There is a lot to reflect on from the Repeal The 8th March on Saturday, a crowd of some 40,000 people demanding equality in a peaceful, colourful and good spirited demonstration in the nation’s capital.

However the topic is quite serious and what troubles me is that advocates of the 8th have an unjust advantage in that they seem to very easily manipulate our inherent good nature by implanting falsehoods, claiming the 8th amendment protects children.

So here are five quick pointers from the weekend, which most people on the march would know but that you need to share with your friends in order to overcome the bias of the pro-eighters and their glam rag hate flyers.

1.  The Citizen’s Assembly voted that the issue of abortion should not be dealt with in the constitution but the government have not acted on their independent recommendation to remove the 8th amendment. FF, FG, and SF remain silent on the issue so as not to alienate themselves from voters. This is nothing but cowardly from the largest parties in the state.
2. Ireland has the most repressive abortion laws in Europe. Women or Doctors found aiding an abortion face up to 14 years in prison in Ireland. This is the same sentence women face for having an abortion in Nigeria. This also includes doctors offering medical advice on abortion.
3. Amnesty International called Ireland out for failing to comply with International Human Rights Law. Amnesty’s website carries the following message for Ireland: ‘Women and girls must also have access to abortion on the minimum grounds set out under international human rights law for the duration of their pregnancies. Therefore, they should have access to safe and legal abortion when the pregnancy is the result of rape or incest, when the pregnancy poses a risk to the woman’s health or following a severe or fatal foetal impairment diagnosis. Abortion ‘on request’ should be available without limits for adolescent girls, guaranteeing their best interests, and ensuring in law and practice that their views are always heard and respected in abortion decisions.’
4. Every day, between 10 and 12 women and girls living in Ireland travel to England for an abortion. The majority of the women are aged between 20 and 34. The 8th amendment does not stop abortions from happening; it just prevents Irish people from accessing medical advice and procedures in Ireland. The 8th amendment also discriminates against asylum seekers and people trapped in Direct Provision who cannot travel for medical procedures.
5. People who want to have children will have children. Irish people are not gendercide monsters who want to terminate all ginger fetuses, not all teenage pregnancies are unwanted babies, access to abortion does not mean we have mass graves of unknown human beings – that was the Catholic Church’s method of dealing with the Tuam babies. We must trust people with their choices. We must show the courage to act now when our government has failed us. 

Act now and demand a referendum to repeal the unlawful 8th amendment, we must ensure it is fully removed from our constitution. 

You might have thought Netflix showcased the greatest miscarriage of justice in American history with the screening of Making A Murderer, but it appears the tv network is about to go a whole level deeper into the world of psychological entertainment with a documentary called Audrie & Daisy. The film tells the story of two teenage girls who were sexually assaulted and depicts the intense emotional trauma they receive from public shaming in the aftermath of their attacks.

In hindsight I feel this film should come with a viewer warning, as it peels back the paper thin layers of a sensitive fifteen year old girl, Audrie Pott, who hangs herself without leaving a note, and before your tears dry it travels through every fibre of your body as it retells the story of Daisy Coleman, who at the age of fourteen was raped and left for dead by senior high school students.

Prepare to be emotionally outraged, you are about to relive a young girls last breath, to shoulder the cross of blame culture in America, this film will make you question your faith, if you have a teenage daughter you will crumble in fear for her safety. 

The documentary is such a compelling watch it will have you stomping the dust at your feet like a bull in a rodeo, it will prod you into an intense fury before leaving you helpless and at an absolute loss as to why the law doesn’t protect minors from rape the way it should.

It will leave you wanting to reach out to the victims of cyber bullying and suicide. Screenshots of social media messages such as “Kiss my closing eyes, help me sleep” express the anguish and suffering these young girls endured, messages which will break your heart.  

There are many lessons to be learned from this film, such as young girls like to gossip, that you should never drink from the bitch cup, and that all victims of rape need to be heard. They need to be heard and supported. Their voice needs to be so loud that men, be they adolescent or otherwise, know that there is no excuse for attacking, abusing, or shaming women. Their voice needs to be carried by all those who want their daughters to feel safer than Liam Neeson’s first child.

“We can’t ignore an army of voices, the words of our enemies aren’t as awful as the silence of our friends” Daisy Coleman
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Illustration by Jesse Lenz

One day the name Amanda Mellet may be as well known as Rosa Parks for fundamentally changing the landscape of society.

Her story is one many Irish women face, yet a position no woman should be subjected to in modern Ireland.

Amanda was just 21 weeks into her pregnancy when her baby was diagnosed with Edwards’ syndrome, congenital heart defects, and a prognosis of death shortly after birth if not in the womb. Under Irish law Amanda Mallet was denied the option of having an abortion.

Given the limited chance of survival and the increased risk of complications in birth she travelled to Liverpool for a termination on December 2nd, 2011.

Following the anguish of travelling abroad to access health services denied in Ireland Amanda filed a complaint with the UN Human Rights Committee. The Committee found that Ireland’s abortion laws violate the UN’s International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and called for reform.

The ruling aligned Ireland’s ban on abortion, subjecting a woman carrying a foetus with a fatal abnormality, to “discrimination” and equated the practice to “cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.”

So far the Irish government haven’t been very good at listening to UN or EU rulings, but with pressure on the administration to have a referendum to Repeal The 8th there is a chance that the people of Ireland will get to speak up and correct an injustice which seems so transparent to a younger generation.

However one of the key issues which might prevent Ireland from progressing towards greater reform and access to health services is the weight of a conservative majority who may not be as receptive to constitutional change for the sake of something as ‘unholy’ as abortion. 

Ireland, traditionally a catholic stronghold, has a very gloomy past in its understanding of child mortality, historically speaking stillbirths and unbaptised infants were buried outside of church graveyards in unholy burial grounds called Cillíns.

This is significant as an older generation have a very different mentality in how they grasp the miracle of life, the suffering of humanity, and the rural attitude of ‘If you have livestock you must be prepared to have deadstock”.

The older generation accepted the loss of life as one of the hardships they faced and the practice of burying a child in a Cillín was a part of the grieving process whereby a mother would not lament over the graveside of her child and left wondering who they might have become.

The focus therefore became not on the life lost but on the lives of all those who might be. So it’s no surprise that in 1983 the Irish electorate voted by a 2:1 margin in favour of amending the 1937 Constitution to specifically protect the life of the unborn child. A referendum I might add which had the support of both Charles Haughey and Garret Fitzgerald.

The challenge facing Repeal The 8th advocates is to explain the reasons why women should have the right to an abortion, to convince traditional sections of society that the necessity for abortion is not borne out of some millennial desire to use abortion as a form of frivolous contraception. To tell people the story of Amanda Mellet, to prevent Irish women suffering further cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.

“I hope the day will soon come when women in Ireland will be able to access the health services they need in our own country, where we can be with our loved ones, with our own medical team, and where we have our own familiar bed to go home and cry in. Subjecting women to so much additional pain and trauma must not continue.” Amanda Mallet
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(Image from www.abortionrightscampaign.ie)