Referendum on the 8th amendment.

[nigel-harps1954]

They can put happy smiley people with Down Syndrome on camera. They have an advantage in that regard.

Except, they've been asked not to by Down Syndrome Ireland. There's no advantage to be had using images of people with Down Syndrome as a whipping tool, or images of any healthy baby in that regard. It's bullying tactics.

Many of those who have an abortion are not capable of keeping a baby to term, or are not able to give them any sort of life. To rub it in by shoving pictures of healthy babies in their faces does not serve any honourable purpose.

I made my mind up on this subject a long time ago. Five years ago, my partner, then heavily pregnant, organised a Donegal Pro Choice rally in response to a pro-life rally in Letterkenny. At the time, I wasn't too well versed on the whole thing, but I went along to support her. The utterly VILE abuse, bordering on physical abuse at times by all of those in attendance at the pro-life march as they walked past disgusted me to levels I had rarely been accustomed to in my life. People walking past calling a (very clearly) heavily pregnant woman a 'babykiller' struck me with a serious sense of irony, as they held up their pictures of aborted babies. Nuns walked past and threw holy water over her and said prayers to clear her of her wicked ways, others spat in her face, and one woman made shapes to push her into the hedge she stood in front of. There was no worry for the baby she was carrying from these people. It was totally disgusting treatment, and listening to their rally for about twenty minutes afterwards, it was led by two priests, a nun, and a doctor who said a prayer when he went onto the stage. It was all religiously motivated.

From that day on, if I hadn't much of an idea what it was all about, I certainly knew afterwards and have been strongly pro-choice since.

[backstothewall]

The pro-life extremists behave horribly. No doubt about that. Equally there are pro-choice extremists who behave horribly. I'm sorry your partner was treated in that way. How those idiots think that sort of behaviour advances their cause is beyond me.

Down Syndrome Ireland can say what they like. They don't speak for everybody. There will be pro-life parents of Down Syndrome children out there who will give their consent and as Down Syndrome Ireland have no right to dictate to any parent what campaigns parents should allow their children to be featured in they what can they say about it?

I think you are right to mention the crazies Bonnie. I suspect whichever side of this is most successful at reigning in their crazies will win.

[osarusan]

It would probably depend on the question being asked on the ballot and the legislation being proposed.

At the moment, the options on the ballot appear to be:

a) leave the amendment as it is

or

b) repeal it and replace it with a provision explicitly giving the Oireachtas power to legislate on the issue.

and, if the recommendations of the Citizens' Assembly are implemented the accompanying legislation will have the following limits:

• a 12-week limit for abortion on request
• a 22-week limit for abortion for a foetal abnormality that is not likely to result in death before or soon after birth.
• no limit for abortion for a foetal abnormality that is likely to result in death before or soon after birth.

[backstothewall]

I don't like it being in the constitution. I don't like having the 8th. I don't like the idea of replacing the 8th with another 8th which hands the issue to the Dail. It's the wrong place for this issue.

Despite being broadly pro-life I would recognise something has to be put in place for parents with certain foetal abnormalities. The details of what should be allowed and what should not are so far removed from my expertise that I don't feel qualified to comment on what they should be. My worry is that over time this sort of provision would be used as the thin end of the wedge for late abortions in the way the 67 Act was used in GB.

Something also needs to be put in place for rape victims. I don't like the idea of a rape clause because it inevitability means asking women to prove they have been raped. Therefore I can't avoid coming to the conclusion that some early abortion ought to be allowed. But where should the line be?

I'm an athiest. I'm not part of the every sperm is sacred brigade. I'm not obsessed with the moment of conception. My partner and I have used the morning after pill. But it being legal to abort a healthy baby at 24 weeks, as it is in GB, is nothing short of barbaric imho. Therefore it's a debate about shades of grey.

I used to think of the establishment of a heartbeat as a milestone I couldn't go past. I've moved that forward as when I thought about it a heartbeat isn't what makes us human. It's nothing more than a pump.

At 10 weeks though the head has formed as something recognisably human. A little misshapen but to me there is something that looks very human about it. So that's a line I would have difficulty in going past. It's only 2 weeks but for me it makes a big difference.

[dahamsta]

I'm putting my mod hat on here for a moment. Aside from mentions - documented mentions - of what others are saying about Downs, I don't want to see it mentioned here again. I certainly don't want to see it "debated", because it is scientifically irrelevant in this case. There will be no warnings about this, just suspensions and bans. It's a vile argument and I won't see it propagated here.

(This is a pre-emptive warning, I realise and am pleased that no-one has gone down this route yet to any great degree.)

[DannyInvincible]

Some "pro-life" advocates argue that legal restriction on women's bodily and reproductive autonomy is justified as they regard a foetus as a life with human rights. However, some of these "pro-life" advocates also say they would permit exceptions and allow abortive treatment in the cases of rape or fatal foetal abnormality, but how do they square this with their simultaneous insistence that the foetus is a life with human rights? Why would the fact that a foetus might have potentially-fatal abnormalities or the fact that it might have been conceived through rape mean that the otherwise asserted human rights all of a sudden evaporate into thin air? By their logic, isn't the foetus in those circumstances still a human with the right to life?

"Pro-life" advocates also tend to avoid answering just how far they would go to enforce their ban on abortion. Do they support the law merely acting as a means of practically-unenforceable "moral" guidance, would they advocate the idea of fining "guilty" women or would they go as far as threatening women who might wish to procure an abortion with potential criminalisation in order to legally force them to endure and deliver a pregnancy against their wishes? I have yet to see a "pro-life" advocate adequately deal with this question.

[backstothewall]

Some "pro-life" advocates argue that legal restriction on women's bodily and reproductive autonomy is justified as they regard a foetus as a life with human rights. However, some of these "pro-life" advocates also say they would permit exceptions and allow abortive treatment in the cases of rape or fatal foetal abnormality, but how do they square this with their simultaneous insistence that the foetus is a life with human rights? Why would the fact that a foetus might have potentially-fatal abnormalities or the fact that it might have been conceived through rape mean that the otherwise asserted human rights all of a sudden evaporate into thin air? By their logic, isn't the foetus in those circumstances still a human with the right to life?

"Pro-life" advocates also tend to avoid answering just how far they would go to enforce their ban on abortion. Do they support the law merely acting as a means of practically-unenforceable "moral" guidance, would they advocate the idea of fining "guilty" women or would they go as far as threatening women who might wish to procure an abortion with potential criminalisation in order to legally force them to endure and deliver a pregnancy against their wishes? I have yet to see a "pro-life" advocate adequately deal with this question.

I can only speak for myself but I don't see the existence of life as being something that gets turned on at the moment of conception like one might turn on a light. I see it as being rather more complicated than that. It is not a binary state as different things develop at different times. I won't be posting diagrams of foetal development for obvious reasons but you can find them yourself if you are interested in understanding my thinking. What is clearly no more than a ball of cells at 4 weeks is (in my opinion) identifiable as human by 10 weeks.

Virtually nobody believes in completely unrestricted abortion up to 40 weeks. Therefore almost everybody is granting the foetus rights once a pregnancy reaches a certain defined point. That has to be a arbitrary line in the sand, and unfortunately it can never be a perfect system, but it's the best we have. If this was simple it wouldn't arise such passions on all sides.

[DannyInvincible]

I can only speak for myself but I don't see the existence of life as being something that gets turned on at the moment of conception like one might turn on a light. I see it as being rather more complicated than that. It is not a binary state as different things develop at different times. I won't be posting diagrams of foetal development for obvious reasons but you can find them yourself if you are interested in understanding my thinking. What is clearly no more than a ball of cells at 4 weeks is (in my opinion) identifiable as human by 10 weeks.

Virtually nobody believes in completely unrestricted abortion up to 40 weeks. Therefore almost everybody is granting the foetus rights once a pregnancy reaches a certain defined point. That has to be a arbitrary line in the sand, and unfortunately it can never be a perfect system, but it's the best we have. If this was simple it wouldn't arise such passions on all sides.

Is it primarily a visual thing for you then, so, the more human the foetus might look, the harder you would feel it would be to justify permitting an abortion? Or would you consider other factors too in determining your preferred limit?

Personally, I would have difficulty with using the law to force a woman to proceed with a pregnancy that she didn't want, but if a legal restriction has to be imposed upon "on demand" abortions, I feel that around the point at which a foetus might develop the capability to perceive pain would be a reasonable cut-off point after which an abortion "on demand" would be prohibited. Of course, that point won't be the same for every foetus and, as you say, it is arbitrary, but that's where I would put a legal limit if I had to. I believe that point would be around 20-24 weeks for an "average" foetus. This also happens to be the point after which the "average" foetus would begin to become viable.

One would hope that that length of time would provide enough time for a woman who might contemplate having an abortion (for any reason) to have made a decision.

Where there might be a likely-fatal foetal abnormality or a palpable or serious risk to the health (physical or mental) or life of a pregnant woman, I would expect no time limit. Obviously, determinations in these circumstances would involve consultation with and approval by medical practitioners and/or psychiatrists, if necessary.

For what it's worth, there are a few countries where there is no time limit stipulated in law; they are Canada, China, Vietnam and North Korea, as far as I know. In Canada, it seems the matter is "regulated" by professional medical guidelines rather than the law. I'd need to study more how the system works there, but I do like that idea as I find the notion of criminalising women who might have abortions distinctly unappealing.

[backstothewall]

Is it primarily a visual thing for you then, so, the more human the foetus might look, the harder you would feel it would be to justify permitting an abortion? Or would you consider other factors too in determining your preferred limit?

Personally, I would have difficulty with using the law to force a woman to proceed with a pregnancy that she didn't want, but if a legal restriction has to be imposed upon "on demand" abortions, I feel that around the point at which a foetus might develop the capability to perceive pain would be a reasonable cut-off point after which an abortion "on demand" would be prohibited. Of course, that point won't be the same for every foetus and, as you say, it is arbitrary, but that's where I would put a legal limit if I had to. I believe that point would be around 20-24 weeks for an "average" foetus. This also happens to be the point after which the "average" foetus would begin to become viable.

One would hope that that length of time would provide enough time for a woman who might contemplate having an abortion (for any reason) to have made a decision.

Where there might be a likely-fatal foetal abnormality or a palpable or serious risk to the health (physical or mental) or life of a pregnant woman, I would expect no time limit. Obviously, determinations in these circumstances would involve consultation with and approval by medical practitioners and/or psychiatrists, if necessary.

For what it's worth, there are a few countries where there is no time limit stipulated in law; they are Canada, China, Vietnam and North Korea, as far as I know. In Canada, it seems the matter is "regulated" by professional medical guidelines rather than the law. I'd need to study more how the system works there, but I do like that idea as I find the notion of criminalising women who might have abortions distinctly unappealing.

I wouldn't say it is a visual thing. It's about the development the the point at which the foetus has become identifiable as human. There will obviously be a visual element to that. For example one of the things that makes a foetus at an earlier stage of development not meet that standard imho is the presence of a tail (the foetal tail is an evolutionary throwback to our ancestor species of primate). That is obviously something that is visible, but it is not that visibility that makes a difference for me. It is not that I can't see a tail anymore that is important to me, it is that there is no tail.

At 10 weeks the human form is pretty much there. All the parts are more or less formed, and are more or less in the right places.

Where the health of the mother is in danger I'd certainly be prepared to do something later in a pregnancy. Whilst i consider there to be a human life in the womb, the mother also has a human life that must come first. I said above that I think aborting a health pregnancy at 24 weeks is barbaric. Allowing a woman to die because of absolute restrictions on abortion was at least as barbaric. What happened in Galway should never have happened in a civilised country and must be allowed to happen again.

[osarusan]

If the argument against abortion involves invoking the innocence of the foetus, human rights of the foetus, its status as (or potential to become) a human being, then the exception made in the case of rape always strikes me as inconsistent. It is no less innocent, human, or possessing of fewer rights, because of the circumstances of its conception?

I can understand the argument behind the exception on a deeper level, as certainly, there is a huge difference between consensual sex and rape, but in terms of the foetus and its possession of the above attributes, I am not sure that it can consistently extend that far.

[harry crumb]

The lack of coherence on the repeal side will see it defeated.

3 months is a hard sell.

[DannyInvincible]

Polls consistently show that a majority of voters (usually around 60 per cent) are in favour of repealing. It's those who wish to retain the eighth amendment who have ground to make up surely. Polls show that less than a third of people wish to retain the amendment.

[osarusan]

The Irish supreme court has overruled a high court decision, and found that the unborn has no constitutional rights outside those in the 8th amendment, which seems to have been the only hurdle that would have prevented the referendum taking place.

The Supreme Court has ruled that the unborn has no rights under the Constitution other than the right to life in the Eighth Amendment, in a landmark case about the extent of the rights of the unborn.

The State had appealed a High Court finding that the unborn has constitutional rights beyond the right to life.

[...]

The High Court found his unborn child had rights under the Constitution beyond the right to life.

The State appealed the finding.

It argued the only right the unborn has is the right to be born and all other constitutional rights, including the right to the care and company of a parent, take effect at birth.

https://www.rte.ie/news/2018/0307/94...hts-of-unborn/

[backstothewall]

Date set for May 25th.

The tone of the debate has started low and is going downhill fast.

[backstothewall]

How do people feel this is going? It's a week out and I get the feeling all the noise is coming from the 2 extremes and the media. The middle ground seem to have totally disengaged.

Low turnout likely as a result?