Breda O’Brien, teacher, Irish Times columnist and Iona Institute patron, recently debated surrogacy with Deirdre Madden of UCC on RTÉ’s Today with Sean O’Rourke programme. She talked about the recent surrogacy scandals, and emphasised the fact that similar things can and have happened regardless of whether surrogacy is commercial or altruistic. Madden argued that banning surrogacy in...
Trying to facilitiate human flourishing and happiness should be among the first goals of any policymaker. In all the endless discussions we have about economic growth, social capital, labour productivity, and debt levels, what we often don’t talk about is the reason we pursue all these policies. The answer is (or should be) very simple...
Several terrible surrogacy scandals have come to light recently. The most high profile involved Gammy, a Down’s syndrome baby born to a Thai surrogate mother. The Australian commissioning couple did not want to raise Gammy, only his healthy twin. A very similar case has just come to light in Britain. And now we learn that...
The Rotherham child sex abuse scandal that has rocked Britain is the result of half a century of Multiculturalism, moral-relativism and national self-loathing by those driven to guide, protect and improve society. “Rotherham,” dear reader, will for a long time to come be synonymous with the utter, immoral collapse of Radical social engineering. Well, one...
The Rotherham child sex abuse scandal that has rocked Britain is the result of half a century of Multiculturalism, moral-relativism and national self-loathing by those driven to guide, protect and improve society. “Rotherham,” dear reader, will for a long time to come be synonymous with the utter, immoral collapse of Radical social engineering. Well, one...
Dawkins was at it again recently. He claimed that Ireland is civilised in all but one aspect: its abortion laws. He then added that it’s “moral” to abort a baby with Down’s Syndrome. As Dawkins has greyed, his pronouncements have gotten more off the wall. And I thought wisdom increased with age… Note that he...
A new study from the University of Virginia’s National Marriage Project analyses some of the ingredients that go into lasting, high-quality marriages. By starting with a sample of over 1000 people who were in a relationship but unmarried and tracking them (418 of the individuals got married), the study’s authors were able to analyse how...
OK, this is a good one: a letter from the National Union of Journalists expressing concern about a possibly disastrous development in broadcast journalism. That development? Broadcasters might have to be balanced about everything. The NUJ’s complaint was occasioned by the decision of the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland (BAI) to uphold a complaint about an item on the Derek...
Over at Patheos, I blog about the obligations both sides of the abortion debate have in the current case of the young migrant woman and her prematurely born child: So I ask you, if you are pro-choice: write everything you write on this issue like it was a letter to this child. If you can,...
A poll published in The Sunday Times last week shows how rapidly Ireland has changed on a raft of moral questions. The exact degree of change is open to debate because different polling questions get different answers, but there has undoubtedly been a big shift in a lot of moral attitudes. The poll finds that...
