Abortion Discussion

Brown Bomber

Macha wrote: »

Like I said, corpses and 8-week old foetuses have more right to bodily integrity than Irish women. You seem happy with that status quo. I, as an Irish woman, am strangely not.

Could you clarify something for me? Do you wish this child had died or was dead through whatever means?

Delirium

Brown Bomber wrote: »

OK. However, what I am describing as "a good thing overall" is the outcome at circa 25 weeks pregnancy. That being this child still being alive and being cared for rather than having it's life brutally taken away from it.

Surely you can't disagree with this?

I do. I don't think that a woman who was raped should be denied an abortion.

Brown Bomber

SW wrote: »

I do. I don't think that a woman who was raped should be denied an abortion.

Wow! So why not give the baby a lethal injection now then? What is the difference?

volchitsa

Brown Bomber wrote: »

OK. However, what I am describing as "a good thing overall" is the outcome at circa 25 weeks pregnancy. That being this child still being alive and being cared for rather than having it's life brutally taken away from it.

Surely you can't disagree with this?

Do you what medical treatments are involved in first resuscitating, then keeping alive a baby born at 25 weeks? "Care" is a euphemism, I can assure you.
And this is not a child which was born at that stage despite the best efforts of the doctors, this suffering was deliberately inflicted in the baby thanks to Irish legislation which allows a suicidal woman to terminate her pregnancy, but not, apparently, to terminate it within a reasonable timescale while the fetus is still undeveloped and so cannot feel pain.

Delirium

Brown Bomber wrote: »

Wow! So why not give the baby a lethal injection now then? What is the difference?

because an 8 week foetus isn't the same as a newborn.

Macha

Brown Bomber wrote: »

Could you clarify something for me? Do you wish this child had died or was dead through whatever means?

I don't like how you've asked this question. It's loaded and accusatory, waiting for my answer to jump and say 'aha! Look how barbaric this position is'.

What I wish the woman had been given the choice at 8 weeks to carry out a termination as that's clearly what she wanted. And I believe that for the first trimester for all women for whatever reason.

And I say that as someone whose grandmother was raped and forced to give birth to a child in 1940s Ireland -she too should have been given a choice.

Brown Bomber

SW wrote: »

because an 8 week foetus isn't the same as a newborn.

Once again, I am discussing the events when the option was Caesarian section (baby alive and with chance of a future) vs Surgical abortion (same baby dead, mutilated and it's body parts discarded).

Chemical abortion was a solution at 8 weeks, but not when the Caesarian happened.

kylith

Brown Bomber wrote: »

OK. However, what I am describing as "a good thing overall" is the outcome at circa 25 weeks pregnancy. That being this child still being alive and being cared for rather than having it's life brutally taken away from it.

Surely you can't disagree with this?

Depends on whether you consider significant chances of cerebral palsy, undeveloped lungs, necrotising enteritis, jaundice, brain haemorrhage, blindness, deafness, cognitive and neuromotor impairment, long term mental disability, and probably spending its entire life in state care is a 'good thing overall'. 50% of babies born between 24-28 weeks gestation have a disability.

Brown Bomber

Macha wrote: »

I don't like how you've asked this question..

How would you like me to ask it? I get the impression that you would prefer if this baby wasn't living. It's blowing my mind because I think it is tremendous news that this infant now has a chance in life, I simply can't understand how anyone would wish a baby dead so I am asking you to clarify (in the hope I am mistaken).

Brown Bomber

kylith wrote: »

Depends on whether you consider significant chances of cerebral palsy, undeveloped lungs, necrotising enteritis, jaundice, brain haemorrhage, blindness, deafness, cognitive and neuromotor impairment, long term mental disability, and probably spending its entire life in state care is a 'good thing overall'. 50% of babies born between 24-28 weeks gestation have a disability.

Well I am considering this from a non-eugenics perspective.

lazygal

Brown Bomber wrote: »

How would you like me to ask it? I get the impression that you would prefer if this baby wasn't living. It's blowing my mind because I think it is tremendous news that this infant now has a chance in life, I simply can't understand how anyone would wish a baby dead so I am asking you to clarify (in the hope I am mistaken).

Your lack of empathy for the raped suicidal teenager who had to undergo invasive abdominal surgery which will impact on future pregnancies isn't surprising.

Brown Bomber

lazygal wrote: »

Your lack of empathy for the raped suicidal teenager who had to undergo invasive abdominal surgery which will impact on future pregnancies isn't surprising.

I'm going to ignore that personal attack

irishpancake

NuMarvel wrote: »

A referendum isn't required to make a Supreme Court judgement constitutional. For example, in 1973 the Supreme Court found that citizens have a constitutional right to marital privacy, and that right continues to exist there though there's never been a referendum on that since.

Whether the right is explicitly stated in the Consitutuonal or one found to exist by the Courts, the net effect is the same; it is a constitutional right. The 12th amendment wasn't about putting parts of the Supreme Court judgement into the Constitution, it was about limiting the constitutional rights that the Supreme Court determined existed.

He knows this, this Absolam person, he is at his game of obfuscation and sowing confusion again, by using Orwellian newspeak to attempt to prove black is white, while knowing full well that black is black.

If not this, he is a very stupid person to think he can pull the wool over the eyes of people who were involved in 1983 and 1992.

But, some will take what this person says as truth, unfortunately.

kylith

Brown Bomber wrote: »

Well I am considering this from a non-eugenics perspective.

This is not eugenics. All of those conditions are a direct result of delivering so early and could have been avoided if she had been allowed to terminate when she requested at 8 weeks.

Macha

Brown Bomber wrote: »

How would you like me to ask it? I get the impression that you would prefer if this baby wasn't living. It's blowing my mind because I think it is tremendous news that this infant now has a chance in life, I simply can't understand how anyone would wish a baby dead so I am asking you to clarify (in the hope I am mistaken).

Because you don't make the distinction between an 8 week old foetus and a 24 week old foetus. Of course I don't wish the baby that is now alive (and no longer a foetus but actually a child) to be dead but I still think the woman should have been allowed a termination at 8 weeks.

As for 'having a chance at life' - by that logic, all contraception should be banned to allow the maximum number of people to have a chance at life!

Delirium

Brown Bomber wrote: »

Once again, I am discussing the events when the option was Caesarian section (baby alive and with chance of a future) vs Surgical abortion (same baby dead, mutilated and it's body parts discarded).

Chemical abortion was a solution at 8 weeks, but not when the Caesarian happened.

and the woman requested an abortion at 8 weeks. I think it should have allowed.

swampgas

Ralphdejones wrote: »

Very alive, although many would prefer if she was dead

Wrong, very very wrong. You simply can't get away from the image of pro-choice people as evil baby-killers, can you?

I would prefer that the poor girl had never been raped in the first place, does that also mean that I prefer that the child was dead? After all, no rape, no baby?

I would prefer that she had an early abortion, before there was a baby. That doesn't mean I want the child dead.

Now that there is a baby it should get all the support it can. If you can't understand how I can think all of these different things it's because you cannot see the difference between an 8-week foetus and a baby.

Loafing Oaf

Absolam wrote: »

To claim that the later votes indicate a public about face on the basic abortion issue ignores the fact that they weren't about abortion, they were about other rights that needed to be protected .

So what were the 'services lawfully available in another country' referenced in the information referendum? Did people think they were voting on a right to travel to get their teeth done in Budapest?

irishpancake

Absolam wrote: »

Eh, this one, the Twelfth which proposed to Constitutionally emplace the mothers right to abortion in the event of a threat to her life, which to this day remains only a right conferred by judgement rather than a Constitutional one.

What is this gobbledygook you are spouting.

Can't you write in English.

You are saying, I think, that the proposed Twelfth Amendmenth you link, was a liberalising proposal, in respect of existing abortion rights conferred by 40.3.3, as interpreted by the ISC, where there was a right enshrined in the Constitution to abortion where there is a threat to the life of a pregnant woman/girl including a threat due to suicide ideation??

You do know that the proposed, defeated, Amendment, was about removing that existing right due to a suicide threat to life??

Or do you??

Or are you just a liar by nature??

Ralphdejones

SW wrote: »

and the woman requested an abortion at 8 weeks. I think it should have allowed.

She went to the IFPA at 8 weeks seeking medical help.
The first time she got to see a doctor was 16 weeks, and only after her friend got her to a GP instead.

aloyisious

Brown Bomber wrote: »

Well for this newborn Hope to be still alive now he (or she?) must have been around 25 weeks at the time of the Caesarian to still be alive. If there is another method to kill this foetus at this stage of development other than ripping it and tearing it limb from limb with a forceps inside the womb and extracting it body piece by body piece then share it because i am not aware of it.

Caesarean?

For info on the IFPA, it's a voluntary organization originally set up due to the lack of Govt involvement in abortion advice to pregnant women. Anyone deriding the IFPA for not taking the woman - now mother of a baby boy - to a GP is NOT being accurate as to what the IFPA can do. It is NOT a statutory body with powers to force anyone do something they don't want to do and it definitely cannot lead a woman directly to a GP's clinic door and push her through it. It's actions are limited to advice. Google IFPA for info.

Delirium

Ralphdejones wrote: »

She went to the IFPA at 8 weeks seeking medical help.
The first time she got to see a doctor was 16 weeks, and only after her friend got her to a GP instead.

and she went to the IFPA seeking help to get an abortion. That was as 8 weeks, which you just confirmed.

swampgas

Ralphdejones wrote: »

She went to the IFPA at 8 weeks seeking medical help.
The first time she got to see a doctor was 16 weeks, and only after her friend got her to a GP instead.

I think the point is that if abortion on demand (for early stage abortions say) were available now, then this whole sorry scenario would have been addressed much more easily and with much less trauma to the girl. Yes, an 8-week or 9-week or 10-week foetus would have been destroyed in the process, but that not the same as killing a baby.

Ralphdejones

SW wrote: »

and she went to the IFPA seeking help to get an abortion. That was as 8 weeks, which you just confirmed.

So why was it 16 weeks before a suicidal person who needed serious needed medical help got to see a doctor ?
And why was it only after her friend intervened and got her to a GP ?

volchitsa

Ralphdejones wrote: »

She went to the IFPA at 8 weeks seeking medical help.
The first time she got to see a doctor was 16 weeks, and only after her friend got her to a GP instead.

Imuic, the IFPA have no legal right to go further than providing information. They did that, and presumably when they didn't hear back from her they logically concluded that she was in the system and her needs were being looked after.

Another thing we learned today is that an association which looks after victims of torture contacted the HSE about her case in June, but the suicide procedure was still not set in motion.

I get the impression that, as with Savita Halappanavar, there is a lot of misinformation being put about by the HSE and others with something to hide, probably deliberately. Remember that the HSE tried to get their (untrue) version out first by contacting the Indo saying she had only become aware of her pregnancy late in the second trimester.

aloyisious

Ralphdejones wrote: »

So why was it 16 weeks before a suicidal person who needed serious needed medical help got to see a doctor ?
And why was it only after her friend intervened and got her to a GP ?

For info on the IFPA, it's a voluntary organization originally set up due to the lack of Govt involvement in abortion advice to pregnant women. Anyone deriding the IFPA for not taking the woman - now mother of a baby boy - to a GP is NOT being accurate as to what the IFPA can do. It is NOT a statutory body with powers to force anyone do something they don't want to do and it definitely cannot lead a woman directly to a GP's clinic door and push her through it. It's actions are limited to advice. Google IFPA for info.

Delirium

Ralphdejones wrote: »

So why was it 16 weeks before a suicidal person who needed serious needed medical help got to see a doctor ?

a good question. as is why shouldn't the law permit a raped woman get an abortion. An abortion should have been provided at 8 weeks. The law needs to revised to stop this scenario repeating itself at some point in the future.

And why was it only after her friend intervened and got her to a GP ?

you would have to ask the woman or her friend.

volchitsa

Ralphdejones wrote: »

She went to the IFPA at 8 weeks seeking medical help.
The first time she got to see a doctor was 16 weeks, and only after her friend got her to a GP instead.

I can't yet post links, but an article in today's Indo says there were multiple contacts with the HSE and the department of the DoJ concerned with asylum seekers from the 8-week point on.

The IFPA says it contacted the HSE again about her deteriorating mental state in April and in May, but nothing was done.

A question that also needs to be asked is what is the source of these contradictory versions, starting, as I pointed out, with the attempt at getting a false version out there the day before the reporters who had spoken to the woman herself published their account?

Richard Bingham

irishpancake wrote: »

Your claim has no merit, regardless of how many members of the public knew the meaning of the word paedophile, [however most knew what sexual abuse was, and particularly those who suffered at the hands of abusers]

Thanks for the ruling your Honour but that isn't how boards works. My point is valid. We are a lot more enlightened now than we were in 1992. You can disagree and I can stick to my assertion.

irishpancake wrote: »

As for your 100 people, do you have evidence to support this, or is it merely your opinion?

I remember when the word paedophile became commonly used and understood and it was later in the 90’s when the full extent of the abuse which had been happening for decades, was coming out.

irishpancake wrote: »

It still did not matter anyway, who knew what the appropriate terminology was for the sexual abuse and impregnation of an under-age child was. Their Lordships were very aware, and ruled accordingly.

If your referring to the X case, in which the ruling went one way in the High Court and was overturned by a majority in the Supreme Court (with Hederman J.A. dissenting), then you must believe that the Supreme Court is infallible. I have referred to this previously and Robert Houghwout Jackson United States Attorney General (1940–1941) and an Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court who stated;

“We are not final because we are infallible, but we are infallible only because we are final”

irishpancake wrote: »

I support your contention that something which is from a long time ago is not of less value. Certainly...

I didn’t say that. I contend that we should make decisions with the most up to date information available. As John Maynard Keynes said,

“When my information changes, I alter my conclusions. What do you do, sir?

We know more about the unborn now that we did in 1992. Medical science has also moved on and I believe we should make our decisions based on current information.

irishpancake wrote: »

which is why the "X" decision from 22 years ago, 1992, is so important, and was seminal in Irish Law, whereby the ISC legalised abortion, in Ireland, for women in a similar situation, and under a threat to their lives due to a continued pregnancy, including the threat of suicide, interpreting the Constitutional Amendment, 20.3.3, inserted 9 years previously, in 1983.

We could go around in circles on this but I don’t intend to. I (like the psychiatrists who spoke at the hearings last year), don’t agree that abortion is a treatment for suicidality. It is widely reported that women who have abortions have more mental health problems than those who don’t.

See this research by the British Journal of Psychiatry which concluded that ”Women who had undergone an abortion experienced an 81% increased risk of mental health problems, and nearly 10% of the incidence of mental health problems was shown to be attributable to abortion.”

http://bjp.rcpsych.org/content/199/3/180.short

In the X case, the Attorney General did not contest whether abortion was an appropriate treatment for suicidality. That is why neither the High Court nor the Supreme Court heard any legal arguments or medical evidence on the question of whether suicidality should be treated by abortion. The point was entirely overlooked. Do you not think that the X case had an effect on what happened afterwards?

irishpancake wrote: »

You say:

which I assume refers to the Argument put by the PLAC, to achieve it's Amendment in 1983??

I wasn’t referring to that, and I’m a bit tired of all the jumping to conclusions which is going on in this thread. I was referring to the fact that the Pro Life argument is in my opinion largely unchanged because Pro Life people like myself simply believe that there is always a better option than the killing of the unborn.

irishpancake wrote: »

Leaving aside the fact that using the term "Pro life" to attempt to exclude and portray others as "Anti life" is a distortion of language. I consider myself to be Pro life, and Pro Choice.

Sorry, you can’t be that any more than you can be a smoker and a non smoker. You either are Pro Life or you ain’t.

irishpancake wrote: »

Do you accept, however, that the interpretation of what your Amendment, 40.3.3, actually meant, did change, by dint of what the ISC ruled in "X"?

In that they interpreted it as permitting Abortion in Ireland, which most certainly was not the intent of it's promoters, PLAC.

As I said above, I wasn’t referring to that to begin with.

irishpancake wrote: »

You say:

What Referendum in 1992 being passed are you referring to here??

Two were passed, those in relation to Travel and Information.

The third, to remove the suicide grounds, was not passed, it was rejected.

Do you think the Amendment, which was inserted into our Constitution, passed by Referendum in 1983, and interpreted by the SC in 1992, in the "X" Appeal, is redundant??

We should dispense with it??

Not be slaves to it??

Which seems to be in direct contravention to your earlier statement that something which is from a long time ago is not of less value??

I’ve clarified above that I believe in making decisions with current information. If it appeared otherwise it is because in my earlier post I was challenging Lazygal to go one way or the other. It appears that Lazygal agrees with me that old information should be put aside instead of current information.

irishpancake wrote: »

When you say:

in apparent reply to my point about knowledge of sexual abuse:

What Referendum are you referring to??

You’ll note that the word referendum or referenda is not mentioned in the above post but in the previous one quoted by you. I've tried to paste the original text in here but it won't work. Anyway, I was referring in general to all three referenda held in 1992. My point was that the result of such referenda can be swayed by the backdrop.

irishpancake wrote: »

It would be nice to know, seeing as you remark upon my consistency, but, unfortunately you seem to be consistently confused as to Referenda, when they were held, and the results, not to mention SC appeals, and how the Law on Abortion in Ireland was changed by that decision.

You must be a barrister, or alternatively you are capable of a google search. Like you, I was of age in 1992, though not as old as you, and if I had any difficulty recalling the referenda, all this information is available at the touch of a button. Don’t think for a second you’re going to impress anyone with your reams of legal knowledge here. Boards is full of keyboard warriors with no more ability than the ability to do a google search.

irishpancake wrote: »

Can I submit one more sentence from your even more confused post, and ask you to reflect upon, and perhaps research, just what it is you are attempting to say, if indeed you know.

And perhaps expand on "you lot".

I was referring to the pro abortion side.

The point I was making is that I have been criticised here previously for emotive bunkum and such, but the pro abortion side only want to hold referenda when something emotive has just happned (such as the instant case).

Now I have addressed your many queries can I ask you to address something I have said;

There are a multitude of things that could be done for this woman, which would reduce her suffering. The pro abortion side don't even mention doing any of these things. Just kill the baby.

The fact is that given the low incidence of pregnancies as a result of rape, the government could afford to provide an extremely high level of care to women who find themselves in the terrible position of being pregnant after a rape. Even if it cost €50,000 per incidence, the annual bill would be a drop in the ocean of the funds wasted by the HSE every year. I find it extraordinary that something as extreme as killing is considered before any attempt whatsoever is made to improve her circumstances. Do you not think that more could have been done for this woman, who seems to have been passed from Billy to Jack and her needs ignored by the services that were supposed to help her, right up until the point where she went on hunger strike.

Could we not give her all the support she needed in terms of practical things like accommodation, food, counselling, prenatal care etc and explore whether she was still suicidal afterwards. Is it any wonder that she was suicidal. It would be difficult enough for an Irish person who speaks English, to negotiate the gamut of state and private services, all of which probably regarded her as a hot potato to be avoided. Can you imagine how difficult it must have been for her, no English, didn't know system, needed an interpreter, little or no money. Do you not think that we could try to do a little better before we go for the nuclear option?

swampgas

Richard Bingham wrote: »

There are a multitude of things that could be done for this woman, which would reduce her suffering. The pro abortion side don't even mention doing any of these things. Just kill the baby.

The fact is that given the low incidence of pregnancies as a result of rape, the government could afford to provide an extremely high level of care to women who find themselves in the terrible position of being pregnant after a rape. Even if it cost €50,000 per incidence, the annual bill would be a drop in the ocean of the funds wasted by the HSE every year. I find it extraordinary that something as extreme as killing is considered before any attempt whatsoever is made to improve her circumstances. Do you not think that more could have been done for this woman, who seems to have been passed from Billy to Jack and her needs ignored by the services that were supposed to help her, right up until the point where she went on hunger strike.

Could we not give her all the support she needed in terms of practical things like accommodation, food, counselling, prenatal care etc and explore whether she was still suicidal afterwards. Is it any wonder that she was suicidal. It would be difficult enough for an Irish person who speaks English, to negotiate the gamut of state and private services, all of which probably regarded her as a hot potato to be avoided. Can you imagine how difficult it must have been for her, no English, didn't know system, needed an interpreter, little or no money. Do you not think that we could try to do a little better before we go for the nuclear option?

This boils down to telling a woman that the only available solution to an unwanted pregnancy is ... to continue the pregnancy.

You can dress it up any way you like, but all you are doing is offering padded handcuffs instead of leg-irons.

How hard would it be just to offer her an abortion, like in most other civilized countries?

Tell you what, why not go out and run your proposal past some actual women, and see what their take on it is?