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First Mothers Rejects Zappone's Transitional Justice Plan
By Kathy McMahon, Founder of Irish First Mothers | 5th March, 2017 The Irish First Mothers group rejects Minister Zappone's offer of so-called "transitional justice" to address civil r ights abuses, forced adoptions and incarcerations in Mother and Baby Homes. The mothers seek simply the same justice afforded to any other Irish citizen. Minister Zappone has reportedly said that in the coming days she will start a “conversation” with advocates, historians and scholars specialising in transitional justice. The mothers are not deceased, and have no interest in becoming an academic gender justice program, or stuffed objects in a cultural history museum. The over sixty mothers in the group are living, breathing victims of genocidal crimes. The youngest among them are in their forties. They have sought the Irish Attorney General's consideration i...
Mothers Seek Genocide Prosecutions By Irish Attorney General
By Kathy McMahon, Founder of Irish First Mothers 5th March, 2017 - Irish First Mothers has today written to the Irish Attorney General seeking to bring prosecutions under the Irish Genocide Act of 1973 in respect of religiously motivated grievous injuries which we suffered. We claim the protection of Article 2 of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide adopted by the U. N. General Assembly – and we demand justice under the provisions of Ireland's 1973 enactment of that Convention. We were subjected to religiously motivated, grossly criminal acts which meet the following criteria described under Section 2 of the Convention: 2(b): Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group. 2(e): Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group. The Attorney General could pursue prosecutions for failure to prevent genocide, for conspiracy, for incitement a...
Zappone Adoption Bill Cynically Pits Mothers Against Children
I write as the founder of First Mothers, Ireland's largest group of women who were coerced into having their children taken from them for adoption. We view with horror Minister, Katherine Zappone's just-proposed Adoption Bill - which intends to invite natural mothers to legally threaten their lost child against ever even attempting to contact them. It's a blatant attempt to try pit mothers against their own stolen children. Classic divide and conquer from cynical bureaucrats aiming to cover their own tracks of past malfeasance. Furthermore the Minister has ignored the many experts who urged changes to the Bill at the committee stage. In playing politics with a sensitive issue, the Government is trying to stampede mothers into defensively registering a preference of " no contact ". As a consequence, the State's prompting may cut mothers off from engaging with a desperately needed healing process. Many of these women suffer life-long, unresolved...
Time To End The Culture Of Adoption Secrets
by Kathy McMahon, Founder. Irish First Mothers group M y name is Kathy McMahon. I am an Irish ‘First Mother’. My first child was born in April 1974 after I spent 4 months in the Good Shepard Convent in Dunboyne Co Meath. I was aged 18. I nursed my child for 7 days. But on the day I was discharged from hospital a nurse took my infant daughter without warning. I was later forced to sanction her adoption. I did not see my daughter for another 28 years. In early 2014 I founded Irish First Mothers - a peer-to-peer mutual support group for women who were coerced into yielding up their children for adoption. Our group has over such mothers - who range in age from early 40's through to mid 70's. Most of us were incarcerated in so-called ‘Mother and Baby Homes’. The vast majority were forced into adoption. We never asked for, nor were we offered personal confidentiality. Rather, we were told that if we ever attempted contact with our own children we wo...
Irish First Mothers Launch Funding Appeal
I had my beautiful baby stolen by forced adoption in Ireland. Please help me to aid other mothers who suffered the same fate: the tens of thousands of innocent girls who were incarcerated behind the high walls of often savage religious institutions. Nothing can ever undo the damage inflicted on women who suffered their baby in some cases being literally torn from their arms. Most carry the wounds of those experiences to this day - never having had the opportunity to speak of it. I found the strength to speak out, and so have other mothers in Irish First Mothers - a peer support and reform activism group which I founded in early 2014...... Read more: bitly.com/DonateToFirstMothers My Story: http://bit.ly/KathyMcMahonJournalArticle
