Youth Defense prints 50,000 anti-gay leaflets

dublin | rights, freedoms and repression | opinion/analysis Monday January 31, 2005 18:22 by tobie*

After reading an article from the Sunday Business Post that youth defense printed 50,000 anti-gay leaflets I ventured over to youth defence office to see if I could get a copy.

The youth defense office using the name the Mother and Child campaign is contently located across the street from the Outhouse Community centre on Capel st. The walls of their building are covered in pictures from protests and images of fetus. The people working there were surprisingly young and trendy. There was a buzz about the place, four people bumping into each other in the office, a little girl running around and a guy carrying a vacuum up the stairs. They all seemed very happy to help me out and get me a copy of the leaflet. Although they were more interested in giving me a pro-life postcard. Suddenly one of them turned and said that he knew me from somewhere and wanted to know if I went to demos. With a knot in my stomach we figured out that it was the December 6th march in Shannon that we were both at.

Next to where I was standing was a pile of about 500 leaflets that have already been signed, which accounts for all that had been collected by the campaign but does not account for the ones that have been sent directly to The All-Party Oireachtas Committee. According to someone working in the youth defense office today was the last day for submissions, but they were looking for an extension.

Although the leaflet does not say who created them, the guy who handed me the leaflet said it was organised by The Mother and Child Campaign. It was filled with homophobic and sexist statements in order to 'protect' the family. The family needing to be protected is not a new concept for right wing groups. Abortion, same sex couples and women's lib is all the same issue; they all ruin the traditional family and therefore need to be stopped. This is clear when the leaflet claims that the recognition of same sex couples will some how weaken the "stability and security" of family based around a heterosexual married couple.

The submissions urged that the definition of the family not be extended to include same sex couples. It went further to say that same sex couples should never have the right to adopt children and that "Parents of Irish children would be horrified to think that their children could, in the event of their deaths, be adopted by homosexuals or lesbians". They go further and say that "Parents of Irish children would be horrified to think that their children could, in the event of their deaths, be adopted by homosexuals or lesbians."

Along with the homophobic statements the leaflet also calls that the reference to a women's life in the home in the constitution not to be changed, saying that the majority of Irish women want to stay home and rear their children.

Here is the article about the leaflets on Sunday Business Post, read it here http://url.ie/2h
Longer url: http://www.thepost.ie/post/pages/p/wholestory.aspx-qqqt=ANY%20OTHER%20BUSINESS-qqqs=commentandanalysis-qqqsectionid=3-qqqc=5.7.0.0-qqqn=1-qqqx=1.asp

the most recent GCN has articles on same sex partnership and parenting. you can read them on http://www.gcn.ie