Ireland's abortion debate has already succeeded in shifting my position

Ireland’'s abortion debate has already succeeded in shifting my position

I’m adamantly pro-choice, but was ambivalent about liberalising UK laws. The Irish referendum has changed all that

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A yes campaign banner for Ireland’s abortion referendum on the repeal of the eighth amendment. Photograph: Barry Cronin/AFP/Getty Images

They came from Los Angeles, from Bangkok, from Sydney, from Buenos Aires; from all four corners of the globe. One woman said her plane ticket was a birthday present from her boyfriend, who knew how much it meant to her. Others are funded by student unions, family whip-rounds, expats who have been away too long to take part. Young Irish women and men are coming home to vote in Ireland’s abortion referendum, many wearing their hearts on the sleeves of their repeal jumpers. They swap knowing glances in airports, proudly tweeting and Instagramming as they go. The #HomeToVote phenomenon is an extraordinarily moving, powerful sight. For what cause would you fly halfway round the world and back again? Only one that cuts to the heart of who you are, how you seek to live.

Repealing the eighth amendment would be seismic enough, since it’s what guarantees the unborn a right to life even when the mother has been raped, is practically a child herself, or is carrying a wanted baby with such severe abnormalities it cannot survive. But this referendum has become a public test of so much more; of a woman’s place in society more generally, of a scandal-ridden Catholic church’s moral authority, even of shifting dynamics between the sexes in the #TimesUp era.

?w=620&q=55&auto=format&usm=12&fit=max&s=56ae9e0a594556ea1af78bdcf786eb9b Irish people in London attend a rally for the yes campaign ahead of Ireland’s abortion referendum. Photograph: David Levene for the Guardian
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We who watch from abroad – fingers crossed for yes – know we have no right to interfere in Ireland’s decision. We don’t want to presume, yet cannot look away: it’s too visceral. You don’t need to have had an abortion yourself to be profoundly grateful that the right not to give birth against your will exists, a backstop to every other freedom women have. Besides, the Irish vote feels like an omen, a sign of the way the global winds are blowing. Rather like the teen movement for gun control in America, it’s tempting to see the yes movement as part of a millennial blowback against gathering reactionary forces – although older women raised in darker days, when supposedly “fallen” women endured grim punishment in mother and baby homes, are often as anxious for change as their daughters. But there may be more practical implications for Britain too.

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To be clear: a vote for repeal would allow Ireland’s parliament to consider reforming abortion law, but doesn’t guarantee this. The proposals aren’t for no-questions-asked abortion on demand, and they are not, despite what some no campaigners say, wildly more liberal than British law. But they are different: stricter in some ways (abortion would be legal beyond 12 weeks of pregnancy, and up to 24, only given a risk to the mother’s life, or serious harm to her health), and looser in one. Under the Irish proposals, a woman wouldn’t need to give a reason for seeking a termination before 12 weeks. She’d simply need a doctor to confirm her stage of pregnancy, and then undergo a 72-hour cooling-off period to reflect on the decision. In Britain abortion is legal up to 24 weeks only provided two doctors agree it’s justified on grounds including threat to the mother’s health, or to that of any existing children; serious foetal abnormality; risk to the mother’s life; or grave permanent injury to her.

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https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/may/24/ireland-abortion-debate-pro-choice-uk-laws-referendum