Opinion

Prepared to ‘sleep with enemy’ than dilute abortion stance

The paradox of the absolutist stance on abortion is exposed in John Austin’s letter (February 15) where he asked us to vote DUP/TUV/UKIP/SDLP in yesterday’s election. Dismissing as ‘hot air’ the very scandal which prompted the election in the first place. He exhorts us to vote for some who have supported capital punishment, aided paramilitary groups responsible for murdering innocent people, ignored state collusion in such atrocities, who have denied equality to the LGBT community and who have encouraged (either implicitly or explicitly) sectarian violence. I am not taking political sides in this debate as I am aware that the same charges can be applied to other parties but rather highlighting the point that to the absolutist, the destruction of a cell with no capacity to feel pain, or of an embryo with no neurons or brain, trumps that of sentient, human beings.

Real lives could be saved and much human misery relieved if the funds negligently squandered in recent scandals were more appropriately applied. Asking the electorate to support the culpable because they give embryonic life precedence over fully formed life lacks moral fortitude.

It is incumbent upon the rationally minded to afford, at the very least, the same protection to fully formed life as some would give to potential life.

I have always considered it  anomalous that the absolutist never offers any valid suggestion how to reduce the scandalous volumes of the very problem they are keen to vilify.

The Catholic Agency for Overseas Development, in relation to contraception, has recognised that “Any strategy that enables a person to move from a higher risk towards the lower end of the continuum we believe is a valid risk reduction strategy.” There is no doubting that contraception, while not a panacea for abortion, would reduce its volumes, particularly in the poorest regions in the world like sub Sarahan

Africa where a concomitant reduction in Aids would be a significant added benefit. Yet I have not seen one letter in this paper from a pro-life supporter advocating its use. The reason is evident. Contraception is still banned by the Catholic Church which actively encourages the dissemination of erroneous information about its use in the poorest regions on earth while turning a blind eye to its profligacy in Catholic Ireland.

The absolutist claims ‘all abortion is wrong’ while ignoring the reality that there will always be abortions and who offers nothing in mitigation.


Mr Austin does not see contraception as a valid risk reduction strategy because of his Catholicism, he proudly calls himself a pro-life Catholic but paradoxically accords support to parties not known for their Catholic sympathies.


He is prepared to ‘sleep with the enemy’ rather than dilute his abortion stance, but not prepared to dilute his Catholicism to support contraception. Upon such logic reason flounders.

DANNY TREACY


Templepatrick, Co Antrim

It was Sinn Féin who gave DUP cloak of legitimacy

The use of sophistry and turning logic on its head has been used extensively by Sinn Féin and supporters for a long time. 


The use of it by Tomas O Dubhagain (February 2) was not one of the more clever examples.


Tomas agreed with analysis that the DUP had abused its position in Stormont for its own narrow sectarian agenda but then complained that I was doing the DUP’s work by criticising Sinn Féin. Surely I don’t need to remind Tomas that it was not me but Sinn Féin that was in partnership with the DUP in Stormont while the latter carried out its sectarian policies.


It was not me who was in partnership with the DUP for so many years before telling the electorate that there isn’t equality or respect in Stormont. 


No, it was Sinn Féin that gave the DUP its cloak of legitimacy.


It wasn’t me who shook hands with the unelected head of state of Britain when she came here as ‘head of state’ and gave legitimacy to that claim.


How anyone can accuse me of then doing the DUP’s work is beyond me. It is hard for me to give any credence to the arguments of anyone who considers the PSNI as an impartial force.

Tomas asks me what my alternative is?  As opposed to what Tomas, to a British devolved institution at Stormont that serves no other purpose that to give legitimacy to continued British rule but one that the vast majority of people in the six counties recognises as having failed to deliver any meaningful change, that lurches from crisis to crisis and is regarded as farcical?


Well Tomas if that is the height of your aspirations it says much about your ideals and values which are similar to those of Sinn Féin but could hardly be regarded as republican.

SEAN O'FIACH


Belfast BT11

Unfair to pick on PBP

When I open my Irish News every day the first page I usually go to is the Letters page. I did that as usual on Friday February 16. Imagine my surprise – I had to smile actually – when I read the letter from P Gormley.

He had a right tirade at the People Before Profit (PBP) political party asking what they had done for the ordinary people in our areas?


He went on to, among other things, make a few accusations against the PBP, including being a ‘pro-cuts party’ and being in league with the DUP, UKIP and the Tories.

Yet, PBP didn’t hand back welfare reform to Westminster, didn’t sit on their hands while the DUP gave them the runaround over Red Sky, the ‘cash for ash’ scheme, an Irish language act, Nama and while the DUP treated nationalist representatives like naughty schoolboys.


There wasn’t much the PBP could do as all this was going on as they had only two MLAs and weren’t elected until last May.


Now ‘who is going to pay for this far-left party’s socialist utopia’ asked P Gormley? I would suggest that when our nationalists politicians go to Washington to that ‘right-wing’ utopia for St Patrick’s day they ask those ‘republican’ far-right politicians to make a financial donation to the basket case that is Stormont.

PADRAIG O FEINNAIN


Newtownabbey, Co Antrim

Stop viewing the unborn as invisible

Grainne Teggart in her letters(February 27)attempts to make the illogical logic shows the same common sense which Sinn Féin states that they are pro-life, while pushing to repeal the Eighth Amendment in the south and is supporting the nefarious David Ford Bill targeting the unborn sick.  


Where was the voices of Ms Teggart, Peter Corrigan and the hierarchy of Amnesty raised in horror against the expose of the selling of human body parts of aborted children of Planned Parenthood of America last year, or the horrors committed by the serial abortionist Kermitt Gosnell? At least, we can be grateful that she managed to put laws, inhumane and abortion in a sentence, but not in logical sequence.


One hopes that this tentative approach will see Amnesty return to their founder’s original principles and stop viewing the suffering of the unborn as invisible, acceptable and even justified

JDP McALLION


Clonoe, Co Tyrone

How low can Sinn Féin sink?

It has been asked many times in the letters page how low can Sinn Féin sink? Their latest escapade is trying to bring down the institutions in the Republic by the pretence they are concerned about the treatment of Garda Maurice McCabe. I’m sure  murdered Garda Gerry McCabe’s widow can see the irony after they told her of their concerns over the death of her husband only for them to petition for his killers to be released under the GFA. 

JOSEPH KENNEDY


Dunmurry, Co Antrim