Martyn Turner cartoon about the X-Case

From: http://www.irishtimes.com/150/articles/pen-and-think.html

About a month ago there were cards free in The Irish Times celebrating 40 years of Martyn Turner cartoons in the paper. Amongst these cards was the famous one about the X-Case in 1992. What got me, aside from the actual cartoon itself, was the comment Turner had made about it:

“This cartoon, sadly, is one of the most reproduced cartoons I have ever drawn. A friend once wrote, one Christmas, about the awful state of affairs in the world. He listed the wars, tragedies and potential flashpoints that were just around the corner. A desperate year for the world, he said, but a great one for us political cartoonists. And it's true. Would that the circumstances that brought about this cartoon have never happened. Would that interminable self-righteousness, lack of compassion, blind dogma and hatred that marked all the abortion debates had never happened. Personally, as a man who is never going to be pregnant, I have no view on abortion. Lucky me.”

Now, what got me, apart from the obviously heartlessness, & the "self-righteousness, lack of compassion, blind dogma and hatred" comment that you could discuss for a year, was the fact that he claims that as a man, he has no view on Abortion. Firstly, he obviously does. Secondly, why shouldn't a man have an opinion about it? The child would be as much his as the mother’s. Of course, it all comes back to "body-autonomy" and why should a man or a baby make me do something I don't want to do? I do actually consider myself to be a feminist, and as far as I'm concerned once you've decided to have sex, you've made that choice. (I realise the X-Case involved the rape of a 14-year-old girl, which throws up a whole new set of questions that I will come back to at some point.)

Aside from the other points I brought up above I hope to have some other posts up soon, like “the right to travel”, “The impact of The X-Case, &c.”, and a few other things that have been floating around my head & recently been talking points.

I hope this wasn’t too clichéd & obvious to be worth reading, & I would appreciate comments. :-)

(Originally published as a Facebook Note on 14/07/2011)