It’s awful that a tragedy must vie with a pageant for an audience

There was something surreal about being immersed in a TV discussion on the botched nature of our abortion law, while on another channel the nation indulged in it’s annual "lovely girl" fest, celebrating all that is wonderful, innocent and global-peace loving about young Irish women.

One young woman, who lives here now, and may one day become an Irish citizen, has probably not yet heard of the Rose of Tralee. When she does, it’s timing, coinciding with the controversy over her failure to get the abortion she sought after being raped in her home country, will be a sad annual reminder of her personal tragedy. What we heard this week is that she first sought an abortion at 8 weeks, and grew increasingly desperate and suicidal, but appears to have been strung along until she reached 25 weeks and her baby was delivered by caeasarean section.

Could there be any more of a contrast with these lovely, fresh faced, confident, smiling young women in the Dome in Tralee, and the image we have of the young woman, raped as a war crime, and finding herself pregnant in a country where she does not speak the language and where her pleas to terminate the pregnancy were met with consistent obstacles.