2/15
This tells me one thing & one thing only - they have nothing to say yet. I find it so interesting that so many others have leapt to speak on behalf of survivors when some of the key survivor interest groups have not yet commented.
#motherandbabyhomes
3/15
The report is MASSIVE, approximately 3000 pages, the information contained in it very detailed in parts, I've been immersed in this story my whole adult life & even I can't yet grasp the detail in the one chapter that is about the #MotherandBabyHome I was born in.
4/15
I appreciate that much of the report is shocking to those for whom this has not been their life story, for those of us who are survivors we have, for the most part, been only too intimately familiar with the details of the #motherandbabyhomesreport, & much more besides.
5/15
My experience, & the experience of every other survivor I know, is that we have been talked about & talked over our entire lives. Gaslit by agencies, adoptive parents, birth parents, the state, churches, society & much more, with others deciding for us what is best for us.
6/15
Now, for some survivors for the first time, they feel that it's easier to speak the truth of what happened to them, how it damaged them, how they feel. I've seen talk of feeling like the publishing of the #motherandbabyhomesreport & some of the responses
7/15
to it as well as the questioning of it has given a sense of 'permission' to speak because now they're more likely to be believed & taken seriously. While that is gut-wrenchingly sad, I can see & know the truth of it for many survivors.
#motherandbabyhomes
8/15
& so my request is this. Amplify survivors, read the journalists & commentators who are sharing survivor stories, read the academics who are analysing the law, the facts, the evidence - most #motherandbabyhomes survivors don't have the specific education/training to do this.
9/15
Certainly, I'm happy to see journalists with integrity like
@CaelainnH &
@ococonuts &
@fionndavenport telling our stories, I'm delighted to see
@Tupp_Ed &
@maeveorourke sifting through legal & other data to interpret & support survivors to have a better understanding.
10/15
What I'm not happy to see is people speaking over us, deciding what we want or need without hearing what the larger organisations have to say, & they've said nothing as they, likely, haven't yet read, digested & sufficiently discussed the #motherandbabyhomesreport to do so.
11/15
I want to invite people to consider..... if this were an issue effecting black people would it be acceptable to only listen to 'white' voices? No, it wouldn't, we'd want to hear from black people what their experiences, thoughts & desires were.
#motherandbabyhomes
12/15
We'd criticise, rightly so, those who spoke on behalf of black people & decided what it is they wanted or needed. This is no different. Survivor stories need to be at the centre of every narrative, anything else is a continuation of #humanrights, & other, abuses.
13/15
And that's not to say there is one survivor story, there isn't - we are not homogeneous. For example my birth mother & I are at total odds about birth certificates, are her feelings in this regard any less important than mine? Of course not, but feelings are not #rights.
14/15
The #motherandbabyhomesreport, as well as all associated issues, is deeply complex & sensitively personal - it is a trauma. I want to invite all who are not survivors to consider the perspective they're coming from when commenting, do you have survivors at the centre?
15/15
If not, then don't fill that space, unless it's expert opinion you need or have, leave it open & invite survivors into it or amplify their voices, listen to the voices silenced for decades, listen, hear, digest & really take in what's heard.
#motherandbabyhomes
