Date: Wed, 10 Dec 1997 23:38:43 -0500
From: malecki-AT-algonet.se (Robert Malecki)
Subject: M-TH: Finnegal slanders Sparts and has no program!


Finnagal writes;
. Not only that but it was also instructive to note how Sparts
>would come to
>demos and harangue women for selling feminist magazines as it was _petty
>bourgeoise_
>and they didn't finish all their articles with mantras about the programme
>of Lenin and
>Trotsky. Perhaps it was then that I realised the distinct limitations of
>certains forms
>of Marxist discourse and practice. Demanding the impossible is all very
>well but
>a bit of imagination and openess is needed for this demand to be listened to.

The above is a lie and slander of the Spartacists. The point is that the
Sparts did turn up at the demonstrations or were the iniators of these
demonstrations in Ireland. Where the entire left has capitulated on the
abortion question!

Another point Finnegal is trotskyists do not liquidate their politics in
order to *join* these kinds of demonstrations. Whereas many of our socialist
heros approach these kinds of questions in the best mini-maxi reformist
manner or in the Staliunist manner.

But we do insist in seperating the reds from the blues and fighting for a
program..

The catchwords in your above is to capitulate or liquidate to and alien
program...

Workers Must rule in Ireland if Women Are to Be Free

The Catholic church also dominates social life in the republic of Ireland,
where the fundamental right to abortion is a match to the explosive tinder
of women=92s oppression. In this terribly backward country, women can not get
abortions. The story of abortion is one of tragedy and fear, of maternal
death, infanticide and persecution.

In 1992, when a pregnant 14-year old tried to get an abortion outside the
country, the Supreme Court ruled this illegal, thereby essentially placing
every Irish women seeking and abortion under house arrest. With tens of
thousands, mostly young women, demonstrating against the court ruling the
government finally backed down and allowed the young women to leave the
country for an abortion.

To defuse the enormous anger over what came to be called the "X case," in
1992 the government held three referenda on the question of abortion rights.
Two were on the availability of abortion information and travel, and the
Dublin Spartacist Group advocated a "yes" vote, while fighting for free
abortion on demand. But our comrades opposed the third, which sought to
limit the legality of abortion, as well as the 1995 Abortion Information
Bill, now law, because of its imposition of severe restrictions on abortion
information.

The new act means that an abortion referral by a doctor or counseling agency
is now illegal. Under the act, a doctor can be struck off the medical
register and fined  1500 pounds for so much as contacting an abortion clinic
on behalf of a woman patient. The police have been given the power to seize
medical records. Even information on billboards and "unsolicited" leaflets
about abortion are deemed illegal. Films and plays can also be banned if
they are judged to "advocate" abortion.

This bill was supported by the Labor Party and Democratic Left, government
coalition partners of the bourgeois Fine Gael, who have paid the price of
their cabinet posts by capitulating to the Catholic church. Fighting for
abortion rights means confronting these misleaders =96 the last think the
reformist left has in mind. In the 1992 elections, the Socialist Workers
Party (SWP =96 the followers of Tony Cliff), the Irish Workers Group
(IWG=97sister organization of the British Workers Power Group) and Militant
Labour all backed Labour and Democratic Left, both of which declared their
intentions of joining in a coalition government with the bougeois parties.
The DSG stood out as opponents to the popular front. We said no vote to
Labour, the Workers Party or Democratic Left, and warned that such a
class-collaborationist alliance would be necessarily be anti-women,
anti-Traveller (Gypsies), anti-working class and pro-imperialist.

As the left backs popular-front coalition, so they mirror aspects of the
bourgeoisie=92s own reactionary policies. Their claims to stand for women=92s
liberation are shown to be hollow as they refuse to fight for free abortion
on demand. Dublin Abortion Information Campaign (DAIC), a coalition of
groups including IWG, Red Action and the Workers Solidarity Movement, calls
only for abortion information. At the time of the X case, the SWP
capitulated to the liberal bourgeoisie=92s line of restrictive "special
grounds" for abortion. "Rape victims," they said, "have the right to
abortion"! Militant Labour goes even further, pandering to the anti-women
notion that abortion is a shameful "problem." The DSG says all women have
the right to abortion!

In 1990 Mary ("I am opposed to abortion") Robinson was elected as the
president of the popular front because she was offered a possibility of
heading off growing outrage over clericalism and of seeking accommodation
with the capitalists of Northern Ireland in order to broker an imperialist
"peace." The recent divorce referendum was similarly designed to give an
appearance of European modernization. While noting that the proposed law =96
which requires four years=B4 prior separation =96 was far from making divorce
available unconditionally at the request of either partner, the DSG called
for a "yes" vote. The referendum won by a slim 1 percent margin, and the
result was immediately challenged by former senator Des Hanafin, the main
spokesman for the anti-abortion campaign. Implementationof this meager
advance awaits the court rulings.

The forces lined up against divorce rights include Human Rights
International, with connections to Operation Rescue in the U.S., and Youth
defense which, with its fascistic core, has physically targeted pro-abortion
forces and leftists. While the SWP and Militant Labour have ignored the
threat posed by Youth Defense, the DSG has fought for united front
mobilizations to stop these shock troops for Catholic reaction.

In clerical Ireland, a fight for abortion rights is also a fight for the
means to carry it out, i.e., ending church control over health care.
Contraception must be made free and available on demand. The secularization
of education and provision of free quality health care requires the
expropriation not just of the church=92s property, but the entire ruling class.

Working-class struggle in defense of women=92s rights in the Republic can be a
catalyst for cross-communal struggle in Northern Ireland, where abortion is
virtually illegal and where reactionary Protestant Loyalists oppose divorce
and rights for gays. But for such a struggle to succeed, revolutionaries
must win the trade unions to the perspective of championing the rights of
all the oppressed, not least for abortion on demand, and that in turn means
fighting tooth and nail against the sellout labor bureaucrats and giving no
quarter to the wretched, anti-women popular front.

Warm Regards
Bob Malecli



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