Children are more likely to thrive in a married family unit, a new study has found. Compiled by the Social Trends Institute from data available in over 100 countries, the study reveals that children born to cohabiting couples are 94% more likely to experience family breakdown than children born to married couples. The study also found that more than three in five children born to unmarried parents had experienced family breakdown before the age of 12. Among the worst countries for family breakdown is Britain, prompting Sir Paul Coleridge, chairman of the Marriage Foundation to call on the government there to act on the study findings: “How many more surveys and reports do we need before government puts this problem at the very top of the social justice agenda?” He described the study as “a wake-up call” for Britain.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has attacked a legislative bill in the US state of Arkansas that seeks to prevent women seeking termination on the grounds of the gender of the unborn child. Claiming that the content of Bill 1434, soon to be placed before the state House, is unconstitutional, the ACLU’s Executive Director Rita Sklar warned that “There is very good potential for litigation because of this burden on women obtaining abortions that they want for whatever reason.” Under the bill, before a doctor could perform an abortion he or she would be required to ask the woman if she knows the sex of her unborn child. If the woman answers that she does, the doctor would be required to request the woman’s medical records relating to her pregnancy. The doctor would be prohibited from performing an abortion on the woman until “reasonable time and effort” has been spent to obtain the records. Sex-selection abortions have become a major problem across the world and have caused major demographic imbalances in places such as India and China. If Arkansas passes Bill 1434, the state will become the eighth in America to ban abortion for sex-selective reasons.
Eight countries have now joined together in seeking to create a global fund for abortion in answer to US President Donald Trump’s ending of taxpayer funding of groups who provide overseas terminations. Following the announcement of the initiative to seek funding for that lost by the US announcement, Canada, Sweden, Denmark, Belgium, Luxembourg, Finland and Cape Verde have agreed to pledge future funding for abortion, viewing it as necessary for ‘gender rights and the fight against poverty’. Towards finalising the global fund, leaders from the eight countries will meet in Belgium this March 2 for a gathering themed ‘She Decides’. Thus far, the Netherlands, Belgium and Denmark have announced pledges to the value of €30million towards the project.
An Irish author whose exposé on the crimes of infamous US abortionist Kermit Gosnell has become a nationwide bestseller in America has attacked the New York Times for failing to feature the book on its respected Bestseller List. Gosnell was a Pennsylvania-based abortionist who, in 2011, was exposed as performing abortions beyond the state’s 24-week limit. He was subsequently convicted of three infant murders and the manslaughter of a woman who died at the clinic. He is currently serving life in prison without the chance of parole. Documentary maker Phelim McAleer, who is co-author of Gosnell: The Untold Story of America’s Most Prolific Serial Killer, accused The New York Times of “messing with the figures” in order to keep attention away from the book’s revelations. The book has shot to No.3 on the Amazon bestseller list and is the fourth bestselling non-fiction hardback in the US.
A bill to criminalise the purchasing of sex has passed through the Dáil and will now be considered by the Seanad before becoming law. The Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) Bill contains a range of measures in addition to the bar on purchasing sexual services, such as protecting children against online grooming; new offences in relation to child pornography; maintaining the age of consent to sexual activity at 17 years of age and providing new rules for sexual consent. Ruhama, the group working with those falling victim to sexual exploitation, welcomed the progress of the bill. The body’s CEO Sarah Benson said the criminalising the purchase of sex deters men from the “exploitative act” of buying sex. It has a “normative effect” where “it is no longer acceptable for any human being to buy access to another”. Meanwhile, Denise Charlton of the anti-prostitution Turn Off the Red Light campaign, said the bill shifts “attention to the perpetrators of sexual crime, and those who enable abuse and exploitation to continue”.
The Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission (IHREC) has attacked Ireland’s abortion laws, stating that they impede a woman’s right to bodily autonomy. In a report, set to inform a wider United Nations study on Ireland’s performance on gender equality, ‘Ireland and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women’, the IHREC calls on the ongoing Citizens’ Assembly to fully consider recommending calls for a referendum to change the Eighth Amendment constitutional protection for the unborn. It further states that Article 41.2 of the Constitution stereotypes women as it presumes they occupy primary carer roles within the home. The full report will be presented to the United Nations in Geneva next week by IHREC chief commissioner Emily Logan.
A Christian preacher who was jailed in connection with an argument after a gay man asked him about the Bible’s teaching on homosexuality has been cleared of any wrongdoing on appeal. Gordon Larmour was preaching in July 2016 when the young man posed his question on Bible teaching. Apparently enraged by the answer, the man chased Lamour until police intervened and arrested the preacher on suspicion of “threatening or abusive behaviour, aggravated by prejudice relating to sexual orientation” and “assault aggravated by prejudice relating to sexual orientation”. Lamour was subsequently jailed for one night. However, an appeal against this jailing heard from a colleague of the young man that Larmour had in no way assaulted the man or used homophobic terms against him. “I had simply answered his question and told him about Adam and Eve and heaven and hell,” Larmour said. “Preaching from the Bible is not a crime.”
A bill aimed at protecting the right of US health care providers to opt-out of abortion mandates has been tabled in the Senate. The Conscience Protection Act would protect health care providers from federal, state, and local abortion mandates if they conscientiously object to assisting with abortions. It would also protect religious employers from having to cover elective abortions in their health plans. The bill was previously introduced in Congress last year and passed the House by a vote of 245-182, but did not receive a vote in the Senate. “This bill is needed to give health care providers the right to provide medical care without violating their deeply held beliefs,” said the bill’s sponsor, Senator James Lankford. “Americans have very different views about abortion, but we should not force anyone to participate in it or provide coverage.”
