to not want a teenage boy telling me abortion is a sin and should never be legalised?!

[ThisMomentusDay]

I never really know how to feel about abortion, i don't think i could ever have one but thankfully i've never been in a position to have to consider this so it's a very easy thing to say isn't it?
As such i'm very much sitting on the 'pro-choice' fence!
It's such a personal choice for a woman and not usually one taken lightly.

Yesterday on the street there was a stall set up with a petition to the Taoiseach (PM) to not have any sort of a referendum on legalising abortion in Ireland. Fair enough i thought, freedom of speech, right to protest etc.
Untill i was passing and a teenage boy below the voting age (and possibly the age of consent) tries to hand me the leaflets. I looked across the street and on the 4 corners of this junction there are teenage boys handing anti-abortion leaflets out to (mainly) women!

It really annoyed me, (especially as it was very obviously a catholic group and i think the church has done enough damage to the state and should stay the hell out of politics) but i just refused the leaflets and kept walking.

AIBU to have thought 'what the hell has it got to do with you?'

Catgirl i meant not being a child in terms of being able to protest and have an opinion. Joining the army is not the same at all and saying that is a rather lame attempt to derail an opinion that is not the same as yours.

No - you said that they were not a child by any means. I disagree and think that in a lot of respects they are children. Hence they do not have the vote etc.

If what you actually meant was not being a child in terms of being able to protest and have an opinion then I have never disagreed with them having the right to have an opinion or to voice it.

I meant that in the context of this thread not a general sweeping sentance kind of way. It was an expansion of opinions i had previously mentioned about having the right to protest and have valid opinions despite of their age.

They do have those rights. I have never said they haven't. But the OP and many other posters on here have the right to disagree with those views and wonder how these opinions have been formed. In my view they are likely to be the result of on-going exposure to one-sided dogma and propaganda, not through direct experience or from a full and rounded understanding of the issues involved.

Of course 14 is a child. Its not an adult, is it? Therefore it is a child. Children should not be standing in the street shouting at passers-by about things they clearly have no understanding of. They should not be telling complete strangers about sins and campaigning to keep things illegal that the rest of the civilised world legalised decades ago.
It's sick.

I'm quite reasonable on occasion, honest. Was I mean to you before ? Apologies if so.

We had a little spat over something :) can't remember what though! You weren't mean though - we both gave as good as we got!

As far as i am concerned 14 is not an adult but nor is it a child. I would expect a person two years off the legal age of consent to have an awareness of issues around sexuality including abortion.

As far as i was aware from the OP these lads were handing out leaflets not shouting at strangers - if you dont like it just dont take a leaflet.

Personally I find men involved in the pro-life movement very off-putting people. Just my opinion.

I have had a similar experience in Ireland, btw.

Yes, they are within their rights. And I am also within my rights to tell them straight that I think their attitude is misguided and offensive and to throw their horrid little leaflets into the bin right before their eyes.

Free speech etc etc.

Not sure I'd like to live in a society where half the population is excluded from political debate by virtue of their gender, NightKitchen .

Seems a bit too familiar from history... there was a time when only men fought wars. Does that mean it was right that women had no voice in whether their country involved itself in one?

inthenightkitchen- Its a fundamental principle of democracy that all citizens are allowed to entitled to other their views on all issues.

"Seems a bit too familiar from history... there was a time when only men fought wars. Does that mean it was right that women had no voice in whether their country involved itself in one?"

Women didn't have a voice in it, did they. Still don't, in the vast majority of cases.

I certainly wouldn't want soceity to start excluding people from the debate based on gender.
What if a similar attitude was ascribed to debates surrounding prison sentences for rape? Women are incapable of commiting the actus reau of rape in Ireland thus they are not directly affected by a custodial sentence for rape, so we should exclude all women from the debate.
Now I know that this is reductio ad absurdum to a certain extent but I believe it highlights the difficulties you may encounter if you start to censor who may or may not comment on issues.
Should childless people be denied a voice in educational matters? Should the unemployed be denied an opinion on how taxes gathered from workers wages are alloted?

*actus reus

One of the things I like about the UK is that issues like abortion are not part of the mainstream political debate like they are in the USA. I believe that is right. However, no part of political debate in a democratic country should be able to exclude people on the basis of gender. That way madness lies.

Why not? You say a man will never be directly affected by the abortion debate as it's not his body, similarly a woman will never have to serve a custodial sentence in Ireland for the crime of rape so she is not directly affected.
However I would consider custodial sentences for rape to still have a significant indirect affect for women and to be an issue of direct concern to them in much the same way that abortions will indirectly affect men and to my mind is an issue of direct concern to them.
Either way, even if I felt there was an issue which somehow didn't affect a section of soceity (and I can't think of one) I would not seek to deny them their part in the democratic process or political debate which concerns the issue.
Tbh that just seems like an extension of the attitude of certain people who resport to the "oh you're not a parent/woman/man/minority you wouldn't understand...etc." in a debate when they can no longer argue the facts or the issues at hand.

I think the point is that historically men have told women what they may and may not do with their bodies and this continues in societies like Ireland where abortion is banned.

The idea that women should be able to decide what happens to their own bodies appears to be somewhat revolutionary!

I like the idea that men unilaterally telling women what they may and may not do = fine. I am not aware of large female input in RC doctrine

And yet the idea that women discuss what they should be allowed to do with their own bodies, without male comment = outrageous

rather missing the point there mayorquimby. Women not directly affected by rape? Who's getting raped then?

Bad anology, rather offensive in fact, since both directly pertain to womens control over their own bodies, both taken away by men.

MistressFrankly, 14 is 3 years away from age of consent in Ireland. £ years is a long time.