Appalling vista

We are regularly told that women — and women alone — should decide the outcome of the abortion issue, since matters relating to their health and bodily integrity should not be decided even in part by men.

The biggest selling books in Ireland in 2012 were the appalling Fifty Shades of Grey series which sold over 400,000 copies, virtually all of them bought by women.

The central character is a woman who willingly subjects herself to physical and sexual abuse. Doesn’t this make a mockery of the pious arguments that women should be the judges on these issues?