Reblogged: Rick Santorum on Pregnant Rape Victims

[dianahsieh]

Rick Santorum on Pregnant Rape Victims:

Rick Santorum says that pregnant rape victims should "accept the gift of human life" and "make the best out of a bad situation." And yes, that's what every advocate of "personhood for zygotes" must say.

As Ari and I said in The Assault on Abortion Rights Undermines All Our Liberties:

In [a] 2004 survey, around 1.5 percent of women who got an abortion cited rape or incest as the cause of the pregnancy. Forcing a woman to carry an unwanted fetus to term when the pregnancy was caused by a sexual assault victimizes her yet again. Even if she gives up the child for adoption, she must live with the ever-present physical reminder of her assault for the duration of her pregnancy. Moreover, the woman might feel a torturous conflict over the born child: she might desperately want to raise her own child, but abhor the thought of raising the child of her rapist.

That last point, I think, is particularly important.

Original entry: See link at top of this post

[Swerve of Shore]

You make some excellent points. The stunted nature of Santorum's view of rights is further made clear in this quote from his interview with Byron York:

"We in America should be big enough to try to surround ourselves and help women in those terrible situations who have been traumatized already. To put them through another trauma of an abortion, I think is too much to ask. So I would absolutely stand and say that one violence is enough."

To suggest that allowing women to choose to have an abortion is more traumatic than forcing them to carry their rapist's baby to term is really quite an impressive feat of il-logic.

[bluecherry]

". . . I think is too much to ask."

Because of course, somebody else MUST be the one trying to get them to get an abortion, no way somebody would not want to have a baby with their rapist of their own volition.

[Steve D'Ippolito]

The comments on the original post http://blog.dianahsi...l#disqus_thread are particularly interesting given who is supporting Santorum's position and how. (The Whittaker Chambers "gas chamber" line gets invoked.)

Edited February 2, 2012 by Steve D'Ippolito

[brian0918]

How does one go from, "a woman should be allowed to determine the fate of the smaller-than-a-pinhead zygote growing in her body" to "people should be sent to gas chambers for not measuring up to some standard"? Please help me understand that, Avila.