Abortion referendum: Historic victory for women’s rights and social progress in Ireland

Crowd welcomes the result, Dublin Castle, Saturday afternoon, May 26 (Irish time)

by Philip Ferguson

“I think for so many people in this country the weekend’s vote was just like an enormous weight being lifted – a ball and chain that dogged us all our adult life being finally gone. And I can’t believe that I’m 50 years of age and it’s taken this long. . .  I think for so many women it represented so much.  It’s almost like society atoning for everything it’s done to women in this country.  Atoning for how we stigmatised women faced with crisis pregnancies, the Magdalene Laundries, the Mother and Baby Homes, the shaming, the forced adoptions, the robbed identities. . .  For me, the biggest sentiment of the Yes vote, the thing that people said the most was, ‘Who am I to judge? It’s not my decision.'”

‘Kicking Bishop Brennan up the arse!’ The making and popularity of the ‘Father Ted’ TV comedy series, made in the mid-1990s, was an indication of changing attitudes towards the Catholic hierarchy.

With these words, spoken this week in the Dublin parliament, independent Marxist TD (MP) Clare Daly, welcomed the massive victory for women’s rights and human progress in the referendum vote last Friday, May 25.  The referendum was on whether or not to repeal the 8th Amendment to the Irish Constitution (the constitution of the southern or 26-County state).  The amendment, which had been passed in 1983 effectively banned abortion in Ireland.

Scale of victory

On May 25 66.4% voted Yes for repeal and just 33.6% voted No.  In numerical terms this was a vote of 1,429, 981 to repeal the anti-abortion amendment and 723,642 to maintain it.

Indicating the sea-change of attitudes among the people in the 26-Counties, this was a

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Ramzy Baroud national speaking tour in New Zealand, May 18-24

Below we’re reprinting the official statement and itinerary for the speaking tour.

Dr. Ramzy Baroud’s NZ speaking tour itinerary – 18 to 24 May 2018.

Hosted by the NZ Palestine Solidarity Network

Ramzy Baroud brings the authentic voices of the Palestinian struggle for human rights to New Zealand, as part of a world-wide launch of his new book The Last Earth: a Palestinian Story.

Please note that signed copies of Ramzy’s book will be on sale for $35 at each venue – cash or EFTPOS (bookshop retail prices may vary). Other merchandise will be available also.

Each event is free entry and open to the public – bring your friends & workmates. There will be a collection for donations towards tour costs.

 

AUCKLAND: FRIDAY 18 MAY

10:30am: A special book signing event at UBIQ Auckland University Bookshop, 2 Alfred Street, Student Commons (off Princes or Symonds Street, City.)
12:00 midday: Listen to 95bFM radio for Kelly Enright’s studio interview with Ramzy Baroud on ‘The Wire’ current affairs programme.

AUCKLAND: SATURDAY 19 MAY

9:00am: Listen to Kim Hill’s face-to-face live interview with Ramzy on her popular ‘Saturday Morning’ programme, on RNZ National radio (FM 101.4)
2:00pm: Ramzy will speak at the Nakba Rally for Free Palestine, Aotea Square, Queen St, CBD.

AUCKLAND: SUNDAY 20 MAY

Free public talk: 7pm Freemans Bay Community Hall, 52 Hepburn St, Auckland.

 

HAMILTON: MONDAY 21 MAY
Free public talk: 7pm: Wintec, Room A2.05, City Campus, Hamilton.
Access via Gate 3 or Gate 2 on Tristram Street. Free parking.

 

WELLINGTON: TUESDAY 22 MAY

Book signing from 12pm to 1pm: Vic Books, Easterfield Building, 1 Kelburn Parade, Wellington 6012.
Evening event: 6pm Free Public talk: St Andrews on the Terrace, 30 The Terrace, Wellington City 6011. (Wellington event book sales by Vic Books).

 

CHRISTCHURCH: WEDS 23 MAY
Free public talk: 7pm Christchurch Cardboard Cathedral, 234 Hereford St, Christchurch 8011.

 

DUNEDIN: THURSDAY 24 MAY

Free public talk: 5:15pm Burns 2 Lecture theatre, Ground Floor Arts Building, Albany Street, University of Otago.

 

ABOUT THE BOOK AND ITS AUTHOR:

Gaza-born Palestinian author Ramzy Baroud is

One stinking hot afternoon down at the Fords factory – some reflections on the class struggle in the ‘70s and now

by Don Franks

It was a stinking hot afternoon down at Fords Lower Hutt assembly plant when one of us deliberately smashed a new truck windscreen. The truck trim line was a small non-automated section where four or five painted cab shells got fitted out each day, their windows fixed in place by skilled use of a big rubber hammer.

A worker would tap around the edges of the glass, on this occasion whacking it hard in the middle so it shattered. This meant work in the area had to stop until a cleaner’s union guy was located, had made his dignified way across to us and methodically swept up all the pieces. That process took a good twenty minutes, during which we were able to enjoy a break.

Of course we didn’t pull that stunt too often or it would have looked suspicious. There were other, less dramatic ways to get a break.

This time as we sat watching

A play about something that matters – Howard Petrick as V.R. Dunne

Being arrested for union organising, Minneapolis 1934

One of the most important battles fought by workers in the United States in the 1930s was waged by the Teamsters Union in Minneapolis.  Through a series of fights, Minneapolis was converted into a union town and the Teamsters were able to spread organising across the Mid-West.  At the heart of the working class struggle in Minneapolis were a group of teamsters who were union militants and Marxists.  One of the most prominent of these was Vincent Raymond Dunne (1889-1970).  Dunne later spent 16 months in jail for opposition to WW2.

Recently, long-time left-wing activist Howard Petrick, a former anti-Vietnam War GI, produced a play on Dunne and his life. 

by Barbara Gregorich

Howard Petrick’s one-man play, Fight for 52 Cents, is set in 1969, with Vincent Ray Dunne speaking to a meeting. With this as the framing device, Dunne tells his younger-generation audience about his life — the lessons he learned in helping lead the working class in its struggle for better living conditions and why he became a communist.

Howard Petrick as V.R. Dunne

As written and performed by Petrick, Fight for 52 Cents is a well-structured play that treats the audience to the story of Dunne’s life: what events were significant to him, and why; how these events helped shape him and allowed him to stand on a strong foundation.

Childhood experiences

The first event Dunne speaks about is that when he was five years old, his father, who was a street-car conductor in Kansas City, fell into a hole and broke both legs. Because of this accident, his father was not able to work. There was no such thing as workman’s compensation in 19th century United States. Dunne experienced this grave injustice first-hand: the five-year-old child saw that his father was injured and as a result the company he worked for dropped him from existence. The Dunne family was forced to

Israel is the only ‘democracy’ that throws children in military prisons and leaves them there

by Daphna Whitmore

Ahed Tamimi in a military court yesterday remains in detention without legal representation or charges

So, Lorde has been invited to a meeting with the Israeli Ambassador to New Zealand after announcing she would cancel her concert in Tel Aviv. Mr Yitzhak Gerberg wants to tell Lorde that Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East and to discuss the the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement.

Sure, Israel is a democracy of sorts for Jewish Israelis. There are anomolies, such as religious intermarriage being outlawed. This does contravene the notion of basic freedoms and resembles the old segregation seen in the Southern States of the US and the former apartheid regime in South  Africa. There are also no civil divorce rights in Israel – only religious bodies can rule on divorce – and there are numerous other democratic shortcomings, but for Jews many of the features of a democracy do exist.

For the 1.4 million Palestinian and other Arab populations in Israel, however, the democracy is very second rate. They face discrimination that is among the worst by Western standards. But all the limitations of democratic rights in Israel pale in comparison to the brutal military occupation carried out by the Israeli state for the past 50 years over the Palestinian people in Gaza and the West Bank.

Will Ambassador Gerberg explain what sort of democracy it is that imprisons children? There are currently 400 Palestinian children in Israeli prisons. This week the case of 16-year-old Ahed Tamimi highlighted the situation when she was seized in the middle of the night by Israeli soldiers after video footage showed her slapping two Israeli solidiers who were on her family property, just hours after a 15-year-old cousin of Ahed had been shot in the head by soldiers.

Israel, Palestinian liberation, the BDS campaign and left critics

The article below was written a little over nine years ago.  Since then the campaign for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) in relation to Israel has grown significantly and caused some real headaches to the Israeli state.  Nevertheless, some on the left oppose BDS.  While this is essentially a capitulation to the pressures of imperialism, there are also some genuinely left-wing people who remain confused about the nature of the Israeli state and the political forces within it and the role of BDS.

In the article below, one of the founders of BDS, Omar Barghouti, takes up the left and liberal critics of BDS.

Since the launch of the Palestinian boycott movement a few years ago, we have experienced an awkward phenomenon that demands urgent comment. Several organizations known for years — in some cases, decades — for their tireless Palestine solidarity work stood firmly against the Palestinian civil society Call for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions, BDS, issued on 9 July 2005, for various reasons. Some said such tactics were “harmful” to the Palestinian struggle. Others opined that BDS would undermine the so-called Israeli “peace” movement. Others, still, stated that boycotting Israel would invite accusations of anti-Semitism and betrayal of the Holocaust victims, thereby setting back Palestine solidarity work in a substantial way.Many other arguments were

John Pilger: “We need to keep the documentary alive”

Pic: EPA/FACUNDO ARRIZABALAGA

The following is the text of a talk delivered by veteran journalist and film-maker John Pilger at the British Library in London last Saturday (Dec 9).  His talk was part of a festival called “The Power of the Documentary” organised by the Library.  The festival was held to mark its acquisition of the archive of his written work.

by John Pilger

I first understood the power of the documentary during the editing of my first film, The Quiet Mutiny. In the commentary, I make reference to a chicken, which my crew and I encountered while on patrol with American soldiers in Vietnam.

“It must be a Vietcong chicken – a communist chicken,” said the sergeant. He wrote in his report: “enemy sighted”.

The chicken moment seemed to underline the farce of the war – so I included it in the film. That may have been unwise. The regulator of commercial television in Britain – then the Independent Television Authority or ITA – had demanded to see my script. What was my source for the political affiliation of the chicken? I was asked. Was it really a communist chicken, or could it have been a pro-American chicken?

Of course, this nonsense had a serious purpose; when The Quiet Mutiny was broadcast by ITV in 1970, the US ambassador to Britain, Walter Annenberg, a personal friend of President Richard Nixon, complained to the ITA. He complained not about the chicken but about the whole film. “I intend to inform the White House,” the ambassador wrote. Gosh.

The Quiet Mutiny had revealed that the US army in Vietnam was tearing