Irish Women Speak Out Against Brutal Childbirth Operations

[skepticscott]

x-post from GD.

Between 1942 and 1990 in Ireland, more than 1,500 pregnant women in childbirth endured, often without their consent, an operation called symphysiotomy that involves breaking the pelvis to make more space for the baby to be born and sometimes involving having their pubic bone sawed through. Others claim their wombs were removed without their consent. Now, survivors of these operations are speaking out – and they’re alleging that these doctors wanted nothing more than to control the woman’s reproductive health.

A woman can only receive a cesarean section (a C-section) a limited number of times, whereas a symphysiotomy would mean a woman could have as many kids as possible. In Ireland, many doctors chose to perform the painful procedure on women in objection to the notion of limiting a woman’s capacity to bear children. A known 200 Irish women who have received this brutal operation are still alive today.

“These doctors saw cesarean sections as a ‘moral hazard’ that capped family size and led to the ‘evil’ of family planning,” said a representative from the group Survivors Of Symphysiotomy. “They preferred to break women’s pelvises instead.”
Survivors Of Symphysiotomy submitted a report to the UN Committee Against Torture, wherein a survivor named Cora testified against the procedure. “I was screaming,” her testimony reads. “ not working, I said, I can feel everything. I saw him go and take out a proper hacksaw, like a wood saw…a half-circle with a straight blade and a handle…The blood shot up to the ceiling, up onto his glasses, all over the nurses … They told me to push her out, she must have been out before they burnt me. He put the two bones together, there was a burning pain. I thought I was going to die.”

Another complaint was that a surgeon in Drogheda – in the same hospital where many of these symphysiotomies were performed – removed the wombs of 129 women and the ovaries of others. Most of the women did not need the procedure, and most did not give consent. The complaints were first raised in the 1970s, but took until 2003 for the surgeon to be taken off the Medical Register, and until just last year for the women to receive money from a part of a redress scheme.

. . . . . .

“When I held consultations with survivors for the symphysiotomy report, many said the same thing,” Professor Oonagh Walsh of Glasgow Caledonian University told the Telegraph. “One woman said that the Medical Missionary nuns told her Gerard Connolly’s hands ‘had been blessed by the Pope’ so everything he did apparently had Divine authority. That culture of deference was very powerful and difficult to overcome.”

But having the Catholic Church control as much health care as possible CAN'T be a bad thing, now can it?? I'm sure pope Frank will be all over this…seems like it calls for a LOT of denouncing from him and from all Catholics of the torture and brutalization of women in the furtherance of Catholic doctrine.

http://feminist.org/blog/index.php/2015/02/13/irish-women-speak-out-against-brutal-childbirth-operations/

[haikugal]

1. OMG that's horrendous!

I've never heard of such a thing. I really hate the religious crap that subjects women to these kinds of things. Ugly, ugly shit.

[skepticscott]

2. But of course even pointing out that such things have happened

and continue to happen under the auspices and with the knowledge of the RCC makes one an "intolerant bigot" and a "Catholic hater".

[haikugal]

9. The hell with that....

We need to shout it from the roof tops...Damn, I'm still horrified! Only a man would think something like this up....is it any wonder females are persona non grata in the RCC...good gawd!

[skepticscott]

10. Not even just men

Men deeply indoctrinated to believe in the supremacy of Catholic doctrine over all else, including basic human rights and decency.

[rug]

3. Considering this report comes from the Telegraph, I'm skeptical about some of these claims.

Whatever happened, it's doubtful Catholic hospitals in Ireland (a regular target of the Telegraph) would routinely perform hysterectomies and ovarectomies, given its stance, which you revile, against sterilization.

Why don't you put aside your anti-Catholic prejudice for once and find a more reputable source with verifiable facts. There will always be another scandal you can exploit for your agenda. This one, even if some of it is true, and the women involved, deserves the respect of facts, not to be used simply as another convenient platform for your crusade against religions.

BTW, what "x-post from GD."? there's nothing on the first five pages and Advanced Search comes up empty.

[Curmudgeoness]

11. Link

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10026225077

[AtheistCrusader]

13. I'm sorry, your link is not valid.

It must be in the form of an archaic language, open to subjective reinterpretation.

[rug]

15. Thanks. That thread sank pretty fast.

[AtheistCrusader]

14. Here, pretend the Guardian is full of crap too.

http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/dec/12/symphysiotomy-irelands-brutal-alternative-to-caesareans

And the BBC.

http://m.bbc.com/news/world-europe-18424391

I guess it was just too hard for the google.

[rug]

16. The Guardian story is two months old and doesn't say anything about sterilization.

The BBC is from 2012 and doesn't mention sterilization either.

I guess it was too hard for the OP to check the facts before racing to post it.

[AtheistCrusader]

19. I'm not sure that was the primary focus of the OP.

Certainly their legislature found the other issue to have occurred, and one of the reasons was the RCC.

[rug]

20. I'm sure the primary focus of the legislative investigation was women's health and to redress wrongs

not to bash the RCC beyond what role it may have played.

I'm also sure the focus of the OP was the precise opposite.

[AtheistCrusader]

24. 'Beyond the role it may have played.'

Insert disgusted snort here.

Can't help but notice the RCC has acquired all but two hospitals in the greater Seattle area. I'm sure there's no ulterior motives.

[rug]

26. Better insert some facts there too.

This isn't about Seattle either.

[AtheistCrusader]

30. No, it's about the RCC and the skeletons in its closet.

Looks like some have been leaking out of late.

Very unfortunate, I suppose.

[rug]

35. It's about the systemic control pf women's health by the medical establishment, the government,

and religious leaders, in that order. If you read the articles you posted you'd realize that. Unless you'd rather support the usual Catholic bashing of the OP, this time literally over the bones and reproductive organs of women. If not, wait. It looks like he's now using a murdered corpse in Denmark to rail against religion. I'm sure it's an objective fact-filled post.

[Warpy]

4. It was the church more than the doctors, as usual

C-sections were frowned upon because they limited a woman's future offspring, meaning she'd need to have the thing removed or go on the kind of birth control the male churchmen were prissy about.

Women's lives meant less than nothing to those men. Doctors were forced to go along, every c-section second guessed by the priests on hospital boards.

That the pubic bone fracture required a long recovery period and often left the woman in chronic pain was of absolutely no importance to the men in the church. The only thing she was good for was producing the maximum number of children, preferably male.

[rug]

5. What church doctrine promoted hysterectomies and ovarectomies?

[okasha]

6. Read rug's post.

You can't have it both ways. You can't claim that Irish doctors broke women's pubic bones to maximise their pregnancies in accordance with RCC teaching while also claiming that Irish doctors performed ovaro-hysterectomies that reduced future pregnancies to 0-- in accordance with RCC teaching.

What screams off the page here is that these surgeries were done without the women's consent.. What else screams off the page is the doctors' assumption that "Doctor knows best.". Fewer physicians display that grandiosity today, but it's still a problem.

[skepticscott]

8. Unless you're arguing that ALL of the women involved are lying about what happened

why would you care about "having it both ways"? Would the Catholic Church not be a supporter of torture and brutality and a hideous violator of human rights if only one group was telling the truth?

[rug]

17. Maybe it's just the Telegraph, your source, that's lying.

[Warpy]

12. I found the claim of hysterectomy a little odd, too

since the parish priest would raise holy hell about it once he found out.

I know this because one of my aunties persuaded her doc into one after her tenth and it happened to her.

They really don't care about the lives of women. At all. To them, we're just walking flower pots.

[skepticscott]

7. Didn't take long for the usual

knee-jerk apologists and defenders of this kind of Catholic atrocity to show up. What a surprise. And how sad that some people are so blinded by "faith" that they support it even in face of something like this.

[rug]

18. Didn't take you long to post something that suits your agenda, even with nonexistent facts.

[Warpy]

28. I try to keep dishonest people on my ignore list.

It helps the blood pressure.

[Lordquinton]

21. there are people here defending this horror story

I wish I could say I was surprised, but every time this comes up it getsdefended. The guy was blesses by the pope so it really wasn't some rogue doctors. The whole history of the Catholic Church in Ireland is a horror story, so really why should this be anything unexpected.

[skepticscott]

22. I'm not a bit surprised

The defense of the atrocities committed by the Catholic Church, in the name of the Catholic faith, are coming from all of the usual sources. They speak for themselves.

[Lordquinton]

23. and nary a hint of irony

Esp considering recent events and some familiar faces calling for atheists to reevaluate their outlook. by that measure this story should shake the entire foundation of the Catholic Church. But no, just victim blaming and no true scotsman (no true Irishman?)

[skepticscott]

25. Self-examination is not a trait

of catholic apologists. They are indoctrinated from very early on to regard the RCC as incapable of doing wrong, and they will defend it at any cost, not matter the ugliness they have to support to do it.

[Lordquinton]

29. sad really, the lengths people go to to

When you have a codified law book and a divine leader you have to defend it, regardless of the barbarity of the actions of other members. It's one thing when it's a splinter group, but when it's sanctioned by the leader of your group, you have to attack the people shining light on their heinous actio.

Come to think of it, the popes of the last hundred years or so have sanctioned some horrible stuff.

[skepticscott]

32. Yes, it's quite a sad phenomenon

There are people on this board, and out in the real world, who have the knee-jerk reaction when they read something like this "No, no…this can't be true…I can't LET this be true! If it's true, then I'd have to face up to what my church does and change my thinking about…NO..NO…I WON'T let this be true! These people must all be lying…yes..that's it…just like all those little boys who claimed that priests raped them were lying. And the people they say did this…they weren't REAL Catholics, right? Yes…that's it *deep breath* And those gay couples who say the church hates them…that's not true! My church says it loves them…it cares for there souls, even if they don't, and it's only trying to do what's best for them by keeping them from marrying who they love! Everything is fine *deep breath*"

And then they go through the most tortured and convoluted arguments and distortions of fact and reason to convince themselves (if no one else) that what they desperately NEED to be untrue can't possibly be true, or that it really isn't that bad..any self-deception that lets them look in the mirror in the morning and still feel good about supporting the RCC without hesitation. Anything that lets them preserve their little bubble of "Catholic Church can do no wrong-ness". No matter how vile and brazen and unimaginable the evil is that they're trying to defend and deflect attention from, they simply can't help themselves.

Very, very sad. And a perfect example of how Christopher Hitchens was right in saying that religion poisons everything.

[rug]

27. Really? Where?

I see posts questioning the accuracy and motive of the OP but I don't see defending.

You may now resume your clucking.

[AtheistCrusader]

31. Deflecting. Distracting. Take your pick.

[rug]

34. None of the above.

Try fact checking.

[hrmjustin]

33. This is just horrific!