Queer and Voting Yes | Pocketmags.com

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Queer and Voting Yes

AISLING DOLAN 29

from Offaly, now living in Dublin

When our community marched in 1983 to protest the murder of Declan Flynn and the subsequent lack of justice, we were joined by women opposing the Eighth Amendment. These women stood with us in solidarity. They showed us a level of respect and dignity denied to us by wider society.

I trust pregnant people to make the best decision for themselves. I believe that every individual has the right to decide what happens to their bodies. As a cisgender woman, the Eighth Amendment affects my life. Doctors and nurses still check whether I’m pregnant before prescribing treatments, despite the fact that I have been in a relationship with a woman for the past eight years. If my fiancée and I have children in the future, my sexuality will not exempt me from the Eighth Amendment. The Eighth Amendment hangs over our entire community. I hope we do the right thing on polling day.

We asked the LGBT+ community how they will vote in the forthcoming referendum on to repeal the Eighth Amendment in Ireland’s constitution.

Here’s what they said:

JON HANNA 42

Dublin

In 1829 the British parliament passed the Ofences Against the Person (Ireland) Act. This included bans on consensual sex between men and on abortion, with a penalty of death by hanging for both.

While the penalties were later reduced, these bans remained part of Irish law, even after 26 counties had become independent. ‘Free’ Irish citizens still did not have freedom when it came to their own bodies.

The architects of the 8th Amendment inserted our repressive culture of shame into our constitution, as a bulwark against an erosion of that culture after the Supreme Court found that contraception was legal for married couples (but only married couples).

As was the intention, it decelerated the move towards freedom we have had since. Article 40.3.3 remains a tumour in a constitution that should be guaranteeing the liberty and safety of the Irish people, forcing those who can be pregnant into exile, bodily harm or even death. Decency demands that we repeal the Eighth. Liberty demands that we repeal the Eighth. Justice demands that we repeal the Eighth.

ROWAN CATHAN DALY 35

Gorey, Wexford

Repeal of the Eighth Amendment is absolutely an LGBT issue.

I am a bisexual person and a sexual assault survivor. I also had a miscarriage while in a long-term relationship. It was so early on in the pregnancy, I wasn’t aware I was pregnant until I miscarried. I remember being relieved to a degree, as well as saddened. I was in my early 20s and I could not have afforded to travel for medical assistance.

I’m now in my mid-30s and have a chronic illness called Fibromyalgia. I would struggle to access medical care abroad.

After struggling with mental health problems all my life, I have figured out my truth. I was born in the wrong body. I am at the very beginning of my journey as a transgender man. Unless my body significantly changes through hormone therapy or surgery, I will still need to access medical care for my reproductive organs. And some transgender men choose not to get surgery.

Whatever way your life looks, you should have the choice. The Eighth Amendment blocks that choice for many people with a womb in Ireland: women, transgender men, non-binary people and disabled people. Our bodies, our choice.

KEELI NEENAN 28

from Cork, now living in Dublin

Advocating for social justice and equality is really the grassroots of what binds our community together.

Growing up in pre-marriage referendum Ireland, both socially and legally, I was not viewed the same way as my heterosexual peers. That has a massive impact on a young person. It is a damaging thing not to feel respected by one’s own state.

As a woman, I still face this. Under the Eighth Amendment, I am not offered the right to bodily autonomy. I am still viewed as a second class citizen.

We have been failed for long enough: forced to procure illegal pills, to travel, and then shamed for seeking medical care elsewhere for being sexual beings. We are blamed for making the ‘wrong choices’ or ‘not being careful enough’. To say that is unacceptable is an understatement.

I believe in carving out a future for my children that allows them the right to freedom of expression, freedom of identity and freedom of autonomy – one where their wombs are not dictated to by the Irish constitution. Until the 8th is removed, I cannot promise that future.

ESTER K 32

from Hungary, now living in Dublin

Being pregnant has always been one of my worst fears, well before I knew anything about genders or dysphoria.

Getting my first period was tough and I hated my body for it. While I’ve made peace with that, I simply cannot be pregnant. I know already what the right choice is for me, but it might not be the right choice for others. I can’t vote in this country and I’m just scared, like my anatomy is a time-bomb. Please vote Yes for all people who have a womb.

At a desperate time, when I needed it the most, I had a choice… but if the pills had failed to arrive, I don’t know what I would have done. Please vote Yes for anyone like me who is too young to vote, or people living here who come from other countries and can’t vote. We need a choice too.

ANONYMOUS 17

Westmeath

CHRIS CLANCY WILSON 42

Naas, Kildare

Before the marriage equality referendum, I felt unwanted as a lesbian in Ireland. I had no choice.

‘You’re gay, you don’t deserve anything,’ that was it. I’m voting Yes in the upcoming referendum because now that I have a choice, who am I to deny anyone else a choice? Now that I am equal, shouldn’t we all be equal?

AISLING CRONIN 27

Dublin

I was honoured to hear the deeply heartfelt, personal perspectives of the contributors in this article.

All I have to add is this: it’s not my place to stand in judgement over anyone. It’s not my place to determine whether their reasons for requesting a termination are ‘good enough’. I’ve never been pregnant. I cannot even begin to imagine the pain of carrying a foetus with a fatal abnormality, for example – surrounded by people smiling and asking when the baby is due, knowing all the while that it has no chance of surviving once born – and it simply isn’t up to me or anyone else to tell people what they should do.

ANONYMOUS 23

Wicklow

Being autistic, I worry about the abortion of disabled foetuses. I don’t think that’s solved, however, by preventing people whose lives are at risk, or who have been raped, or who can’t raise a child, from having healthy and safe access to abortion.

Ideally, education and improved services will make the country a better place for disabled people. Then people will feel safe and comfortable making the choice to have children if they are disabled. I am voting Yes out of loyalty to women/people with uteruses.

I’m voting Yes because as a bisexual woman in a long-term relationship with a man, I have all the same issues with the Eighth that straight women do. I have always been and will always be LGBT.

SARAH HANNAH MAGUIRE 38

Midleton, Cork

SHARON NOLAN 26

Galway

Maternity care and reproductive rights are required by more than heterosexual cisgender women, and our ght for reproductive justice must re ect that.

The Eighth Amendment has the capacity to affect anyone with a uterus in this country, which includes cisgender women of all sexualities, trans men, and AFAB (assigned female at birth) non-binary people. Queer and transgender voices have always been at the forefront of activism for abortion access and freedom of maternity care, as this issue affects our communities too. Our LGBT community have been fighting for their rights and their bodily integrity for generations, with reproductive justice being integral to that.

The Eighth Amendment doesn’t just a ect straight, cisgender women. I’m voting Yes for every person in Ireland, LGBT or not, who cannot make decisions about their own body while pregnant.

LORNA COSTELLOE 22

East Cork

Kay Cairns

OPINION:

Repeal is a Trans issue

We cannot expect the care of trans people who become pregnant to improve as long as we are excluded from the discussion.

If you’re not trans and you’re reading this, well here’s the shocker: trans men and non-binary people can get pregnant. You won’t see us on the #TrustWomen posters. You won’t hear about us on the ‘Together For Yes’ leaflets. And most likely you won’t talk about us on the doorsteps. But we’re here, and we’re not going anywhere… except to the UK when we need abortion access.

We have this unfortunate habit in feminist activism of equating reproductive rights with being exclusively a women’s issue. We’re seeing this kind of feminism at the forefront of the repeal campaigns. A kind of trans exclusionary feminism whose defence is ‘the laws were made to harm women’. But look at our history: the law is very good at harming many more members of society. Up until 2015, marriage was restricted to couples seen as a man and a woman in the eyes of Irish law. Not too long ago homosexual sex was illegal.

It’s a bit short-sighted to presume that conservatives aren’t aware of the existence of non-binary people and trans men. They’ve known for aeons that trans people exist. Don’t let them off the hook by saying our lack of abortion laws is a purely misogynistic issue.

Trans and non-binary people face extra barriers to reproductive health. We’ve got the misgendering of accessing abortion support/referral services that advertise only as ‘for women’, and of being presumed women if we approach our GP or women’s clinic for reproductive healthcare of any sort. We politely correct the doctors and nurses on our pronouns, but they don’t catch on. Our junk is mislabeled. There’s no understanding of the effects of hormone replacement therapy on our bodies, or the underlying dysphoria that many feel.

We cannot expect the care of trans people who become pregnant to improve as long as we are excluded from the discussion. It’s clear the patriarchy deals blows to many more of us, and we’d serve ourselves better by acknowledging that.

And a big shout-out to all the women who want to get pregnant but can’t and are being bombarded by how pregnancy is a ‘woman’s issue.’ This is for the trans women, the intersex women, and those who face fertility issues. This is an issue strictly concerning pregnancy.

It’s about trusting people who can get pregnant to know their own bodies, and we should include all of these people in this national discussion, no matter their gender.

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