I dreamed the referendum to repeal the Eighth Amendment had been lost, claims Donal O’Keeffe, and – after 35 years – the ‘pro-life’ still had no idea how Ireland should deal with crisis pregnancies.
In my dream, it was 11am on Saturday, 26th May, 2018, and I was listening to Seán O’Rourke on the wireless.
“Well, they say the Tallymen are seldom wrong,” offered the imaginary O’Rourke. “This morning, in what looks like a shock result, the Tallymen are saying the Nays have it. Early days, obviously, but it looks like the referendum to repeal the Eighth Amendment has been defeated by a small but decisive margin.
“In the studio with us are Cora Sherlock of the Pro-Life Campaign, businessman Declan Ganley, and Sunday Times columnist and Iona Institute spokesman, David Quinn.
“Also with us is Minister for Social Protection, Regina Doherty.
“If I could turn to you, Minister, where did the Yes side lose this campaign? I mean, many would say this referendum was an open goal for the Government, with early polls showing strong leads for Yes. In all fairness, it was your's to lose. Was it simply the case ye lost the run of yourselves and forgot the ‘silent Nos’? And, if I could say this, Regina Doherty, did you not yourself do damage when you floated the idea of a second referendum in the event of a No vote?”
“Well, Seán,” replied the imaginary Doherty, “I’ll accept failings on my part, and on the Government’s part, but you know as well as I do that was not what I said. I said those who campaigned so hard for Repeal would not accept lightly a No vote and would likely campaign for another vote. And of course the No side went to town with their customary pity party.”
I remember being quite impressed with the dream’s production values and thinking this sounded quite like the real Regina Doherty, when the pretend Minister was interrupted by a male panellist saying, “Pity party. Well isn’t that just typical.” She ignored him.
“Look, Seán, I wouldn’t accept anything in politics is ever an open goal, but it is great that you’re talking about people losing the run of themselves. I have to say, I don’t recall you – or indeed too many other journalists either – tackling Save The Eighth’s spokesman when he was championing a fake nurse called Noel Pattern, or when he was promoting the notion that completely innocent Yes campaigners were neo-Nazis.
“Perhaps if the media were less devoted to their slavish obsession with false balance, and had highlighted some of the despicable carry-on of the No side, we might be looking at a very different result this morning. Who knows?”
When Doherty had left the studio, the dream took a weird direction, as Seán O’Rourke turned to the victorious anti-Repeal side.
“Well, you’ve won,” he said. “You’ve had 35 years to think about this. So: what happens now, if an Irish woman is pregnant and decides – for whatever reason – that she doesn’t want to remain pregnant?”
There was an eerie silence in the dream-studio. After a moment, O’Rourke pressed on.
“Cora Sherlock, if I could turn to you, now that you have won, what does the Pro-Life Campaign propose to do to prevent Irish women from having abortions? How do we stop the dozen or so women a day who travel abroad for terminations? Should we have mandatory pregnancy tests in airports? What about the three women a day taking illegal, internet-sourced abortion pills at the risk of a 14-year jail sentence? How do you stop women accessing those pills?
“One pregnancy in five ends in miscarriage. Will grieving parents be forced to prove they haven’t taken abortion pills?”
But from Cora there came nary a word.
“Declan Ganley, you’ve won,” said O’Rourke. “The Eighth Amendment is saved. But 5,000 Irish women a year travel abroad for terminations, every year. Their rights to travel, and their rights to access information on seeking abortions in foreign jurisdictions, are enshrined in the Constitution in the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments. How do you propose to stop those women from travelling abroad? Do you propose campaigning to repeal the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments? Do you propose we start prosecuting women who have had abortions? Do you propose we close the borders?”
From my dream-radio, the silence became awkward, but there wasn’t a peep out of Watford’s favourite multimillionaire champion of the “pre-born”. By now, Seán O’Rourke was sounding rattled. So he turned to the man from Iona.
“David Quinn, I know I can depend on you for a comment.
“You’ve won. You’ve had 35 years to plan this. Where now for Irish women experiencing crisis pregnancies?
“Do we section women for seeking abortions? Of course, this has already happened, even before the referendum. And there was, as we know, the horrible case of the teenage refugee rape survivor who was hospitalised and force-fed until such time as she could be delivered of her rapist’s child by C-section.
“What do you propose we do with women who have crisis pregnancies? Could we lock them all up? Could we make them pay their way, perhaps in a modern version of the laundries? Could we take the resulting babies and sell them abroad for adoption?
“Is it fair to say that now you’ve saved the Eighth, an Irish woman loses all bodily autonomy once she suffers rape? Is it fair to say the Eighth is the ultimate exercise in power without responsibility? Is it fair to say you have nothing at all to offer Irish women except judgement, punishment and a cold, authoritarian ideology which reduces the worth of sentient women to that of a missed period?
“David?
“David?
“Declan?”
“Cora?
The silence was deafening.
I think the dream ended there.
Actually, no, I’m not certain. I can’t shake the feeling that maybe Dave, Deccie and Cora then joined hands and danced around Sean O’Rourke, and sang the Smurfs’ theme song.
Dreams are weird. Sometimes we think they’re prophetic, but usually they’re just nonsense.
Trouble is, real life is deadly serious.
Not for the lack of trying, but it seems downright impossible to get a straight answer from those opposing repeal of the Eighth Amendment when you ask what Ireland will look like if they win. That’s okay. We know what it will look like. Girls and women are exiled from it, a dozen a day.
Your vote on May 25 either changes Ireland for the better, or leaves it as it is. Do we continue to outsource terminations to the UK (pending Brexit)? Do we continue to compound the pain of parents with desperately-wanted, unviable pregnancies? Do we continue to turn a blind eye to girls and women taking illegal abortion pills without medical supervision? Do we continue to be a cold house for victims of rape and incest?
This is not a dream. There is a girl or a woman in our future. She is bleeding to death in her parents’ bathroom, or on a ferry home. One day, her name will be as well-known as Savita Halappanavar’s.
It’s up to you, but a No vote will only ensure that Ireland’s 35-year abortion nightmare continues.
