The Equal Marriage Referundum
First, I want to say how delighted i am that there is a majority of Irish people who are willing to allow others to live their lives and get married.
However, there seems to be a narrative that this is the way thing should be done; That a vote of all people should be given in order to allow Equal Marriage in other countries. I do not believe that this is the best way of going forward.
In Ireland, there had over many years, been various court decisions that interpreted the Irish Constitution to effectively mean that marriage was between a Man and a Woman. This meant that any law that allowed for Equal Marriage may have faced, and lost, a constitutional challenge. This is why we needed a referendum.
This however does not mean that this was a good option. What happened was that we let a majority decide the rights of the minority; this is not a good thing. The rights of the minority should never be something the majority can decide, People have rights and they should not be at the mercy of other people.
So I can understand that people may want the whole democratic process of letting the people decide might be attractive; it however is something that is problematic.
However, there seems to be a narrative that this is the way thing should be done; That a vote of all people should be given in order to allow Equal Marriage in other countries. I do not believe that this is the best way of going forward.
In Ireland, there had over many years, been various court decisions that interpreted the Irish Constitution to effectively mean that marriage was between a Man and a Woman. This meant that any law that allowed for Equal Marriage may have faced, and lost, a constitutional challenge. This is why we needed a referendum.
This however does not mean that this was a good option. What happened was that we let a majority decide the rights of the minority; this is not a good thing. The rights of the minority should never be something the majority can decide, People have rights and they should not be at the mercy of other people.
So I can understand that people may want the whole democratic process of letting the people decide might be attractive; it however is something that is problematic.