Hello,
In light of the death of Savita Halappanavar, there is a protest outside the Dail tonight by an Irish pro-choice group. In solidarity with the group, and to express our own shock and anger at the death of Savita Halappanavar, there will be a London-based pro-choice protest tonight. This will be at 6pm, at 17 Grosvenor Place, SW1X 7HR. Although it is short-notice, I hope that many of you can make it to express your own views on the terrible tragedy of a young women dying after her request for an abortion was refused.
For more information on Savita's death, please see: http://www.independent.ie/national-news/pregnant-woman-died-after-hospital-denied-abortion-3293842.html
If you have any further comments, please leave a comment below or tweet me, and if you have any pro-choice placards or banners, please bring them tonight!
UPDATE: good to see so many people interested in coming down tonight. Would really appreciate it if anyone with any banners, placards or flyers could get in touch ASAP, as there won't be time to make any before this evening. If you want to bring along candles or glowsticks or similar, go ahead!
UPDATE: Anne, from the wonderful Abortion Support Network, will be on hand to talk about the legal situation in Ireland and how to help. Visit http://www.abortionsupport.org.uk/ for more information.
Best wishes,
@FeministLondon
Great idea, I will be there.
ReplyDeleteI will be there. You should make a facebook event to help spread the word.
ReplyDeletePlease get an event page up soon. There's lots of people I want to invite, I'm definitely coming.
ReplyDeleteHello!
ReplyDeletehttp://www.facebook.com/#!/events/297721726995434/ is the facebook event page. Please come along, bring friends, bring loud voices so we can make a lot of noise!
Thank you for all your support guys!
I'll be along and I'm going to do up some flyers with a bit of background info. Nothing fancy, but enough to inform people.
ReplyDeleteFab! That's really helpful! I'll be outside the embassy from about 5.30 so see you later!
DeleteHi
ReplyDeleteThis outraged reaction is quite human and understandable, but one tragic death should not be used to promote the deaths of countless others. There is adequate constitutional provision in Ireland for abortion in such circumstances but the medical people involved got it wrong. Simple as that. Just a thought from Ireland.
There's constitutional provision but no legislation. No one organising events is promoting the deaths of others.
DeleteHi conan. If you're sending your thoughts from Ireland are you aware that Catholic ethos - which apparently prevented medical intervention in Savita's pregnancy - seems also to allow the facilitation of the physical & sexual torture of thousands of children!
DeleteSeems to me the 'right to life' movement is against those already alive!
@Conan:
ReplyDeleteSpeaking only for myself, I have a very clear and precise desire that I hope will be facilitated by this protest, and I've taken pains to ensure that this is clear in the flyer I wrote up to help people understand the issue.
What I want is for the Irish government to follow the ruling handed down in the X Case (and the instructions handed down by the European Court of Human Rights) and enact legislation that formalises the mechanisms under which medical professionals in Ireland are allowed to administer abortions in those cases where the life of the mother would be at risk through continuing the pregnancy.
That is all. The question of wider access to abortion is a separate one, and one that I think does need further discussion, but I think we should sort out the long-standing embarrassment that is the failure of our government to act on the ruling in the X Case first and then figure out how to move forward.
I should note, for the record, that I'm an Irish citizen, currently living abroad. One of the various reasons I would have serious reservations about moving back to Ireland in future is the retrograde stance that the country takes, in my opinion, regarding women's reproductive rights. I would also like to note that a number of polls in Ireland have found that there is a substantial majority support for access to medical emergency terminations (ie mother's life is at risk), so despite what Youth Defence like to claim, there is not a majority anti-abortion/anti-choice view amongst the Irish population.
Hi
DeleteYes of course I agree largely with Kyle's input here, so enough of that. However, 'Knitter's' contribution is something else entirely. In a week in which we've seen the (English and English establishment) Savile stories of child abuse it's not really appropriate to be bringing up the old 'Irish Catholic' thing. Sexual abuse of young people is a world wide thing, outside of any particular culture. Look at your internet!