Ireland: Five rules for a open and civil debate on the abortion referendum

Five rules for a open and civil debate on the abortion referendum
All sides should understand that all the ethical issues that abortion raise are “up for debate”

Mon, Jan 29, 2018
Alberto Giubilini

In a few months, Ireland is going to have a referendum on whether to repeal its constitutional ban on abortion. Few topics raise more disagreement, controversy and heated reactions than abortion. Abortion strikes emotional chords and touches upon issues to which people are very sensitive, such as the value of human life, women’s bodily rights, religious prescriptions and freedom of conscience (for doctors).

Continued: https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/five-rules-for-a-open-and-civil-debate-on-the-abortion-referendum-1.3372591

Brazil’s Abortion Battle

Brazil’s Abortion Battle

By Sabrina Fernandes
Nov 29, 2017

The Brazilian right's efforts to destroy abortion rights are key to their broader crusade against the Left.

Brazil’s right wing has gotten ahead through a series of dirty tricks. The 2015 impeachment of Workers Party (PT) president Dilma Rousseff, pushed through despite the absence of any “crime of responsibility,” is the most notorious example. Now, through similarly slick manuevers, they’re seeking further restrictions on reproductive rights. This, in a country where already one woman dies from a clandestine abortion procedure every nine minutes.

Currently, abortion is legal only in particular cases, such as when there’s a direct threat to the life of the pregnant person, or when the pregnancy results from rape. It’s these exceptions that the conservative and Evangelical parliamentary front is seeking to destroy. Through a variety of proposed bills and amendments, they may eliminate the right to abortion completely.

Continued at source: https://www.jacobinmag.com/2017/11/brazil-abortion-rights-cunha-rousseff

How a harsh abortion ban has reignited Polish feminism

By Andrew Roth, The Washington Post
Posted: 11/19/16

WARSAW, Poland >> The long-submerged struggle over abortion has abruptly resurfaced in Poland after more than a generation, as the failure of a right-wing initiative to impose an outright ban has revitalized the country’s feminist movement.

The most hopeful now have their sights on overturning the legal restrictions on abortion that date back 23 years, and bringing women’s issues in from the margins of Polish society.

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Source: New Haven Register