Youth on both sides mobilise ahead of Irish abortion referendum
Text by Catherine Bennet, France 24, 2018-02-13
As
Ireland prepares to hold a May referendum on the Irish constitution’s
anti-abortion amendment, the youth vote is front and centre of the debate – and
young activists on both sides are gearing up for a fight.
© Paul
Faith, AFP | Protesters take part in the March for Choice calling for the
legalisation of abortion in Dublin on September 30 following the referendum
announcement.
A
previous national referendum in 1983 approved the Irish constitution’s Eighth
Amendment, which recognised an unborn child’s right to life. Women who have an
abortion in Ireland can face up to 14 years in prison – leading thousands of
women each year to seek to terminate their pregnancies in England and Wales.
Last week
marked 26 years since a 14-year-old Irish girl travelled to London with
her parents to seek an abortion after being raped by a neighbour. Her plight
led to the Irish Supreme Court's landmark
1992 "X" case, which established the right to an abortion
if a woman's life was at risk, including at risk from suicide. Although the
decision sparked outrage across much of Ireland, thousands of others took to
the streets to express their support for the girl (known only as
"X"), and the case remains a key turning point in the country’s
abortion debate.
In his
speech announcing the upcoming referendum, set to be held in late May, Ireland’s
Prime Minister (Taoiseach) Leo Varadkar called for “no more X cases".
“We
already have abortion in Ireland but it is unsafe, unregulated and
unlawful," he said. "We cannot continue to export our problems and
import our solutions.”
Varadkar
also pointed out that no one under the age of 52 had ever voted on the topic.
For young activists, this is an opportunity for a new generation to have its
say on a subject that had previously been decided for them.
And with
little time left before the vote, young activists are getting organised.
‘Young
people see this as their issue’
“Young
campaigners feel the weight of history since 1983 on them,” says Síona Cahill,
deputy president for the country’s Union of Students and the chair of pro-choice
group Students for Choice.
Cahill
says that more pro-choice student societies have been created across Ireland
over the last year and feminist societies are also engaging in the issue. She
said that the number of pro-choice students who attended the annual March for Choice in Dublin on September 2017 was
double that of the previous year.
“We have
seen a groundswell of incredibly creative direct action, unlike anything in
previous years,” she told FRANCE 24. “Young people see this as their issue. We
get one opportunity to make sure that this wrong is righted and we remove
something that doesn’t make sense from our constitution.”
An Ipsos-MRBI
poll published in The Irish Times on January 25 shows that voters
aged between 18 and 24 would vote overwhelmingly in favour of repealing the
Eighth Amendment – at 74 percent. In comparison, only 42 percent of voters aged
50-64 would be in favour of a repeal, with that number falling to 36 percent
among voters over 65.
The
country’s Union of Students pushed to hold the new referendum in May, before
exam period, so that the scores of young people who leave the country over the
summer to travel or work abroad are able to take part.
Ireland’s
young voters have mobilised before: In 2015, the gay marriage referendum first
spawned the #hometovote movement, with expatriates sharing
photos online of airport queues and packed planes as they rushed home to cast
their ballots. The referendum saw record-high turnout, particularly among
younger voters.
Professor
Gail McElroy, the head of the political science school at Trinity College
Dublin, thinks that young people will “play a key role” in the May vote. She
told FRANCE 24, “It will be important because the most pronounced difference in
terms of demographics is between younger and older voters. There is a parallel
here with the marriage equality campaign, which was led by young people.”
Location,
location, location
But
despite the support for the repeal seen in opinion polls, there are plenty of
dissenting voices among the youth.
For Cian
Flaherty, 21, an anti-abortion campaigner and fourth-year student at Trinity
College Dublin, the referendum on marriage equality – which he
supported – is in no way comparable to abortion. “Abortion is the antithesis of
equality,” he says. “Marriage equality was part of a move towards a more
tolerant, inclusive Ireland. Legislating for abortion would be a move in the
opposite direction.”
Clare
Crowley is a fourth-year medical student at the University of Limerick and a
campaigner with the university’s anti-abortion association, the Life Society.
She says the group has been attracting more members in the run-up to the
referendum and is stepping up its activities as a result. The society actively
campaigns on and off campus, inviting anti-abortion speakers to events, going
door to door, and having “street sessions” a couple of times a month.
Crowley
believes that talking to people on the street can be what changes minds.
“People often perceive people who are pro-life to be older, Catholic and very
religious,” she explains. “I think meeting young, pro-life people can make a
big impact.”
Geography
could be a key factor in the vote. Dublin and other urban hubs are
traditionally pro-choice, whereas the opposite is the case in more rural parts
of Ireland. A January survey by the Irish Independent found that the
number of TDs (members of parliament) opposed to unrestricted abortion up to 12
weeks is four times greater in rural Ireland than in Dublin.
Crowley
agrees that location has a lot to do with how the abortion issue is perceived.
“I also studied at Trinity College Dublin and saw quite a difference,” she
says. “People there who are pro-life might have reservations about being as
vocal as the pro-choice movement.”
Biased
media coverage?
For
Ireland’s anti-abortion campaigners, it can sometimes feel like they’re sailing
against the wind: Many report that Irish media coverage is blatantly pro-choice
and that there is little information available on the other side of the issue.
“At the
moment, much of social media is dominated by one voice,” says Róisín Bradley, a
postgraduate student and anti-abortion campaigner at Trinity College Dublin.
“However, on the ground, the practical reality is that many, many young people –
despite being subjected to only one side of the debate – actually hold
pro-life views.”
Lauran
Kilmartin, a 25-year-old pro-choice campaigner from Dublin, says that it’s a
very divisive issue among young people, adding: “They’re the ones who will have
to live through the result."
And
neither side appears to be going down without a fight.
