Tag Archives: woman

 

Labour Senator Ivana Bacik, who has co-sponsored recent bills on reproductive leave and period products which omit the words ‘woman’ and ‘mother’

This morning/afternoon.

Further to removal of the word “mother” from seven Acts of Irish legislation and the omission of the words “women” and “mother” from proposed pieces of legislation affecting women: the Organisation of Working Time (Reproductive Health Related Leave) and the Free Provision of Period Products Bills….

Via Irish Times Letters:

Euphemisms for menstruation were common when women’s reproductive business was considered unmentionable and slightly shameful. It’s good that we’ve matured to the point of recognising the significance and importance of openly and correctly naming things for what they are.

However, something else is happening which is quite sinister. The euphemisms have moved from the word “period” to the word “woman”.

The word “woman” does not appear once in either of the Bills. It is replaced by “anyone”, “everyone” and “people”. None of the female Fianna Fáil or Labour Senators contacted seem to know why or where the word went, although it must have been deliberately excluded.

Labour’s Ivana Bacik had no difficulty referring to women and girls in 2019 when she raised the issue of period poverty in the Seanad as she used both throughout her speech.

When contacted, neither she nor any of her female Seanad colleagues answered my question – why are you deliberately excluding the word “woman”?

Women need the word women. We are a distinct biological and political class who are oppressed on the basis of our sex. Language matters. Labour and Fianna Fáil must do better.

Anyone?.FIGHT!

Irish Times Letters

RollingNews

Emergency services found a woman who had given birth at the junction of Linenhall Street and North King Street early on Monday morning

This morning.

Further to reports on Monday of a woman having given birth at the junction of Linenhall Street and North King Street in central Dublin in the early hours of Monday morning…

The Irish Times reports this morning that she remained in the Rotunda Hospital last night:

The woman, who is of no fixed address but is believed to be a Dubliner, went into labour just after 1am around the junction of Linenhall Street and North King Street in what were below-zero temperatures at the time.

She delivered the baby by the roadside in the north inner city as a number of passersby and local people went to her aid on hearing her screams.

After giving birth the woman then walked southwards towards the quays and was eventually found with her baby by the emergency services at the Four Courts on Inns Quay.

…Garda sources described her as having no fixed address, although it remained unclear if she was a rough sleeper.

A number of sources in outreach services said the woman was not known to them and they believed she would be had she been sleeping on the streets.

Meanwhile, yesterday…

The Irish Independent reported:

“Despite report that the woman was homeless, a well-informed source told the Irish Independent that she was not a client of Dublin Region Homeless Executive’s (DRHE) services.”

Woman who gave birth on Dublin street remains in hospital (Conor Lally, The Irish Times)

‘Vulnerable’ woman gives birth on city street on freezing night in the capital (Irish Independent)

This afternoon.

Dublin City Councillor and CEO of Inner City Helping Homeless Anthony Flynn tweetz:

“Society is failing our elderly!!!!

This morning we have been called to a lady who slept in the rain last night. The lady was soaked to the bone, is in her late 60s, suffering with dementia. She has been transported to hospital.

Thanks to the gardai and ambulance services.”

Meanwhile…

Met Éireann have forecast that temperatures could drop to -4C tomorrow night and Saturday night.

Earlier: Sad Café

“The Woman’s Body Was Found In Her Room”

The death of a woman, in her late 20s, has occurred at Phoenix Lodge, also called Judge Darley’s, near the Museum Luas stop in Dublin

This afternoon.

Kitty Holland, in The Irish Times, reports:

A young homeless woman has died “tragically” in emergency accommodation in Dublin.

In a statement to The Irish Times a Garda spokesman said: “Gardaí were called to the scene of a sudden death of a female in her late 20s that occurred at approximately 5pm at Parkgate Street, Dublin 8 on Wednesday, January 15th.

“A file will be prepared for the Coroner’s Court”

It is understood the woman’s body was found in her room at the Phoenix Lodge hostel, also known as Judge Darley’s, where she had been placed by the Dublin Region Homeless Executive (DRHE).

Young homeless woman dies in Dublin hostel (Kitty Holland, The Irish Times)

Pics: Google Maps/Google Streetview

This afternoon.

At a house in Clonmore, Ardee, Co Louth.

The body of a woman has been found.

Investigation under way after woman’s body found in Ardee, Co Louth (RTE)

Rollingnews

UPDATE:

Update:

Woman

By Colette Colfer (above)

I am a woman, how do I know?
Because my body tells me so
I’ve a womb and ovaries, a breasty chest
I’ve carried a baby in my belly nest
I am milk, I am blood
My diploid cells are double X

But what is a woman?
Can we illuminate the detail?
Would you agree that it’s a noun
Meaning adult human female
Where female is a basic
Biological distinction
That’s used in both the plant
And the animal kingdoms.
The female produces
The larger gamete
But these need the male
To make reproduction complete

So female and male
Are a complementarity
A holy grail
Of unity, polarity
As day is to night
And yin is to yang
As black is to white
Woman is to man

Oestrogen testosterone
X and Y chromosomes
Each cell of our body
Is stamped with our genome

These cellular differences
Have a wider significance
Influencing personality traits
Life experiences, interests.
Less women than men
Are in engineering and mining,
Bin collection, construction,
Fishing, truck driving

It’s only women who’ve experienced
Down through the centuries
FGM, menstruation huts,
Magdalene laundries.
In countries where fornication
Is still considered a crime,
It’s the woman who’s punished
Far more of the time
You can never tell by looking
If a man has had sex

But you can with a woman
Because she carries the egg
And pregnancy is a visible sign
That can result in honour killings,
Imprisonment, honour crimes
Meanwhile the man has to deal with
Paternal uncertainty
So the pressure’s on the woman
To be a virgin, to live chastely

There have been changes
With industrialisation
Contraceptives, technology
Modernisation
We now have gender quotas,
Women’s toilets, changing rooms
Women’s sports and awards
And all-girl schools
At the same time we have feminism
And hashtag me too

Does it really matter
About the words that we use?
Some say woman
Is not about biology
That a woman can be a woman
Regardless of physiology
That it’s nothing to do
With the production of eggs
And it’s completely independent
Of what’s between a person’s legs

That ‘woman’ is identity
And how a person feels
It’s femininity, hair styles
Mascara, high heels
Manicures, blusher
Lipstick and dress.
Can you still be a woman
If you don’t shave your legs?

What’s the point anymore
In sex-segregated spaces
When males can now access
Women-only places?
This year a male won a women’s
World championship cycling race
A female boxer fought a male woman
And ended up with 7 staples in her face

Males can use women’s shelters
A male has won ‘Woman of the Year’
But women are being told
There’s nothing to fear.

Languages evolve
And meanings can change
But biological differences
Can’t be erased

People will just come up with
Different words and labels
To distinguish the differences
Between males and females
Some say we should say ‘womex’
To get rid of the men
Some say ‘people with a cervix’
Or there’s ‘pregnant people’ as well

There’s also ‘uterus havers’
‘Birthers’, ‘gestators’
‘Ovulators’, ‘bleeders’
Or my favorite – ‘menstruators’.

I am a woman, how do I know?
I am
Because my body
Makes it so

Colette Colfer

Thanks John Gallen

Last night.

On Dublin’s O’Connell Street.

Tom Duffy, a volunteer from Feed Our Homeless, recorded a live Facebook video claiming a woman in her 70s was sleeping outside Starbuck’s and that her son, in his late 30s or early 40s, was “wrapping her up like a baby” for the night.

In the video, Tom said:

“There’s a man, in his, I’d say, mid to late-30s, and he is now, at the moment, wrapping his 74-year-old mother in sleeping bags. And thank God, we had one sleeping bag left. We gave them an extra sleeping bag.

“…He’s tucking his 72, I think he said 72, or 74 years of age, mother. He’s wrapping her up there like a baby. This is 2018 on one of the busiest streets in Ireland. And no one seems to give a continental about it…”

Tom Duffy (Facebook)

University Hospital Galway

Dara Bradley, in the Connacht Tribune, reports:

A woman lay dead, undiscovered for up to 10 hours, in the toilet of a city hospital.

The deceased, believed to be a Polish national, was eventually found in a disabled toilet on the ground floor adjacent to the Emergency Department of University Hospital Galway.

The woman was not registered as a patient of the hospital, or the Emergency Department. It is understood she was a member of the public, and entered the building without the knowledge of hospital staff. A probe is underway into the death.

It is understood she may have fatally hurt herself, possibly accidentally, while inside the toilet and the alarm wasn’t raised until 10 hours later when it was being serviced.

The toilet was locked from the inside, a hospital source said.

Dead woman in hospital toilet was not found for 10 hours (Connacht Tribune)

Rollingnews