Protesters at a pro-choice rally in Dublin last year
Una Mullally, in The Guardian, writes:
The movement to repeal the 8th is growing, especially since the equal marriage referendum last year inspired a generation of young Irish people. In the days after that referendum, the question that Irish people hear repeatedly from abroad was raised: how can Ireland have gay marriage and not abortion? It’s one that can only be answered by acknowledging that misogyny in Ireland runs even deeper than homophobia.
What the equal marriage referendum taught us was that change comes from the bottom up. And we don’t just need one voice advocating for change, but many. The recent March for Choice in Dublin was replicated in cities around the world, with tens of thousands of people turning out to demand reproductive rights.
…Women are now telling their abortion stories in great numbers for the first time, and as we learned during the equal marriage referendum campaign, you can’t beat real-life experiences with abstract arguments.
Successive Irish governments haven’t listened to their female citizens. But what Irish governments really dislike is being embarrassed from abroad. As a nation, we are insecure, obsessed with our identity and what people think of us. So if politicians don’t have the guts to tackle this issue then they need to be shamed into action.
Solidarity matters because the extended hand often feels so much warmer than your own. The idea that people you don’t even know care about you is important. It bolsters you. And while solidarity from outside Ireland exists in pockets, we now need it from Britain en masse.
British people need to stomp on the streets and on the floors of parliament to help shame our government. British people should especially demand that women in Northern Ireland have the same reproductive rights as in England, Scotland, and Wales, and that those rights be extended to women on the Isle of Man too.
A strip of sea separates us, but we are just like you. We watch EastEnders, shop in Topshop, cry at Bake Off and drink gin. Your football teams are our football teams. We don’t earn enough and are sick of the rain. We are not “other”.
Irish women need British help to change our abortion laws (The Guardian)
Earlier: Free Tomorrow?
Speak for yourself Una. I don’t watch Eastenders, shop in Top Shop, cry at Bake Off, drink gin or support an English football team.
Nor do I care what the people of Britain chose to protest about. In fact I seem to remember we had a couple of wars to try and stop British interference in our politics.
+1…except for the gin
Heaven knows I’m
Miserable now
Plenty of Irish people do all you mention there. You seem to be implying that because *you* don’t, Mullaly shouldn’t generalise about Irish people. Aren’t you doing the same thing?
No, I’m telling Una she doesn’t speak for me and, unlike Una, I’m not claiming to speak for the people of Ireland when I say it.
She didn’t say literally every Irish person does all that. I have no idea why you took such an innocuous line so personally.
That’s fine. I feel no need to explain my reaction to you.
Great, I wasn’t looking for an explanation.
Well, you did kind of ask for one.
It’s Moyest, best not to engage.
What about “Irish” products by English producers such as Diageo? Do you consume those? English fellas who play for the Ireland team? Spit at them do you? You sound like a bit of a misogynist donkey.
@Repro: while I understand Una’s passion for her view, I agree that Britain has no role to play in this matter.
Somehow I don’t imagine the decisive moment of the referendum campaign being when someone on Eastenders wears a Repeal badge.
No but it might be if the UK government forces NI to provide abortion services widely, adding pressure to Ireland. Or if feminist groups in the UK starting campaigning more widely on this issue too. The last paragraph wasn’t the main point.
The mainland won’t touch the NI with a bargepole on this one, Don. Far too fraught an issue with a substantial chunk of the populace.
I wouldn’t bet on it, it’s brewing just like it is in Ireland
I wouldn’t bet on it either, Don!
We don’t need more pressure. We just need a vote.
Pressure is what got you this citizens committee. You won’t have a vote for what, another year at least?
Yes, it will take time as the Citizens Assembly is just a delay tactic but we will get a vote at the end of it. Adding pressure won’t make the government give up their shield of impotence. The assembly allows them to say to the die hard pro-lifers that the decision to have a vote was out of their hands.
NI needs pressure too, pressure will keep the momentum up and make sure the delay tactics are minimal.
You’re completely right. Political change is always affected by single sweeping gestures on popular soap opera as opposed to incrementally by osmosis and influencing among multiple communication media
Britain has a major role in this matter as they are the ones supplying the service that our citizens require.
Britain’s role in this matter is to accept payment and facilitate the required termination.
Financially Britain is better served by retaining the 8th.
Post Brexit economic plan. Jam and abortion based economy.
I would suspect Irish women may find this more difficult once Brexit is put through and the necessary cuts to the NHS start
Except carry out the abortions for us.
She is an abysmally poor writer, while I agree with most of the causes she advocates for she really does them no favours with her reductionist drivel.
“We watch EastEnders, shop in Topshop, cry at Bake Off and drink gin. Your football teams are our football teams. We don’t earn enough and are sick of the rain. We are not “other”.”
Just awful nonsense! Who ever said we are ‘other’? Fighting an argument that doesn’t exist, good on ya Una!
+1
you’d think now that she’d allow the citizen’s assembly to do their work over the next few years. then we can vote on a nice, safe, diluted version of whatever they have in other jurisdictions and sure, won’t that keep una in a job moaning for a while?
Her point seems to be that we won’t do this for ourselves but if we think our former overlords are sneering at us we’ll do it. Beyond bonkers!
You have completely misunderstood her writing. She’s talking about our government, not our society. Our government are right wing and are clearly of a mind that they know better. There is a strong disconnect between society and government here. They will not listen to us. They do not respect us. However, if a nation like Britain were to talk about Ireland on an international stage and make us look outdated, our government might be embarrassed into action. Any student of Irish history knows that our “former overlords” granted us home rule because of international pressure, especially from America. They could have crushed the independence movement if they really wanted to.
Besides the point but you may find Irish Independence was in fact fought for and hard-won following a three year guerilla war which our ‘overlords’ made every attempt to crush but couldn’t.
“There is a strong disconnect between society and government here.”
Don’t think so. Not everyone lives in urban areas. Quite a lot of people live outside of the few big cities on the this island and think a lot more conservatively. While the polls do show the majority want the 8th gone, when pushed on what they actually want, its not that much better than what we already have. Just slightly relaxed rules.
After all is done, if you want an abortion you’re still probably going to have to go to England.
“Our government are right wing”
Have you had a look who’s in power in England at the moment?
I should think her piece is aimed at individuals rather than the government. I would say she’s hoping someone like, for instance, JK Rowling would tweet about it as opposed to May ringing Enda.
Is that the same JK Rowling who tweeted about Brexit and lost??
And?
How is Una still working in the media? Isn’t it well for her that misogyny and homophobia exist or she wouldn’t have anything to write about.
…writing for the Irish Times and the Guardian…being a contrarian journalist seems to even beat being a religious as a career move…
Yeah I bet she’s delighted by all the misogyny and homophobia. Keep it coming!
The varied colours and textures of navel lint will only get one so far…
ah ffs…
I like a lot of what she writes but that first piece in bold is just lazy and narrow minded.
She has a great knack for annoying people!
*second piece
The knashing of teeth under these articles is great. At least we aren’t pandering to bodgers Wikileaks love in.
boohoo Hillary bashing
Sorry human, try harder or gtfo
Agh please leave Hillary alone broadsheet
that caption was a po choice.
I’m not sure the pro-choice movement is actually being heard everywhere in Ireland so would it not make sense to start in Ireland before you try and get support in the UK?
Sure the message is out there and is coming from many voices but is it nationwide?
Is it in the pubs in Limerick? Is it repeal a topic of conversation in Donegal ?
I’m actually asking is the repeal message nationwide currently?
C
What a strange comment.
https://www.donegalnow.com/news/video-find-out-what-donegal-candidates-think-of-repealing-the-eighth-amendment/74962
http://www.limerickpost.ie/2016/10/13/no-winners-repeal-eighth-campaign/
Yes, the message is nationwide. You know we DO have the internet and television outside Dublin.
We culchies speak about it among ourselves. It’s not all daily mass and outside toilets beyond the Pale, you know.
Ah it is really though.
Imagine talking about abortion in a pub. Grim
Sure a pub was where they invented Youth Defence and had their initial meetings. If it’s good enough for the antichoice gestapo…
The bar in the Harcourt Street basement of Conradh was it
Gestapo. Really?
Haven’t you seen their links to far right, racist groups?
country bumpkins don’t understand such challenging concepts surely
Una Mullally and the rest of the Irish journo/columnist arts media set centred around each other’s book launches and mutual backslapping (public twitter spats but besties in private) give me a pain in the hoop.
They jump on whatever bandwagon is passing, usually around gender rights, repeal, feminism, depression, cancer, blah blah blah and all they’re doing is using these issues to feed their careers.
They almost never ever talk about poverty, homelessness, social inequality or even women in poverty. No, because those are ewww and don’t offer wine and cheese receptions and it might mean going to run down council estates or places like Ronanstown or Darndale and that’s just not their style.
No, this crowd prefer the fun issues with a social life and going on the piss afterwards attached.
“how can Ireland have gay marriage and not abortion?”
Almost like they’re two different things Una. That in itself is anti-equality.
Why on earth would this woman invite a foreign jurisdiction to have any part in our laws?
Because they might agree with her.
sure, don’t the germans own our money and tell us what we can spend it on? and the americans, sure we’d give them a tax break and an airport for their air force for a smile. and the Israelis? well feel free to use our passports there.
what are laws for, if only for the elites and their mates to ignore?
The foreign juristiction takes care of 4000 Irish abortions a year.
Though Una does provide the link back to NI and the legality of abortion there. That’d be UK citizens demonstrating about UK issues. But it’d mean have to read the article.
What is to be lost by people who sympathise with Irish women taking to the streets? We’ve done it and do it in sympathy with plights and injustice in other states.
Sympathy does not mean interference. I’m not sure independence from Britain extends to asking their citizens to show support.
Because knee-jerk reaction against Una Mullally.
Referendum is called – referendum fails to pass – back to square one.
Four thousand Irish abortions a year still exported so the hypocrites can say there’s no abortion in Ireland
It’s not hypocritical to seek to change (or retain) the law in the country one resides in. You’ll find most prolife people are concerned about abortion in other jurisdictions to. Perhaps that’s why we hear of all these big, bad American people taking an interest in abortion in Ireland. The abortion providers like to take an interest to…..new markets and whatnot.
It’s not long since anti-choice websites changed their currency of choice from dollars. Do they still tell porkies about appearing on EWTN?
I see. So you’ve decided to change the subject.
Well you started about American interference. The antichoice campaign has been run on interfering American money for years… Probably why they don’t engage with SIPO and publish accounts.
Dear Una
That crying at Bake off might have sum’ting t’do with the gin
And you must have a very simple mentality if EastEnders is under your watchful eye
And as for the Foreign Game, when you can write like Russell Brand about it, then you get to talk about it without looking like a wag
In the meantime, less of the “we are just like you”
Le do thoil
BTW, if you’re all that, do a pudding interview for us
RACIST.
‘Hey Una, you’re simple minded, you’re not articulate enough to talk about football and you’re full of yourself. How about an interview?’ I’m sure she’d be delighted to meet such a polite request.
Haha the cut of this failed scribbler dribbling on about some other contrarian reactionary
Where ate ya going with “failed”
A bollix ya
Good girl. The skin is thin in this one.
So
Where are ya gong with “failed’
Let’s have it
Shay
Where ya goin with bollix?
Straight to the gutter where your prose belongs
smart wimin carry condoms
https://www.google.ie/search?q=smart+women+carry+condoms+poster&client=ms-android-htc-rev&prmd=ivn&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjszPjWifTPAhWCHsAKHZFsDgIQ_AUIBygB&biw=360&bih=511&dpr=3#imgrc=vO4UbvpQUJsDSM%3A
Why doesn’t Ms Mullally declare that she’s a paid Irish Times columnist anywhere on the article?
Why does it need to be?
It’s called transparency, you snowflake.
So should she also declare her hair colour and preferred breakfast cereal? In the name of transparency?