woman dies for want of a abortion

[seafoid]

The prods in the north as a group are insane . I think 1641 has a lot to do with it.

[seafoid]

https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/una-mullally-greetings-from-ireland-the-land-of-balance-and-crazy-abortion-laws-1.2602436

Una Mullally: Greetings from Ireland - the land of balance and crazy abortion laws

Growing chorus of British journalists condemning our brutal, criminalising, archaic and oppressive abortion laws



Greetings from Ireland! I hope you're all keeping well. We're doing a grand old job here looking after ourselves thank you very much. There have been protestors outside Government Buildings for the last fortnight calling for the repeal of the eighth amendment. Not that we have a government, but I'm sure that will sort itself out. And up the North aren't mad things always happening? This week they gave a woman a three-month suspended sentence for getting drugs that would induce a miscarriage. Today, the trial of a mother who tried to get similar pills for her daughter was adjourned in Belfast.

Greetings from Ireland, where as the popular UK website The Pool put it, "when a country bans abortion, it creates horror stories." We're used to horror stories in Ireland. We're good at them. The dead girl in a grotto. The dead baby on a beach. The dead babies in mass unmarked graves. The women imprisoned. The crying girls in airports and ferry terminals. The braindead woman kept alive because a constitution owns her womb. The deathly, sinister, painful silence. Greetings from Ireland. Help.

I laughed hearing an American reporter on Morning Ireland the other day talking about the controversy Donald Trump caused when he merely suggested women should be punished for having abortions. How ridiculous it sounded, the Irish national broadcaster reporting on that incident, when there's an alarm bell that goes off in RTE anytime someone Irish mentions abortion - not the Angelus by the way, a little more hysterical than that. "Balance!" it shrieks! "Balance!" Just as broadcasters made fools of themselves clambering for anti-gay-rights opinions in the lead up to the marriage referendum, they continue to see voices that are pro-choice as things that need to be not listened to but opposed.

What "balance" is really about is censorship. Women get balanced. Gays get balanced. If only they'd stop talking about their rights. If only we could keep our fingers in our ears without hearing these horror stories. Balance. Help.

It doesn't matter how vigorously the UN or Amnesty or the EU or whoever else shake their heads and wag their fingers in our direction when it comes to the human rights violations regarding women's reproductive rights in Ireland. The Irish media isn't so hot on debate or conversation or trying to solve this issue, it's "balancing" that is the priority. We're grand, thanks a million. This is Ireland and we can sort out our own messes, Irish solutions to Irish problems. They always work, don't? The outsiders just don't understand us. We're a complex country. Nothing makes sense. Ha! It's gas really.

But now, abortion and balance and the media collide and collide over and over again, and we can't see the wood for the trees. For decades, the Irish media has largely collaborated in the silencing of women and ignoring the scandal of denying us medical care. That silence is breaking, but only barely. Where are the media campaigns to end the oppression of Irish women? Where are the hard-hitting documentaries and investigative reports? Where is RTE only swinging in the breeze of the hot air the coordinated complaints of anti-choice activists blow when the abortion alarm sounds?

What Irish women North and South can hope for now is external pressure. The British media balked at the story this week that a woman is a criminal because she got pills to end her pregnancy. Pills that are common elsewhere. Too poor to travel, this was her only way to access the medical care her home denied. There is a growing chorus of British journalists and news outlets and especially female columnists condemning our brutal, criminalising, archaic and oppressive laws.

In the centenary of the 1916 Rising, let's hope Britain can save us, eh? Maybe something bigger will happen, an even greater horror story, something really major that external media will use to embarrassed into action. Denying women bodily autonomy here ends up on England's doorstep. If we can't address it, maybe they will? Help. Greetings from Ireland and thank God for England. Sure where would we be without them? I suppose we'd have to arrest at lot more women. That would be terribly inconvenient, and then even more international media would be mean to us.

Greetings from Ireland, where young women who desperately don't want to be pregnant are informed upon, and the police come for them, vulnerable and afraid, and they are stood up in front of judges who criminalise them with ancient legislation, and when we talk about it, the media decides it can't be spoken about alone but pitched against the very rhetoric that got us here and keeps us here. But don't worry, it's only women. And what are they going to do? Arrest us all? Help.

[armaghniac]

Nothing like well a well unbalanced article.
One week it is all about how men died so that we can have different laws from the British and the next week there is a campaign to have them the same because the British don't agree. The Irish Times hasn't changed its role much in 100 years.

[Jim_Murphy_74]

Destroying a bunch of cells is not killing someone. Even in this case, at 12 weeks, it is not killing someone. No person was killed.

I have never got a good scientific answer to when a bunch of cells becomes a person.  That has always made me uncomfortable about abortion.  At 12 weeks that bunch of cells has many "person" functions:

http://www.babycentre.co.uk/12-weeks-pregnant

And certainly if I read Ms Mullaly's article below about bodily autonomy it would appear that you are not a person until born if mother's bodily autonomy is sacrosanct.  So a baby seconds from birth is less a person than a baby just born?

Equally I have a distaste for pro-lifers disdain for complicated situations like FFA, rape, incest cases etc..

One thing I do believe is that anyone bearing absolute views on this matter and that are not conflicted have serious issues.

/Jim.

[general_lee]

Nothing like well a well unbalanced article.
One week it is all about how men died so that we can have different laws from the British and the next week there is a campaign to have them the same because the British don't agree. The Irish Times hasn't changed its role much in 100 years.

A fairly well penned article; because it doesn't fall in line with your opinion doesn't make it unbalanced.

Destroying a bunch of cells is not killing someone. Even in this case, at 12 weeks, it is not killing someone. No person was killed.

I have never got a good scientific answer to when a bunch of cells becomes a person.  That has always made me uncomfortable about abortion.  At 12 weeks that bunch of cells has many "person" functions:

http://www.babycentre.co.uk/12-weeks-pregnant

And certainly if I read Ms Mullaly's article below about bodily autonomy it would appear that you are not a person until born if mother's bodily autonomy is sacrosanct.  So a baby seconds from birth is less a person than a baby just born?

Equally I have a distaste for pro-lifers disdain for complicated situations like FFA, rape, incest cases etc..

One thing I do believe is that anyone bearing absolute views on this matter and that are not conflicted have serious issues.

/Jim.

At 12 weeks there is no consciousness. Personall speaking, that is enough for me.

[haranguerer]

Its a difficult topic, and so I suspect we'll all look elsewhere for guidance on it. When abortion is legalised, we'll be happy enough and decide that, 'well, if the law says its not a life, its not a life', because it will be easier for us. I will anyway I'd say.

Just to note, Jim believes its distasteful of pro-lifers to have disdain in relation to ffa, rape, incest...but what other position could they have? If you believe there is a life there, which pro lifers do, then its entirely consistent to not allow in those instances, otherwise you're saying its ok to punish a child for the crime of its father, in a rape case for instance, or for being disabled in a ffa case.

I'm not saying those are my views, I'm just pointing out that the contradiction is much greater for people like Jim, who are probably most of us, when we are unsure about when life should be deemed to start, but regardless of this believe abortion should be allowed in those cases, than it is for pro-lifers who are against for any reason.

[laoislad]

Nothing like well a well unbalanced article.
One week it is all about how men died so that we can have different laws from the British and the next week there is a campaign to have them the same because the British don't agree. The Irish Times hasn't changed its role much in 100 years.

A fairly well penned article; because it doesn't fall in line with your opinion doesn't make it unbalanced.

Destroying a bunch of cells is not killing someone. Even in this case, at 12 weeks, it is not killing someone. No person was killed.

I have never got a good scientific answer to when a bunch of cells becomes a person.  That has always made me uncomfortable about abortion.  At 12 weeks that bunch of cells has many "person" functions:

http://www.babycentre.co.uk/12-weeks-pregnant

And certainly if I read Ms Mullaly's article below about bodily autonomy it would appear that you are not a person until born if mother's bodily autonomy is sacrosanct.  So a baby seconds from birth is less a person than a baby just born?

Equally I have a distaste for pro-lifers disdain for complicated situations like FFA, rape, incest cases etc..

One thing I do believe is that anyone bearing absolute views on this matter and that are not conflicted have serious issues.

/Jim.

At 12 weeks there is no consciousness. Personall speaking, that is enough for me.

Have you ever been at a 12 week ultrasound scan ?
You can hear the heartbeat.
That's enough for me to say them 'bunch of cells" is human life.

[Jim_Murphy_74]

At 12 weeks there is no consciousness. Personally speaking, that is enough for me.

My understanding is that due to low-oxygen state in womb means babies are permanently in a state of sleep, "unconscious" if you will.  So for you is there a recognised milestone where consciousness is regarded as present?

The reason I ask is that  if such a milestone does not exist then it would default to birth?

This must be counter-balanced with the fact that premature babies show that as early as 21 weeks the unconscious is capable of consciousness post-delivery.

The caring system in UK allows abortions up to 24 week (reduced from 28 weeks in 1990)

Is that enough for you?

I can't agree with article posted because the phrase "bodily autonomy" because to me that implies everything up to birth is fair game.

/Jim.

[Jim_Murphy_74]

Just to note, Jim believes its distasteful of pro-lifers to have disdain in relation to ffa, rape, incest...but what other position could they have? If you believe there is a life there, which pro lifers do, then its entirely consistent to not allow in those instances, otherwise you're saying its ok to punish a child for the crime of its father, in a rape case for instance, or for being disabled in a ffa case.

I think to be so absolute is wrong but I accept that likely is coming from my point of view of being conflicted.  Also for FFA I mean when it is evident that life is not sustainable.   I don't mean "disabled":  I have a child with down syndrome and special needs so I would have strong views on that aspect.  However take the case that this thread started on: if my wife was ill and on her way to a miscarriage.  I would have no moral calms about surgical intervention to speed things up. I would not be waiting for "no heart beat". 

I think the lines are grey and blurred, that is why I don't believe in absolutism here.

/Jim. 

[general_lee]

Nothing like well a well unbalanced article.
One week it is all about how men died so that we can have different laws from the British and the next week there is a campaign to have them the same because the British don't agree. The Irish Times hasn't changed its role much in 100 years.

A fairly well penned article; because it doesn't fall in line with your opinion doesn't make it unbalanced.

Destroying a bunch of cells is not killing someone. Even in this case, at 12 weeks, it is not killing someone. No person was killed.

I have never got a good scientific answer to when a bunch of cells becomes a person.  That has always made me uncomfortable about abortion.  At 12 weeks that bunch of cells has many "person" functions:

http://www.babycentre.co.uk/12-weeks-pregnant

And certainly if I read Ms Mullaly's article below about bodily autonomy it would appear that you are not a person until born if mother's bodily autonomy is sacrosanct.  So a baby seconds from birth is less a person than a baby just born?

Equally I have a distaste for pro-lifers disdain for complicated situations like FFA, rape, incest cases etc..

One thing I do believe is that anyone bearing absolute views on this matter and that are not conflicted have serious issues.

/Jim.

At 12 weeks there is no consciousness. Personall speaking, that is enough for me.

Have you ever been at a 12 week ultrasound scan ?
You can hear the heartbeat.
That's enough for me to say them 'bunch of cells" is human life.

I completely respect that. If my partner, sister, cousin, friend or anyone else I knew wanted an abortion at that stage; I think they have the right to choose what they do from there. That should not be a decision for the state to impose on their behalf.

[general_lee]

At 12 weeks there is no consciousness. Personally speaking, that is enough for me.

So for you is there a recognised milestone where consciousness is regarded as present?

The reason I ask is that  if such a milestone does not exist then it would default to birth?

This must be counter-balanced with the fact that premature babies show that as early as 21 weeks the unconscious is capable of consciousness post-delivery.

The caring system in UK allows abortions up to 24 week (reduced from 28 weeks in 1990)

Is that enough for you?

As you well know, it's aribtrary. As such it's almost pointless engaging in a debate about any supposed "milestone" where a foetus "acquires" the right to life.

[muppet]

Surely by now we have the technology to safely remove a child from a mother who doesn't want it, and place it for the remainder of its term inside a willing pro-life campaigner?

Like an Archbishop???

[seafoid]

If 5000 women every year from Ireland have an abortion outside tge state there is obviously a problem that is not being addressed. And pretending the status quo works is delusional.

[Jim_Murphy_74]

As you well know, it's aribtrary. As such it's almost pointless engaging in a debate about any supposed "milestone" where a foetus "acquires" the right to life.

It maybe be almost pointless but having the right to life is something very fundamental. It perplexes me for that reason.

/Jim.

[seafoid]

Society is weird . 20 year old men are allowed drive cars and thinki nothing or doing so while drunk.  Cheap Alcohol is
is freely available. A lot of food is poisoned with sugar and salt. Smoking is taxed for the benefit of society even though it results in almost certain early death.  The environment is collapsing. and we lecture women about the sanctity of life.