All posts by jcjosAdmin

This Revolution is being Broadcast….

April 6, 2016 jcjosAdmin Leave a comment

This morning I had to as part of one of my college modules deliver a 2 minute oral presentation on a topic of my choosing. I had chosen 5 reasons to Repeal the 8th as my topic, but given recent events decided to do 5 facts about the abortion pills.

“Good Morning, I am here to tell you two things and five facts. ”

I raised my right hand up with with raised fingers and then my left with five raised fingers. Then lowered my right and and ticked off with my fingers on my right both things.

“The first thing I am going to tell you is that I am angry, very angry and that anger is why I am not going to talk about the topic I indicated to our lecturer I am going to instead in light of the court case in Belfast, I am going to talk about the abortion pills.

The second thing I will tell you is that, some of what I am about to say may be illegal, it may break the 1995 abortion information act, but as no one has ever been prosecuted under the act and the abortion pills were not considered when it was created I don’t know for sure. ”

I then lowered my right and and raised my left with all fingers raised, curling one after the other as I ticked off each fact starting with my index finger.

“The first fact is that the pills which are know as the abortion pills are legal for that use everywhere in the EU bar Ireland and Malta. The have been legal in France from 1988, which means that in 1992 if Miss X the 14 year old who was raped had of lived in France she could have been prescribed the pills by a dr and the pregnancy ended in 24hours, instead of facing court injunctions, traveling and national uproar.

The second fact is that the pills are legally used everywhere in the EU bar Ireland and Malta to end a pregnancy in the first 10 to 12 weeks of a pregnancy. This means if Migrant Y had of been in another EU country when she discovered she was 8 pregnant from rape, she could have been she could have been prescribed the pills by a dr and the pregnancy ended in 24hours. Instead due to the 8th amendment she was forced to continue a pregnancy she did not want, had medical treatment she did not want and was forced to have a C Section.

The third fact is the pills are part of health care, if you are undergoing chemotherapy and the mandatory test you do before you start your scheduled dose show you are pregnant the chemotherapy is stopped. This Happened to Michele Harte, she took the hospital in Cork to court to get an abortion to continue her chemo and was denied. Eventually while very ill she travelled to the UK for an abortion and came back to continue her chemotherapy. In any other EU country bar Ireland and Malta you can be she could have been prescribed the pills by a dr and the pregnancy ended in 24hours. Michele Sued the HSE and won, but died from her cancer soon after.

The fourth fact is these pills are prescribed to women all over the country by maternity hospitals and units when they have had a incomplete miscarriage. They are prescribed the pills by a dr and fill the prescription, take the pills at home and what is left of the pregnancy is ended in 24hours.

The fifth fact is that if the young woman in Belfast, who has been given a suspended sentence, had of being living in another part of the UK in Scotland, Wales or England, the use of the pills would have been legal, she would have for free been prescribed the pills by a dr and filled the prescription, taken the pills at home. If she lived in the Republic of Ireland she could have been given a sentence of up to 14 years”

At this stage I folded down my thumb creating a fist of solidarity and kept it raised.

“I am angry and today I stand in solitary with the young woman in Belfast, with the 10 women a day who travel to Ireland to the UK to have an abortion and the many others who can not afford to travel and risk 14 years to import and use the abortion pills at home.

I am Janet O’Sullivan, I am a spokesperson for the Abortion Rights Campaign, and if you want to hear me talk more on this, I will be on Community Radio Castlebar, 109.2fm at 5:30pm. This Revolution is being Broadcast.”

I am still angry, but anger is an energy, it’s fueling a lot of us and we will use it to Repeal the 8th amendment and bring in the abortion rights which we need.

Activism and Agitation

Cis Het Patriarchy is everywhere

March 25, 2016 jcjosAdmin Leave a comment

Cis Het Patriarchy is everywhere, it is and even when we become aware of it’s impact and strive to change our thinking and behaviors, it can be hard to see how embedded it is.

It is so much so that both Cis and Hetrosexual are assumptions we make about people. They are actually labels, but they are unthinking applied in a manner which to make them ‘the norm’. If we really want to not make assumptions about people we have to start with trying to not automatically applying those labels to people.

And we need to look at our use of language and learn where it comes from, how it can be oppressive and even an micro aggression.

Microagression are important, some times they are verbal some times not, some times they are the words we unquestioningly use when talking or writing.

One of the things hard things about trying to be an inter-sectional feminist is trying to figure out my own assumptions and prejudices, which are due to the culture and society we live in.

The big acts/utterances of isms are easier not to do the the micro aggression of isms, esp when I’ve not looked at them or had them pointed out to me.

Thankfully I have learned a lot over the last 20 years. But I still ‘check myself’.

One of the ways I do is to interact and read the writings of other people who are also striving to be ‘less shit’ at being an intersectional feminist, one of those people is Aoife O’Riordan and her post recent writing is

Homophobia: letting go of the Capital H.

Well worth reading in my opinion.

Activism and Agitation

TV shows which dealt with abortion

March 19, 2016 jcjosAdmin Leave a comment

So this morning on my twitter feed there was a tweet by Donald Clarke with a link to his latest piece on the Irish Times Entitled Xena is gay: what next, Marriage?

The piece looks at how in the medium of TV gay* presentation has changed and be come more normalized and frequent but that women having abortion is not part of the stories show and how

Visibility matters. More than anything else, everyday encounters with gay people changed society’s attitudes to the marriage debate. When, as has happened recently, women calmly – without pretending to shame – discuss their own abortions in the media, chinks open up in the information cordon that has grown up around this fraught issue.

The people who commission TV programmes and commercial movies also need to show some guts. Viewers are not so fragile as advertisers and programmers pretend. They can be trusted with the real world.

The thing is, abortion has been part of the stories told via the medium of TV.

1989 the British sitcom Birds of a Feather, in its first season aired the episode Women’s Troubles, which dealt with Trush and an unexpected pregnancy, in which one of the two leads, Sharon chooses to have an abortion. It shows the two sisters supporting each other, despite them being in very different places in their lives when it comes to continuing a pregnancy.

Also in 1989 Degrassi High aired, a show about going to High School in Canada, by episode 2 of it’s opening season it had a student dealing with an unexpected pregnancy and what decision to make. Heather talks it out with her twin sister, who doesn’t agree with her choice but end the end supports and accompanies her to the clinic.

The Degrassi franchise was rebooted and Degrassi: The Next Generation also has had an abortion episode. The story was spit into two parts and aired at the start of 2004. Accidents will happen follows Manny’s process of choosing what to do, talking to her friend, her boyfriend and getting the support of her mother who bring her to the clinic.

Of course Sex and the City dealt with abortion, the episode Couda, woulda, shoulda aired in 2001 and deals with a range of the reproductive stories of the 4 ladies. Miranda is dealing with an unexpected pregnancy, Charlotte struggling with possible infertility and both Carrie and Miranda share their abortion stories.

2001 saw our very own Fair City have an abortion story line, Kay McCoy was happily pregnant when she and her husband get a fatal fetal diagnoses of , trisomy-13. Kay opts to travel to the UK to have a Termination for medical reasons. That was 15 years ago and needless to say the producers got hammered in the press and RTE had complaints lodged and vast tracts were written by anti abortion campaigners.

Abortion was also part of the stories in 6 foot under, orange is the new black, Grey’s Anatomy in 2011 dared to show more then ever before when Cristina Yang had her abortion, of course Girls had an abortion episode.

And most recently Scandal November 2015 had Olivia Pope choose to have an abortion which was counter pointed by Milly’s fillabustering in the US Senate to keep planned parenthood’s budget as non optional, echoing the 11 hours Wendy Davis spent on her feet to try prevent abortion restriction legislation in Texas.

So it is not that abortion doesn’t feature as a story in TV shows, but I think that the episodes are seen as too controversial at times to discuss.

Sure the Fair city Wikipedia lists all of the other scandals and issues which the show has covered but Kay’s abortion story and having to travel is barely listed and not dated like the rest of the entries. If anyone is an wiki editor and wants to make that addition the link is here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_City#Social_realism

So it does happen, even in an Irish context there is precedent. we have come a long way from when the brave people from Fubar Films made 50,000 secret journeys and the struggle to get it aired.

I do how ever echo Donald’s call to have more programs made which do cover abortion and in such away that shows how normal it is, but how abnormal having to travel is; but also how the 8th amendment is detrimental to all maternal care and is more then just about abortion.

*[Gay only as bisexual representation is still far behind, I really must get around to writing about that]

Activism and Agitation

International Womens’ Day 2016

March 8, 2016 jcjosAdmin Leave a comment

When I wrote about the 100th anniversary of International Womens’ Day 5 years ago, there was very little about it anywhere. There certainly wasn’t a Google Doodle, there weren’t images being shared on Facebook and Twitter.

We have come along way in the last 105 years, we have come along way in the last 5 years.

We now have more women in the Dáil then ever, the silence around reproductive rights is being broken, the women esp young women are not hesitant to call themselves feminists.Women are sharing about the stuff they put up with, which we shouldn’t have too.

But we have far to go, to #repealthe8th and undo the years of cultural sexism in our society. This was written the year I was born, 40 years ago and much of this work still needs to be done.

I hope to live for at least another 40 and now more then ever I am optimistic that we will see the changes, we all need for a better, fairer, kinder society.

Happy International Womens’ Day! Onwards and Upwards!

The Wanton Witch

A prayer on the eve of the General Election

February 25, 2016 jcjosAdmin Leave a comment

This evening (sunset) I will be lighting a candle for Ireland and it’s people as we go to the polls tomorrow to elect new Members of Dáil Éireann.

I will work so that the new Teachta Dála we elect tomorrow, will work for the good of the land and the people. That they will heed the plight of those who’s lives have become more miserable over the last 5 years due to the regressive policies.

I will also work that all those who can vote tomorrow take the time to do so, that we have close to or more then 75% turn out. We are an old country but a young sovereign republic, we are not yet 100 years old, unused to governing ourselves, but there are times despite all it’s failings I have been proud of this country of mine.

I hope that the will and compassion of the People which was felt in the Yes Equality referendum will once again lift us all up tomorrow.

Uncategorized

Remembering Savita, 3 years on and what has changed?

October 28, 2015 jcjosAdmin Leave a comment

This hasn’t been easy to write, it is hard to believe it has been 3 years.

3 years ago today on the 28th of October 2012 Savita Halappanavar died, leaving behind her bereft husband. On the 21st of October she had started to have a miscarriage and as the 8th amendment dictates miscarriage management in Ireland she was denied the options and care which would have been available to her in other countries.

She asked for the pregnancy to be ended, she asked for an abortion as there was no way to save the pregnancy and this was denied to her as there was a fetal heartbeat. So she was left to miscarry and eventually through a series of callous missteps went on to die from infection. The news of her death didn’t break in the press until the 14th of November when he husband took advice having not been able to believe the responses he was getting from the hospital admins. What happened to Savita shocked people in Ireland and internationally.

There were vigils held in front of the Dáil, all over Ireland and across europe. So many people started to wake up to what the 8th amendment means in terms of restriction to health care. The 1st big March for Choice had already happened and those who helped put that together did their best to network and get the word out about the vigils.

The next year the government finally after 23 years moved legislation to cover the X Case ruling. This became known as a the Protection of Life in Pregnancy Act. This allowed for abortion in the case where a person is pregnant and suicidal. This new law did nothing to change miscarriage management. The international best practice for miscarriage management where there is no way to save the pregnancy is to offer the option of ending the pregnancy, either via surgery or via medical abortion using abortion pills.

Neither of these are currently legal in Ireland, and the new law the Protection of Life in Pregnancy Act imposes a 14 year criminal sanction on any woman or dr who would end a pregnancy with a fetal heartbeat even in the case of inevitable miscarriage. This is another tragedy waiting to happen. Medical professionals should not have to wait for a patient’s condition to decline from the threat to health to a threat to life before taking action.

While the legally and medically nothing has changed in terms of the restrictions to miscarriage management, we as a nation has woken up to the injustices which the 8th amendment causes. Many brave women have stepped forward to share their stories so that we no longer only hear about this issue when someone had died or had taken a case to the courts.

The stigma which surrounds being pro choice and having had an abortion is being fought, we have had people stand up and say enough is enough, the Abortion Rights Campaign has been joined in their fight to repeal the 8th by Unions, Artists and by NGOs. Political parties find themselves having to state where they stand on the issue of repealing the 8th and if it is a red line issues for them.

Many people will be making sure they Vote Pro Choice in the upcoming General Election. Hopefully then we will soon see a referendum to remove the horrific amendment which has caused so much suffering and we will see miscarriage management and healthcare in Ireland come in line with best practice so that no one else when they ask for an abortion; esp when they are in pain and suffering (which the UN Committee on Human Rights terms as torture), demand an abortion to end it, it will be a health care option medical staff can offer in all our maternity hospitals and units.

3 years on and it’s still hard to watch the video of Savita dancing in the St Paticks Day parade in Galway. Herself and Praveen moved here, were part of the local community, wished to raise children here. In any other country she would have been given the abortion she asked for and then be able to go on to maybe have a child which she could have taught to dance, with whom she could have celebrated Diwali with next month.


For Savita - Never Again from Christopher Tierney on Vimeo.

We need to repeal the 8th amendment so that the words “Never Again” have real meaning for all those living in Ireland.

Worlds Beyond

Octocon2015

October 9, 2015 jcjosAdmin Leave a comment

I will be in the wonderful geeky bubble which is www.octocon.com all weekend.
Mind yourselves while I am off event running and getting to be on so many panels which are so inter sectional it has made me squee.

Panels on bodily autonomy in young adult fiction, on bisexual representation in fiction, on sex workers in fiction, on genderqueerness in fiction, on mental health & neuro diversity in fiction and fandom community and magic & pagan ism in fiction.

This is my schedule for the weekend, you can have a look at the rest of line up here

http://app.octocon.com/#

Scifi/fantasy fandom has this rep of being all older cis white hetro men. It’s not. Both guests of honor this weekend are amazing and also women. Many of out guest authors joining us are women I admire, and I know I will also be surrounded by lovely feminist men.

I will be tweeting from @Octocon over the weekend if you want to see what I am up to.

Uncategorized

So I have been invited to Trinity by The University Philosophical Society

October 2, 2015 jcjosAdmin Leave a comment

I was surprised and delighted to be invited to be a speaker at a debate in Trinity College Dublin hosted by The University Philosophical Society; which is said to be The World’s Oldest Student Society.

The motion up for debate is “This House would Sell it’s Virginity”, it is bound to be an interesting debate and I am looking forward to it. I will up date this when I find out who the other speakers are to be. The Debate will take place on Thursday the 8th of October.

Activism and Agitation

Bisexual Visibility Day 2015

September 22, 2015 jcjosAdmin Leave a comment

http://www.bivisibilityday.com/

Bi Visibility Day, also known as International Celebrate Bisexuality Day, has been marked each year since 1999 to highlight biphobia and to help people find the bisexual community.

Events happening in Ireland, The Bi+ Ireland Network have 4 meet ups happening in Dublin, Cork, Galway and Belfast.

We’re an Ireland-wide organisation working to create social and community space for nonmonosexual people based in, from, or closely connected to Ireland. Our aim is to create a space where bi+ people can make friends, access peer support and reduce any isolation they may experience. We aim to increase the visibility and presence of bi+ people throughout the island and to create diverse, vibrant and welcoming communities.

Get in touch either through here or with our email: biirelandnetwork@gmail.com
or on facebook https://www.facebook.com/groups/1386176571628425/ or on twitter https://twitter.com/IRLBi

Every Autumn Equinox Bisexual people who can safely do so celebrate it in an effort to reduce bisexual erasure, and increase bisexual acceptance. This is important as bisexual people do not get the same support and acceptance gay and lesbian people do, from the gay or straight community. This leads to bisexual people being more likely to suffer from mental health issues and to struggle more in their life. Bisexual people are also more likely to also have experienced partner abuse as a result and also not to be out to friends and family.

Young people need to know that, yes for some people iding as bisexual is part of them discovering themselves and they may go on to eventually come out as gay, many people don’t. Bisexuality is a valid sexuality, it is not being confused, it is not being greedy, it is the ability to be sexually or romantically attracted to a person who’s gender is the same or different to your own.

Activism and Agitation

Why I am going to the March for Choice 2014

September 17, 2015 jcjosAdmin Leave a comment

This will be the 4th Annual March for Choice, it happens on the Saturday closest to 28th of September which is Global Day of Action for Access to Safe and Legal Abortion.

Two years ago I took part in a Speak out which happened before the March For Choice. It was huge for me, I told my story to the people gathered there in the room, I listened to other women tell their stories, we laughed, hugged and cried together, and it helped me to go on to tell it to others.

Last year more women spoke out and shared their stories, it is a wonderful space to be in, I hope we can organize more spaces and opportunities like this across the country.

Attending the March For Choice last year having been so public about my abortion was so very very moving. I was surrounded by 100s of people who didn’t think I had done anything wrong, and thought that I had nothing to be ashamed of.

I had many people thank me that day, I had people hug me, I had people quietly come up to me and say ‘Me too!’ and I hugged them. I am looking forward to being at this years March for Choice. To be able to hold my head up high with the support of so many people had been trans formative. I hope to see you there.