“Posted on 08/21/2012 2:53:18 PM PDT by NYer
Rebecca Kiessling, a pro-life attorney from Michigan, fully understands the national debate going on concerning the controversial comments Missouri Senate candidate Todd Akin made about abortion and rape. Kiessling was conceived when her mother was victimized by a rapist.
“It seems to me, first of all, from what I understand from doctors, if it’s a legitimate rape, that’s really rare. The female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down,” Akin said. “The punishment ought to be on the rapist, and not in attacking the child.”
Kiessling responded to the comments saying that the use of the term “legitimate rape” was unnecessary and improper and she gave her advice for how pro-life candidates can thoughtfully and articulately address the sensitive subject of rape and abortion.
“
First of all — never say ‘legitimate rape,’” Kiessling said. “Ron Paul used the same terminology last January and he got lambasted for it too. This kind of remark only serves to perpetuate the suspicion of rape victims’ accounts. It’s estimated that only 1% of rape victims ever see their rapist convicted as charged. Rape is rape. “Legitimate rape” almost sounds as if it was somehow justifiable.”
“If you are 100% pro-life with no rape exceptions, there is no need to question the veracity of a rape victims’ account, because you are against all abortions. It would not matter if a woman was not or not raped,” she continued.
While abortion advocates often talk about supporting a woman’s right to privacy, Kiessling says rape exceptions in abortion laws turn that notion on its head.
“Rape exceptions in the law actually put the government in the position of having to ascertain when the child was conceived, who the father is, whether the child was conceived during the alleged rape or during intercourse with her husband or boyfriend, and if the child was conceived during the time frame of the alleged rape, then the government would need to determine whether the sexual intercourse was consensual or not,” she explained. “So rape exceptions serve to perpetuate the injustice against rape victims that their accounts are to be viewed with skepticism, and it further leaves the majority of impregnated rape victims wholly unprotected under the law. Rape exceptions suggest that a “real rape victim” couldn’t possibly love “the rapist’s baby” and that rape victim mothers don’t exist.”
The pro-life attorney says pro-life candidates need to be coached on how to answer the media’s inevitable question.
“Senator Rick Santorum, during his presidential campaign, said that he thinks that a child conceived in rape is “a gift from God,” and he was made fun of for that. Just Google images for “Santorum rape” and you’ll see all of the posters where he is mocked for this statement. While I believe it’s true that every child is a gift from God, including children conceived in rape, I don’t believe this was the best response for the interview,” she explained. “If it had been my birthmother sharing that she believes that I’m a blessing and a gift from God, she would not be mocked and ridiculed in the same way he was. And then Sharron Angle, during her Senate race in Nevada, said it’s a “lemonade situation,” which did not come across well at all. The problem is not with these candidates’ values. The problem is how they express them.”
Kiessling gives a three-step process in terms of how candidates should answer the question:
1. The Supreme Court has said that the death penalty is cruel and unusual punishment for rapists and that rapists don’t deserve the death penalty. I don’t think the innocent child conceived in rape deserves the death penalty for the crimes of her father. It seems to me that is cruel and unusual punishment.
2. Rape victims are four times more likely to die within the next year after the abortion, with a higher rate of suicide, murder, drug overdose, etc.. As someone who really cares about rape victims, I want to protect them from the rapist, and from the abortion, and not the baby. A baby is not the worst thing that could ever happen to a rape victim — an abortion is. We need to educate the American public on the truth in this matter and not make public policy based on myth and misinformation.
3. Rape victims choose abortion at half the rate of the average unplanned pregnancy, which is over 50%. Only 15-25% of rape victims choose abortion, depending on the study. The majority of rape victims choose to raise her child — not “the rapist’s baby” — HER child.
Of course, I also think it helps to share a personal story and there are lots available, of women who became pregnant by rape and either regret aborting, are raising their children or are birth-moms, as well as stories of those of us conceived in rape and/or incest. You can find those stories on my website: www.rebeccakiessling.com/Othersconceivedinrape.html and www.rebeccakiessling.com/PregnantByRape.html
Or zygote. So... is your keyword for this issue 'unwanted?'
Aren't all abortions-on-demand the 'unwanted' of babies-by-any-other-name?
Is unwantedness the key issue for you?
All cells contain the potential to develop into the organism which it came from.
"One of my law teachers used to talk about the ideological power of categories. Move the baby from “child” to “embryo,” and suddenly you can kill him with impunity."
Skin cells can be cloned. How does they fit into the professor's irrational catagory scheme?
"with murderous consequences"
A petri dish full of embryos is not a pool of people and an unwanted embryo is not a person. For an embryo to be called a person, their parents must make that designation. No one else has the right to do so.
If it’s not a baby, no need for an abortion.
Absolutely, and the key to it is the requirement for the mother's body and the mother's absolute sovereignty over that body. There's nothing viable about the embryo whatsoever w/o the mother's body being involved, until some later stage of the pregnancy — later stage being the keyword. For the purposes of this discussion, contraception is essentially what's involved here.
bttt
How about we not focus on the rape victim but instead focus on the rapist and have his immolation broadcast and repeated on national television in 3D max? If the victim is preg, abort it and shove it up his ass beforehand.
There is a reason vicious punishment existed in the middle ages: It prevented vicious crime.
And it doesn’t have to be the middle ages. Take the Muslim assassination of French General Jean Baptiste Kleber in 1800. The French took his assassin Soleyman El-Halaby, tied his arm to a tree and burned it down to the bone slowly over 40 minutes using a torch.
Then they took a 10 foot spike, layed the top of the spike on his sphincter hole, and slammed it in using a sledge hammer until it came out beside his neck. Then they flipped the whole thing vertical until the spike was standing straight up and poor Soleyman was resting comfortably like a worm on a fish hook. Then they cooked him like a pig on a spit. How many people would oppose this if their sister, mother or wife was raped? Not me, I would volunteer.
Fellow pro-life Freepers,
I recommend we disseminate this article with others as rapidly as possible.
http://www.lifenews.com/2012/08/20/woman-conceived-in-rape-responds-to-akin-abortion-controversy/
I suppose these lines are drawn at the point between conception and human life at "some later stage of pregnancy." I'm of the opinion that human life begins at conception.
The person who needs to read it most right now is Todd Akin. AND maybe she might come campaign for him after she sets his language straight... He is going to need all the legitimate help he can get to beat Claire.
What is known about this particular question of science is far less than what is not known.
His comments might have been inaccurate, but I would gues the answer is unclear. What is certain is that nobody can states accurately, based on what they feel about the topic, that Akin was incorrect.
But what Akin said certainly has nothing to do with whether or not he will be a good senator.
A petri dish full of embryos is not a pool of people and an unwanted embryo is not a person. For an embryo to be called a person, their parents must make that designation. No one else has the right to do so.
When an intermediate premise assumes the conclusion, we have circular reasoning. Highly irrational.
Translated to expose the circle, you appear to be saying that a very young human life is not capable of being defined as protectable human life except by older human life which has already been designated as protectable human life by other human lives that have also been designated as protectable human life AND capable of judging the protectability of human life by yet other human life deemed as protectable human life by (insert infinite regression here) ....
Confused reasoning at its finest. You are begging the question of what human life is, deferring answering of that question to an infinite regression which never answers it. As Spock would say, highly illogical.
I guess that is an expression of your respect for the value of human life...except tomatoes aren't human, and the mother is not the "owner" of the baby.
Stop at this point. First, human life is determined by adults. Very young human life includes fresh skin calls after division. They obviously can not make decisions, but can, with the help of some scientists become adult humans and then at that point they can make decisions.
"You are begging the question of what human life "
The question isn't, "what is human life?" The question is "what is a person?" Personhood is determined by those who have reached the age of reason. ie. adults
More women should train and conceal or open carry.
God needs to be brought back into the fabric of society. Man is rudderless without His guidance.
There is no baby and you and your cohorts are not the owners of it. You also do not own, or have any justification whatsoever to claim any soveriegnty, or right to determine how the mother must use her body, or to dictate to her how or what to consider her unwanted embryo. That stands especially clear and firm when it was placed by a rapist. In fact, such a person who would join forces to coerce the will of the woman raped regarding the unwanted embryo is no less than complicit in the rape itself!
There are two problems with the Missouri Jack@$$’s comments. The smaller one is that he verbally fumbled the ball in using the term “legitimate rape”.
The much BIGGER one is that he claimed a uterus is smart enough to realize that a rape has occurred and will reject the zygote/embryo. Which is utter insanity and something the very existence of the woman writing this thoughtful commentary directly contradicts. While he’s at it, why doesn’t he just go ahead and claim that the world is really flat too?
This is exactly correct and is what has most of us picking our heads off the desk. You can argue “standing by principle” all you want. It’s irrelevant. This was mind-numbing stupidity that makes all Christians look like radical fundies.
....and stupid ones at that.
No, he needs to go, but that appears to be moot at this point.
How's that going to work? Does she practice drawing during a dream, or stand ready before she passes out?
3. Rape victims choose abortion at half the rate of the average unplanned pregnancy, which is over 50%. Only 15-25% of rape victims choose abortion, depending on the study. The majority of rape victims choose to raise her child — not “the rapist’s baby” — HER child.
No reason to punish the baby
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.