want to perform abortions – even if they’re very pro-choice. Abortion is pushed out to PP or Marie Stopes primarily because only radicalized doctors want abortion to be something they do on a regular basis.
Sure, but like I said before, whie it’s slightly better, it really doesn’t make a big difference.
That is horrible. Are you living in Ireland like Paddy? I’ve been appalled by how many politicians reversed their positions, not least of which is the prime minister. (I can’t spell his real title.) Teens and occasionally twentysomethings change their minds on this, but apart from people who’ve had religious conversions ad women who get pregnant for the first time, I’ve never heard of middle-aged adults doing a 180 on abortion.
Absolutely!
You’ve now heard of one.
Moi.
Trump?
Mitt Romney claimed that he did.
I didn’t believe him, though.
Getting saved, accepting the Lord Jesus Christ into their life will do the trick.
Me neither.
Well, I did mention that as one of the exceptions to the rule. Also, for the other, it might be better to extend that to the husband/father as well – or if you have a loved one who has fertility issues and/or a miscarriage.
The only reason I hesitate to just dismiss the idea is that I don’t think Trump ever gave the issue much thought until recently – which makes it easier to believe that (like a young person) his mind could be changed since his beliefs on the issue hadn’t really solidified. Fr example in ’11 or ’12 a reporter asked him if he believed in a constitution Дconstitutional right to privacy. He said, yes, and she asked if that meant he supported a woman’s right to choose. He said he didn’t see what privacy had to do with abortion.
And without a significant religious or health-related experience triggering the change? If so, would you be willing to explain what made the difference? My thinking, ad experience has tended to bear it out is that one’s position is usually determined by value judgments that aren’t very malleable.
Yes. I think there are two really depressing features to how abortion was legalized in this case:
First, the decision wasn’t imposed by courts or even decided by politicians. I believe that in most cases it’s been the former and less often the latter. If it’s ever happened by direct vote before I’m not aware of it.
Second, it’s usually just a matter of deciding whether to end a prohibition, which from a pro-choicers perspective is like legalizing marijuana. What happened last week was more than that. It was deciding to strip rights away from the unborn. I think that may be a first as well.
@contrarian, may I suggest looking at @katebraestrup’s posts over the past year or so, to learn more about the journey she has been taking with respect to this question of abortion. I’m sure you’ll find them of interest.
Than jack up Planned Parenthood’s fixed overhead and all of the jobs and compensation it supports. It’s better if abortion is more of a side practice of diverse OBGYNs. Completely different fiscal structure.
i do live in Ireland. I voted to introduce Article 40.3.3 in 1983 and I tried to save it this time . Leo Varadkar is our Taoiseach ( PM) and I think it was as recently as 2015 that he was arguing from a Pro-Life position, advocating some change for hard cases but retaining protection for unborn life otherwise. Simon Harris is the Minister for Health who is responsible for the proposed legislation and in the second-last General Election he sought votes based on a letter give assurances about his Pro-Life credentials. He abandoned that position rapidly and he was re-elected having done so.
I’m very much reminded of Brendan Eich who was fired for having held a view on SSM lwhich at the time was also stated by Barack Obama and Hilary Clinton to have been held by them.
Much lip service has until recently been paid here to the difficulty of the abortion issue and that he sincerely-held views of people on both sides of the argument. Some prominent politicians and media figures have described their nights of torment struggling to decide what position they should take. That’s all forgotten now and people who struggled likewise but decided to vote No or to advocate for a No vote are being treated with considerable disrespect-and much worse.
We Catholics have a different understanding, but, yes, turning my life over to Christ (from nothingness) helped me to radically rethink my formerly pro-abort stance. I was in my mid-30’s then. As an old fart, I’m horrified by my former belief.
BTW, Is mid-30’s middle-aged?
Once I was blind but now I see !
My blindness ended at 26 my brother.
Yes, for Catholics, it’s a process; it begins with Baptism – whether as an infant or an adult – which cleanses and claims for Christ; First Communion – as a child or an adult – which feeds us and continues our growth in Christ; and Confirmation – as a youngster or an adult – which provides knowledge/strength/encouragement to engage fully in the Christian life and mission. It’s an arc of more and greater personal awareness, choice, and responsibility for living out the Christian life and engaging in the Great Commission. This charge is one renewed daily. (Some among us can recall a date/circumstance when we entered into relationship, but we’re saved daily, in hope…)