The Dublin government are having great difficulty trying to meet its own November deadline to define words for a referendum on Article 41 to make the constitution gender neutral. Concerned with their excuse of removing what they refer to as ‘outdated language’ from the 1937 constitution the Government in their latest frenzy of wokeness are planning to remove women or at least any protective reference to them from this hallowed document and April fool’s day doesn’t even fall in November. Their task will be difficult as none of them seems to know how to define what a woman is or how many genders there are. On the upside their efforts will really impress their masters at the World Economic Forum. On the downside, the only way they can win this referendum is to carry it out while keeping the sleeping majority especially the women asleep. This is surely wake up time.
Legal Contortions with a Dictionary
With time for their self-imposed final decision on wording rapidly running out the Government is discovering the difficulties of playing legal contortions with gender definition, woman definition and an unbending dictionary. They are discovering that they are running into territory littered with legal landmines.
This week, the Davos student Taoiseach Varadkar said with a push and a grim face that the Government is committed to holding the referendum. He admitted however that ‘the inter-departmental group’ putting the wording of the referendum together is struggling with the question or precise questions to be asked of the electorate.
Should Women Be Allowed to Vote?
One Wag questioned whether women should even be allowed to vote on these questions yet to be formulated based on the fact that:
- women are already considered as non-persons by a government caught up in a frenzy of gender dysphoria
- since their removal is the subject of the referendum their self-interest should excluded them from voting.
The Referendums proposed alterations to Article 41 of the 1937 constitution presents three stated objectives;
- the removal of gender language which in this instance means the removal of all references to women and mothers who will constitutionally cease to exist
- to ensure the role of ‘care’ that women provided here to fore is somehow supported; and
- the creation of a more inclusive definition of family by excluding women and mothers from it. That is todays inclusiveness in action.
Former Women
Believe it or not there are government ministers involved in this who were themselves here to fore recognised and referred to as women who must now be ‘former women’ by their own definition. These issues have been floated around on the political agenda since a carefully selected and non-elected ‘Citizens’ Assembly on Gender Equality’ in 2019 chaired by former a EU Commission secretary general Catherine Day was prompted to bring it up in relation to Article 41. Out of this was prompted the idea or suggestion of a referendum since that would be the only sure way to remove women and mothers from the constitution since their presence is so offensive to the politically correct and gender dysphoric establishment.
Woman in the home
Article 41 is about the family’s role as a “fundamental unit of society”. Article 41’s describing of what constitutes a family and the role of women is considered by the woke establishment to be problematic and sexist. It refers to women and mothers as having a “life” and “duties” within the home when they shouldn’t exist at all. Do they, like cows, possibly contribute to ‘climate change’?
Article 41 further offends the gender sensitive and confused by saying: “In particular, the State recognises that by her life within the home, woman gives to the State a support without which the common good cannot be achieved.” How offensive to give potentially non persons such status.
To add insult to injury it states: “The State shall, therefore, endeavour to ensure that mothers, shall not be obliged by economic necessity to engage in labour to the neglect of their duties in the home.” How very offensive!
Removal of Offensive References
In a report on the issue the ‘Citizens’ Assembly’ and the ‘Oireachtas Committee on Gender Equality’ called for the removal of those offensive references and replacing them with gender neutral language recognising the values the role of ‘care’ in the home which is to be carried out by gender neutral non persons. Taoiseach Leo Varadkar says he wants to replace the reference to women and mothers with “something affirmative“. What is it about women and mothers that is not affirmative Leo? What would be more affirmative Leo?
Offensive Women and Mothers
Sources familiar with the process admit that taking those offensive women and mothers out is proving to be easier than inserting something new or ‘more affirmative’ such as bicycles which are gender neutral or are they? This only adds to a whole new layer of complexity. The Taoiseach said, the Coalition needs to get it right “once you put wording in the Constitution, it’s for the courts to decide what it means“. That could be fun as sanity is likely to prevail in an ‘affirmative’ way of course.
Family Based on Marriage
There are concerns among those with our best interest in mind that any new wording could be seen as an attack on marriage. Marriage is not to be attacked here but elsewhere as it is also not considered to be ‘affirmative’ and is quaintly outdated. A most challenging part of this proposed referendum is Article 41.3 where the family is defined as a traditional family. To make matters worse the traditional family based on marriage fails to reflect the more diverse nature of ‘gender dysphoria units’ attempting to pose as families.
Anticipated Attacks on the Family
The constitution seems to have anticipated the possibility of attacks on the family and safeguards it by saying: “The State pledges itself to guard with special care the institution of Marriage, on which the family is founded, and to protect it against attack.” The progressives will have their work cut out squirming around that and feeding it to the people as progress. Their efforts could come across as regressive.
Varadkar argues that “in the modern world there are lots of families that are not marital families, families led by grandparents, families led by couples that aren’t married, one parent families. But we need to make sure that we get that wording right and people don’t misinterpret it.” He left out gays, lesbians or dysphoric single gender couples with adopted children posing as families. Why one wonders? There is considerable fear that any new wording could be exposed as an attack on marriage, resulting in unsurmountable opposition that could be ‘exploited’ in a referendum campaign.
Include all the Genders in the Constitution
The real fun arises with the pitfalls of trying to settle on an all-inclusive, one hundred or more gender definitions of family. How can all of those genders be included in in the constitution when they can neither define nor quantify them? Could they all be excluded or somehow included without definition? Legality without sanity will require contorted thinking. The ‘working group’ has been looking to the courts believing they have moved away from constitutional definition of a ‘family based on marriage’ to a more diverse definition yet to be defined, reflecting god knows what. The reality is that they have no workable definition and no sane foundation for one.
Cult or Culture war
Whatever the final wording, the progressives are still stuck with the 1937 constitutional definition;
- family protection of women and their right to be in the home if they so choose,
- care, and
- the family based on traditional marriage.
The proposed referendum claims to be based in gender equality. The problem is that this is promoted by those who can neither define gender nor specify how many genders there are. They think they can get away with disparaging the ‘woman in the home’ clause by claiming that it enslaves women while being devoid of any evidence to support such a claim. They remain stuck on gender because they can neither define it or quantify its numbers. They are afraid that this, their cults culture war will wake up the sleeping opposition who will then nuke them with a debate on gender. Having discarded the traditional definition of gender they have outsmarted themselves by failing to come up with any credible replacement.
Conservative Voices
Conservative voices are really looking forward to witnessing the digging of the hole the so-called progressives are deepening for themselves as they gear up for a campaign full of their own gender confusion. The culture cult is rightfully terrified of being unmasked as attacking gender and marriage.
The grandly named ‘inter-departmental working group’ are totally confused as to where the battle lines may be drawn in a campaign where they can’t even agree on a wording. They are like an army about to engage in a fight with fine modern weapons but no ammunition. They fuzz the issue by saying that they are confident that a referendum wording that reflects how we conduct our lives in the modern era will be successful. They should take a look around at how disjointed and broken that is.
A Big Girls Blouse
Varadkar hinted that a degree of caution is necessary as “extraneous arguments” can arise during a referendum debate. He is terrified of being exposed to reality. Just look at the lunacy of those trying to be ever so politically correct. They want gender-neutral toys to confuse their children with images of reversed roles on the packaging such as a picture of a boy with a toy kitchen and a girl playing with a truck. There is consternation about using what they choose to describe as ‘negative female language’, such as “throwing like a girl” or being “a big girl’s blouse.” They trip over themselves when focusing on the gender pay gap but not on the gender hour gap. They create a dishonest narrative with the disadvantage running only one way. These contentious issues for the progressives will not be on the ballot paper but they will muddy the waters and show up the whole referendum proposal for the debacle it is certain to become.
Self-Imposed Timeline
The Government have until the end of November to meet its own deadline and they haven’t even come up with an agreed wording yet. The fudge that “a lot of progress has been made on getting a wording that is germane with the rest of the Constitution as well as being legally sound” just exposes the dilemma they have created for themselves. Just keep on digging. Ask any of those involved to define “what is a woman” and “how many genders are there” and you will get an inkling of where they are at. There is fun in the offering with even ‘hate speech’ still undefined.
There is intensive focus placed on getting the final wording ready to go before Cabinet in September. That will be great fun since they can neither define “gender” nor “what is a woman” never mind the cobbling of a working wording together. Interesting times are indeed ahead in a world of politicians gone mad.
