Why Am I a Second Class Citizen?

I told myself that the next blog I wrote would not be negative in any way, but sometimes you read stuff in the news and you have to say something. This is merely my opinion on a subject. If you disagree with me on this, I have no problem with you telling me but please, no hate and please do not tell me I am wrong in my stance. Object and rebut, but my opinion is valid.

As a 26 year old woman, living in Ireland, which has equal rights for men and women supposedly, I should be free to make my own choices when it comes to my body, just like Irish men do. I can work in any field, like a man, I can choose to marry or not marry, like a man. I can choose or resist medical treatment, like a man.

Oh, wait, I can't.

I have a uterus. And, if said uterus is ever carrying a foetus, I become a second class citizen. In a western, European country, I can be refused an abortion even though I have been deemed suicidal because I've been raped and I don't wish to carry the rapist's baby. I can be strapped to a bed, and forced on a drip, when I go on hunger strike, so that I can be kept alive for long enough to have said viable foetus cut out of me by caesarian section, which I agree to out of duress.

Nonsense, you say. In this day and age, such a thing can't happen. Well, according to the news this week, it can.

How can this be right? A poor woman, a young woman, a refugee who has just come to a new country after being raped, finds out she's been pregnant. When she finds out she's pregnant, she wants an abortion. She's told here, she can't unless her life is in danger. She believed her life to be at risk, since it was shame in her home country to be an unmarried mother. She looks up abortion in the UK, but this costs €1500, and even if she had the money (being a new refugee, she doesn't due to our immigration laws), her legal status makes travel harder, since she may not be allowed back into the country.She is severely traumatised, and suicidal, and in fear of her life.

She proceeds to request an abortion. She's seen by a panel of three doctors (2 psychiatrists, 1 obstetrician), who all agree she is indeed, suicidal. Still, she is refused an abortion at 20/21 weeks. (She found out she was pregnant at 8 weeks during a check up, but it hasn't been released how far along into the pregnancy she was when she requested the procedure) In protest over what she saw as injustice, she goes on hunger strike. The answer to this? Force her on a drip for two weeks, until the baby can be cut out of her.

Not only was this woman raped sexually, she then has her body cut open, for a baby she didn't want to carry. She agreed to the section, but obviously under duress.This baby is now going into the care of the HSE (our health service).

This is my country's 'abortion law'. Keep women pregnant long enough for them to cut the baby out of you. As a woman, I'm frightened. Why am I a second class citizen? Why is my mental, and physical health, second to a foetus? It makes me sad, and angry, and so frustrated, that if I were ever raped, got pregnant, and realised I couldn't carry the baby, I need to raise €1500 (about $1992, or £ 1200) to go to the UK, or be forced to carry the baby. The majority of people in Ireland support abortion in, either in a limited form which we supposedly have, or in the case of the younger generation, a more liberal law. Yet, we haven't have a referendum in many years to give the people a chance to make a choice.

I love my country, but sometimes, I read stuff like this, and I wish I was born a man.