By Irishexaminer.com,Sarah Harte

Copyright irishexaminer

It’s 1930 and, even for a member of the aristocracy, divorce is a cause for shame. She is, as another character puts it, “a social pariah”.

After seeing the film, I drove home from Bantry feeling melancholic as I considered divorce.

Getting divorced feels like a failure, of sorts.

There was a strong stigma surrounding it when I was growing up.

A vivid memory from childhood is bigger children discussing siblings whose parents had been divorced in England.

Even at that young age, it was obvious that divorce was a cause for shame. That early cultural conditioning is hard to shake off.

Of course, we specialised in constructing social pariahs in this country far beyond the early part of the last century.

Anybody who stepped outside the boundaries of strict social norms was a cause for discussion, whether it pertained to marriage breakdown, having children outside of what was quaintly called wedlock, or a range of “offences” you could commit if you didn’t tow a narrow line which was largely dictated by the Catholic Church and State which, at one point, were more or less indivisible.

We only finally legislated for divorce in June 1996, with the measure passing in a referendum the previous year by the narrowest of margins.

This came 10 years after an exceptionally bitter divorce referendum, where divorce was resoundingly defeated two to one.

A post-Catholic country?

It’s interesting to look back and consider how relatively quickly the liberal agenda took hold.

Ireland is now sometimes described as a post-Catholic country.

Can this really be said to be true, though, when 38% of voters voted no in the marriage equality referendum and one in three voted no in the abortion referendum?

Those are substantial numbers of citizens who likely remain conservative in their voting.

The socially conservative barrister Maria Steen, who is currently seeking a presidential nomination, has long been an advocate for family values and is a well-known supporter of stay-at-home mothers.

She and I both campaigned for a no vote in last year’s referendum (for me, it was just in my column) because I also believe in the value of care and care work.

A member of the Iona Institute, which promotes Christian values, and a highly skilled debater, it remains to be seen whether she will be successful in her bid.

The Irish Examiner reports that her path to the ballot looks uncertain. However, if she does get there, she is likely to garner the conservative Catholic vote.

Perhaps her vote might extend beyond that rump.

To my surprise, two male friends of mine — neither of whom is a social conservative — both indicated that they would vote for her because of her intelligence, articulacy, and principled stance on a range of matters, despite holding different views on key social issues.

In some ways, it would be a positive to have a different voice during presidential debates.

It might also mollify right-leaning voters who may not feel that they have a voice in a more liberal Ireland.

Anything that promotes unity in an increasingly polarised world can only be a good thing.

Giving all citizens a voice, or at least the feeling that they have a voice, is essential if we want to strengthen our democracy at a time when democracy globally is thought to be in retreat.

Reality of divorce

Steen has spoken in the past about the harm of quickie divorces, advocating for a more extended cooling-off period so that people don’t rush into divorce.

There is nothing inherently wrong with this view, but is it grounded in reality?

My experience of the divorce process and of friends’ experiences is that divorce is not something that is entered into lightly in this country. And there’s nothing quick about it.

The reality of backlogs in the courts, along with the infinitesimally slow court procedures, means that you’re locked into proceedings for years, which is a form of psychological torture.

It’s not only soul-crushing, it is very costly.

When you look at the American model of marriage, which sees concepts such as “starter marriages” and people waltzing in and out of marriages lightly, she may have a point.

Spending time in an expat community in the Middle East in my teens, where I was mixing with American peers, I saw the tremendous damage done to young people whose parents treated marriage like a game of musical chairs.

Those teenagers were the collateral damage when feckless parents prioritised their own romantic lives over their children’s stability.

But most people I know are very sad at having to throw in the towel.

They recognise that divorce has a profound impact on children and the family unit.

‘Family first’

Maria Steen wrote in the Irish Catholic that she was running in the presidential election because she wished “to be a voice supportive of the values and principles enshrined in our Constitution: Family first”.

I agree that we should support families, but which families? Only families that remain founded on a stable marriage? Families that exclusively have two heterosexual parents?

The Iona Institute opposes, among other things, same-sex marriage, civil partnerships, lifting restrictions on divorce, abortion, and adoptions by same-sex couples.

As a prominent member of the institute, it is reasonable to assume that Maria Steen backs some of these views.

So, while it would be good to have a broader range of voices in the presidential election, I can’t help but feel that a vote for Steen would be a vote for a regression of sorts, a harkening back to an Ireland in spirit if not in law, where there was no marriage equality.

A country where women had to take the boat to England, as we pretended that Irish women didn’t have abortions. And where divorce was a pipe dream, and miserable, socially shamed people had to figure out ways of separating without ever really being free.

It’s a new Ireland. Things change, and, while nothing is ever perfect, we — as the wise Downton character opined — must change with them.