This thing on Facebook…

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

I don’t keep up with everything. I should but I don’t. A friend mentioned Eric Dondero to me and I had to resort to Google, because I hadn’t kept up. He’s pretty funny.

 Republicans around the country are responding to President Obama’s reelection in a variety of ways — among them: anger, depression, finger-pointing. But nobody had the same reaction as Eric Dondero, a former Ron Paul aide who blogs at LibertarianRepublican.net. In a post yesterday, Dondero, reasoning that the only recourse to Obama’s victory is “outright revolt,” laid out the terms of the “personal boycott” against Democrats which he plans to maintain for the rest of his life and which he hopes his followers will as well. What does the boycott entail? Cutting all ties with Democratic family members, friends, and lovers; refusing to work for a Democratic boss; spitting on the ground when a Democrat talks to you; and possibly shitting on your Democratic neighbor’s lawn, among other things.

That last one would be really hard to do! Think about it. You’d have to set the alarm for, like, 2 in the morning, because if you tried it at 11 or midnight, you just know some nocturnal nabe down the street would be walking a dog and the dog would totally run over to you while you were squatting there, and knock you over and jump around and bark while the human shouted “WHAT ARE YOU DOING THERE?!!” It would be soooo embarrassing. You’d have to move out. So you get up at 2 and go over to the neighbor’s lawn – and force yourself to shit? Yeah good luck with that.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

And it continues. Remember the crazed reactions to Rebecca’s article in Slate? In particular the one where Russell Blackford took the trouble to tweet a reporter for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation in order to call Rebecca a liar? This one?

He’s at it again, or still. He’s still doing what he can to harm Rebecca.

 Why? I don’t know. I do not know.

He might say it’s because of Stef McGraw, but that doesn’t make sense. Stef McGraw doesn’t consider Rebecca the world’s most evil monster bully. Remember?

 Photo by Brian S. Engler.

 There are a lot of crazy people out there who want to destroy Rebecca. And there’s Russell Blackford, who also wants to destroy Rebecca. I don’t understand that.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Moving from Dublin and Galway to Athens for a moment – actors in and the producer and director of “Corpus Christi” have been charged with blasphemy.

A production of “Corpus Christi” in Athens was canceled this month after weeks of almost daily protests outside the theatre by priests and right-wing groups, including deputies from the ultra-nationalist Golden Dawn party.

Charges of “insulting religion” and “malicious blasphemy” have been filed after Bishop Seraphim of Piraeus lodged a lawsuit against those involved in the play, the officials said.

Our worst nightmare, eh? Fascists joining priests, priests joining fascists. Teaming up to stamp out everything that’s not fascist and priestly.

Dozens of demonstrators, including some from Golden Dawn, blocked the entrance of the theatre and clashed with police on the night of the play’s premiere last month.

Bearded black-robed priests holding crosses were shown on television tearing up posters promoting the play. A powerful institution, the Orthodox Church plays an influential role in Greek society.

The prosecutor’s decision to press charges against Corpus Christi was condemned by anti-fascism groups who said political instability in the country was pushing the conservative-led coalition to turn to the far right for support.

“It’s the bullies and the neo-Nazis clashing outside the theatre who should be put on the stand and not the actors,” said Petros Constantinou, head of the United Against Racism and Fascist Violence Movement.

Sparta defeats Athens all over again.

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There’s a group that’s going to examine the A, B and C v Ireland judgment of the European Court of Human Rights. It was set up as of January 13th this year…so it doesn’t seem to be breaking its neck in the rush to get the job done.

The Expert Group is to report back to Government within six months with options on how to implement the judgment of the European Courts.

The European Court held there is no right for women to an abortion in Ireland, emphasising that there is no straightforward right to an abortion under the Convention, and that member states have a broad margin of appreciation to prohibit abortion.  However, given the violation of applicant C’s right to privacy, the result is that Ireland may have to further clarify whether and under which circumstances an abortion may be performed to save the life of a pregnant woman.

Ireland may have to further clarify whether and under which circumstances an abortion may be performed to save the life of a pregnant woman.

So as of now it’s not clear whether an abortion may be performed to save the life of a pregnant woman?

This is why people are so angry, you see. It’s become unpleasantly clear what that means in practice. It means women actually die because of a protracted miscarriage.

The Expert Group will be chaired by Justice Mr Sean Ryan and consist of the following 13 members:

• Dr Peter Boylan, Consultant Obstetrician and Gynaecologist
• Dr Mary Holohan, Consultant Obstetrician and Gynaecologist
• Dr Imelda Ryan, Psychiatrist,
• Dr Ailish Ni Riain, General Practitioner
• Dr Mark Walsh, General Practitioner
• Ms Christine O’Rourke, Office of the Attorney General
• Ms Mary O’Toole, Senior Counsel
• Ms Joanelle O’Cleirigh, Solicitor
• Ms Denise Kirwin, Solicitor
• Dr. Deirdre Madden, Medical Council
• Dr Maura Pidgeon, An Bord Altranais
• Dr Tony Holohan, Chief Medical Officer, Department of Health
• Mr Bernard Carey, Assistant Secretary, Department of Health

We’ll have to find out who they all are. We need to know if any are acting for the church.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

There are a lot of tweets about the terrible way the RTE is reporting on the Savita case and the protests against it. I’d already noticed its ridiculous headline.

Rallies held in Dublin, Galway in memory of Savita Halappanavar

Uh, no – those were protest rallies, not memorial services. They weren’t about just remembering Savita, they were about trying to make sure that what happened to her doesn’t happen to other women.

Subhead:

Several thousand people are marching through the centre of Dublin to attend a rally in memory of Savita Halappanavar, the woman who died following a miscarriage at University Hospital Galway.

That is one misleading subhead.

RTE talked to an official.

Earlier Minister of State at the Department of Health Kathleen Lynch said if the expert group on abortion recommends legislation to deal with the issue, the Government will have to act on it…

She said she was a great believer that if you put an expert group in place, you must wait to see what their recommendations are…

She agreed with Eamon Gilmore who said doing nothing is not an option.

However, equally it would be a very challenging and complex piece of legislation but it was more important to get it right rather than quick.

What’s so challenging and complex about it?

It’s not challenging and complex unless you let priests throw up a lot of obstacles.

I wonder how many priests are in that “expert group on abortion.”

Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation Richard Bruton has described the abortion issue as complex and very challenging.

It’s not. It’s not complex and very challenging (I like the way they switched the word order for the sake of variety – it reminds me of Apollo 13 – “Remember, you’re happy and thrilled and very proud”) unless you create pointless complexity.

Speaking as he arrived at the TEEU conference, Mr Bruton said he understood the report was coming to Government on Tuesday week when they would have an opportunity to discuss it.

He said the Programme for Government had resolved that abortion was an issue that would be addressed and that Government had rightly decided to have an expert group work over the ground for them and provide the insights to make the proper decisions.

We need to know who is in that expert group.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

There was a big rally in Dublin in the name of Savita Halappanavar to say Never Again. It just ended, I think. There are lots of pictures of the crowd on Twitter. I got permission to post one, by Gavan Reilly at TheJournal.ie.

Here’s another great photo, by Cathy Heffernan.

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EJ Graff is also angry.

Savita Halappanavar died because an entire country decided to sentimentalize every clump of dividing cells that might or might not be able to develop into a full human being. In fact, in this case, the clump of cells’ only actual effect was to destroy the life of its host, a real human being. As her husband told another newspaper:

How can you let a young woman go to save a baby who will die anyway? Savita could have had more babies. … It has been a terrible few weeks, very hard to understand how this could happen in the 21^st century, very hard to explain to her family. If it had happened in the UK or India, the whole thing would have been over in a few hours.

And he told Reuters, “I am still in shock. It is hard to believe that religion can mean somebody’s life.”

Actually it’s not hard, if you’ve been paying attention…in the US and Ireland and Nicaragua and other priest-ridden countries.

An academic at USCF just released longitudinal research called the Turnaway Study, which looks at what happened to women who couldn’t get abortions because they were too far along—and compared their mental, physical, and economic health to similar women who did have abortions. You’ll be absolutely shocked to learn that the women who had abortions fared much better than the women who were forced to carry the pregnancy to term. Their mental health was better. Their physical health was better. Their economic circumstances were more stable. They had fewer regrets.

Yes indeed, surprise surprise surprise. How astonishing, when the whole point of the right to abortion is the ability to decide not to do something that would make a huge major far-reaching change in your life that you don’t want to make. How astonishing to find that most people have some clue about what they want to do and what they don’t want to do.

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Emer O’Toole is from beautiful Galway. She was born in the hospital where Savita Halappanavar died because that hospital refused to treat her until too late. She is ashamed.

This is a Catholic country. If these were indeed the words used by the doctors, then the hospital did not feel the need to sugarcoat its rationale with references to Halappanavar’s psychological health, or the wellbeing of her foetus. Its ideology was not veiled – as Youth Defence, Precious Life and Ireland’s other powerful anti-abortion lobbyists have learned to do – in the language of care and concern for women. The rationale was not cloaked in academic arguments about the moment when human life begins.

It’s hard to veil refusal to save a woman’s life in the language of care and concern for women.

I know what it’s like to try to speak out against anti-choice hegemony in Ireland. I know how hard it is to even form pro-choice opinions at all. Like 95% of people schooled in Ireland, I had a Catholic education and was heavily propagandised against abortion. More, I had to navigate the biased information offered by the Irish press. RTÉ, our national broadcaster, did not even report on a 2,000-strong pro-choice march in Dublin earlier this year, while it continues to cover anti-abortion movements in the provinces. Teachers and journalists, this is your fault too.

It’s the same in the US, you know. How often do you see sympathetic characters in movies or tv shows get an abortion? How often do you see sympathetic characters in movies or tv shows decide to continue an unwanted pregnancy? I don’t know about you, but my answer to the first would have to be “never” and to the second “often.”

To her family, I want to say: I am ashamed, I am culpable, and I am sorry. For every letter to my local politician I didn’t write, for every protest I didn’t join, for keeping quiet about abortion rights in the company of conservative relations and friends, for becoming complacent, for thinking that Ireland was changing, for not working hard enough to secure that change, for failing to create a society in which your wife, your daughter, your sister was able to access the care that she needed: I am sorry. You must think that we are barbarians.

Again – it’s the same here. Bishops force hospitals to refuse to do abortions no matter what; religious hospital administrations decide that on their own; doctors and nurses refuse to do their jobs. The state looks the other way. Religion governs medical issues in many circumstances. This has got to stop. We have to work harder to make it stop.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Remember the destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas?

Remember the destruction of ancient mausoleums in Mali just a few months ago?

Now it’s the pyramids and the Sphinx.

Photo by Keith Yahl

 A jihadist fella called Sheikh Murgan Salem al-Gohary says they’re next.

Gohary, a jihadist with self-professed links to the Taliban, called for the “destruction of the Sphinx and the Giza Pyramids in Egypt,” drawing ties between the Egyptian relics and Buddha statues.

The Islamist, previously twice-sentenced under former President Hosni Mubarak for advocating violence, called on Muslims to remove such “idols.”

“All Muslims are charged with applying the teachings of Islam to remove such idols, as we did in Afghanistan when we destroyed the Buddha statues,” he said on Saturday during a television interview on an Egyptian private channel, widely watched by Egyptian and Arab audiences.

“God ordered Prophet Mohammed to destroy idols,” he added. “When I was with the Taliban we destroyed the statue of Buddha, something the government failed to do.”

His comments came a day after thousands of ultraconservative Islamists gathered in Tahrir Square to call for the strict application of Sharia law in the new constitution.

Theocracy hits one out of the park again.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Here’s a nice one from 1998, via Stacy. Not Ireland – Louisiana.

Michelle Lee knows she should not have another child. Her heart pumps so weakly and  irregularly that she has waited 2 1/2 years for a new one. The strain that  pregnancy puts on the body, her doctors had sternly warned her for years, might  kill her.

So last month, when she discovered she had accidentally gotten pregnant, Lee,  26, faced an agonizing prospect: saving her fetus or saving herself. She loves  babies. Yet, finally, she went to Louisiana State University  Medical Center, the century-old hospital whose cardiologists tend to her heart,  and said she wanted an abortion.

The hospital refused.

A committee of five LSU doctors concluded that Lee’s chance of dying was not  greater than 50 percent. And under Louisiana law, a public hospital could not  perform an abortion on Lee unless her life were endangered. They decided her  case didn’t meet the test.

Meh. 50 percent. Those are pretty good odds.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Jill Filipovic on the death of Savita Halappanavar.

She died after three and a half days of excruciating pain. She died after repeatedly begging for an end to the pregnancy that was poisoning her. Her death would have been avoided if she had been given an abortion when she asked for it – when it was clear she was miscarrying, and that non-intervention would put her at risk. But the foetus, which had no chance of survival, still had a heartbeat. Its right to life quite literally trumped hers.

It wasn’t even (as I’ve seen some mistakenly say) an attempt to save the fetus. It was just a refusal to act because the doomed fetus still had a pulse. It was just a determined decision to let both die rather than save one – the adult one with existing hopes and plans and work and people who loved her.

Just two months ago, a consortium of Irish doctors got together to declare abortion medically unnecessary. They claimed that abortion is never needed to save a pregnant woman’s life, and stated: “We confirm that the prohibition of abortion does not affect, in any way, the availability of optimal care to pregnant women.”

Tell that to Savita Halappanavar, you evil bastards.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Ok I’ve found a good thing. We shouldn’t need it, but since we do, it’s a good thing that it exists. The Secular Medical Forum.

The Secular Medical Forum campaigns for a secular approach to current major health issues.

We are opposed to religious influences in Medicine where these affect the manner in which medical practice is performed. We campaign to protect patients from the harm caused by the imposition of religious values and activities on people who do not share the same values and beliefs.

The SMF directs itself to the improvement of the human condition. SMF members do not recognise the assumed authority of religious bodies and we challenge their traditional privileges in healthcare service provision or decision-making.

It commented on the death of Savita Halappanavar.

The Secular Medical Forum believes that this death could have been prevented if Ireland’s law on abortion focused upon the need of vulnerable patients, rather than upon Catholic doctrine.  The SMF believes that healthcare should be provided free from the intrusion of religion.  Bioethics is hindered, not helped, by relying upon religious sentiments.

The SMF is aware that women around the world suffer due to the imposition of religious beliefs which takes away their autonomy over their own bodies.  If this case had occurred in the United Kingdom, it would have been legal for Mrs Halappanavar to have a safe abortion.  However in the UK there is the continual threat to abortion rights by religious groups who wish to inflict their particular beliefs upon other people.  The SMF defends the right of religious people to hold their beliefs; however, patients must remain free from unwelcome religious interference.

The SMF hopes that Ireland’s abortion laws are reformed so that this tragedy is not repeated.

I wonder if the US has an equivalent organization. It certainly needs one.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)