On Piers Morgan, Rick Santorum admitted that he would counsel his own daughter to bear her rapist’s child.
He calls rape-borne pregnancy a “gift from God, but a very broken one”. What kind of utter lack of empathy does it take to consider a cluster of cells — a zygote, an undifferentiated blop of cells no bigger than a computer monitor pixel, a barely fertilized egg — more important a life than a fully realized human being whose rights to self-realization have just been utterly trampled upon? Why does his empathy extend to the potentiality of life, but not to the presently-realized and recently-destroyed life that is the rape victim who will now have to endure nine more months of punishment in no longer having control over what your body does, followed by unwanted single parenthood which is another abridgement of your self-realization, for the crime of having failed to avoid being raped?
Remember, this man would absolutely allow abortions for women who happen to be married to him, though he’d never call it that, but would deny abortions in the case of rape. This sounds like hyperbole, but probably isn’t: how long until President Santorum makes ovulating without fertilization a crime?
If this man becomes President, I’m moving to Canada.
Oh wait.
Further proof that the anti-abortion haters aren’t really “pro-life,” they’re anti-woman.
And what kind of God gives his most precious “gifts” by means of violent rape?
Well, it wouldn’t have to mean single parenthood. Not if the “repentent” rapist marries her as is biblically sanctioned. / sarc.
Ye-non-existent-gods what a sack of santorum Santorum is.
I can’t imagine what it does to the identity of a child as they grow up and learn that their father was a rapist. Instead, if the whole thing is kept secret, this becomes a lifetime of punishment for the mother, not just nine months. I agree, “Pro-life” really does mean Anti-woman. It some sense it almost equates to “Pro-Rape” since these people seem determined to amplify the damage done by the original rapist as if it’s part of some twisted sacrificial act of worship to their god.
I think StevoR has it: in Santorum’s theocratic skeevy world, the right of a woman to self-realisation doesn’t exist; sex is sin by definition and only procreation (to make more little Christians robots) makes it allowable; rapists are just men who are a bit more hasty than the norm; and Church-sanctioned heterosexual marriage is the only legitimate way to experience sexuality – but no pleasure allowed, mind! Because happiness is not something you should expect in this vale of tears that is pre-Afterlife. Close your eyes and think of England – I mean, Heaven.
Well, you have to admit, he is consistent…
He is consistent at being cognitively dissonant.
Take the “n” out of his name and you get satorum. Sounds a like satan if you ask me.
Know anyone up north who has a couch my son & I could crash on if he gets POTUS? ;]
Santorum’s not getting POTUS. At least, not directly on this round. What he might get is VPOTUS if, say, Romney gets the nomination and wants to ensure the fundie vote and manages to win against Obama. From there it’s just one fatal accident to POTUS. Hmm…I second Jezzie’s question.
And yet, it’s so much worse than that.
What parental rights does the father (the rapist) have? Would the victim be forced to pay for court procedures to ensure the rapist does not have access to the child? Would the rapist actually need to be convicted of the crime to revoke his status as legal guardian?
Given the investment from the MRA crowd in “false rape accusations” there’s going to be a fair bit of political pressure to ensure that any process to prevent the father from custody on account of rape is NOT simple, painless or one-sided.
If it wasn’t an abortion, then why is he opposing that choice? Yes, they tried to do everything they could to avoid the abortion short of forestalling labor, but they DID NOT FORESTALL LABOR.
Seriously, we’re not going over this again. Just because the guy doesn’t want to call it an abortion, that doesn’t matter — he’d deny others the option altogether.
If you already covered this, I didn’t see it, but it seemed like a lot of jumping through hoops to say they had an abortion when they didn’t.
You can call it whatever you like — it’s only the right-wingers, who hate abortion so damn much, who think calling a second-term medical procedure done with the foreknowledge that the baby will not survive an “abortion” is somehow a bad thing.
Okay.
leftwingfox has a damn good point. If the woman tries to get an abortion, she can count on at least one busybody trying to stop her until they can get the father’s consent. Then she’ll have to accuse the father of rape, which won’t be believed unless, and until, there’s a conviction. Then (conviction or not) the rapist will sue to block the abortion, and to get custody of the kid (because, of course, the mother tried to KILL THE BABY and is therefore worse than a rapist); and the rapist will, I can guarantee you, have the full support of the entire anti-woman anti-choice movement, every step of the way.
women who are impregnated by rape already do “make the best” (*barf*) of their situation. They decide whether having a baby would make their lives better or worse, and then act accordingly. Which quite often means they get an abortion.
Rick Santorum is a hypocrite and seems to be a horrible human being. In practice he wants to deny the choice he and his wife had from other women.
However, to continue to say that his wife had an abortion, implying that they had a procedure with the intent of ending a pregnancy is, at best, misleading. They attempted to save their pregnancy through high risk surgery, it went wrong, and they took an option which had a high risk of premature birth which their baby would not survive.
In the article you link to, it’s an outright fabrication intended to score political points. Fabrications are totally unnecessary! The guy’s stances and videos such as the one you posted are enough to prove how horrible he is without making stuff up.
@Raging Bee
And even the “exceptions in the case of rape” are totally fucked in the head. Seriously, do these morons expect the unwillingly impregnated woman to wait on the less than 10% chance the assweasel gets convicted before getting an abortion, at which point the abortion question is moot, because the products of conception are already in preschool. No, they just want to make themselves seem less ghoulish.
Fuckers.
Waiting to see if two pink lines would appear after I was raped were the second worst minutes of my life. I hope they all fall down on broken bottles in a convenient way.
Whats the phrase, “The only moral abortion is my own (or that of my wife/daughter/mother)”?
Regardless of how the fetus was conceived, it’s screwy to think that the woman who is pregnant should be required to complete the pregnancy. We don’t require people to give their bodies up to others in any other circumstance, not even if the other person’s life is on the line.
If you volunteer to give someone a kidney and then decide not to go through with the operation, you will not be forced to do so. Despite the fact that you completely voluntarily agreed to be haplotyped to see if you matched the person, even if you are their only possible match, even if they’re going to die without the kidney. In short, despite the fact that it’s YOUR FAULT that you’re on the operating table about to lose a kidney, if, just before they give the anesthesia, you say, “Sorry, I don’t want to go through with this” you will not be forced to do so.
Kidney donation is only slightly more dangerous than the average pregnancy and a good deal safer than some pregnancies.
@Raging Bee (#1) — Well, they’re Christians. Their god raped a young woman (Mary) to “give” us “his son”…
I’m starting to think Dan Savage erred in allowing this despicable man’s name to be attached to something that, while icky, is likely the result of a loving encounter between two good, giving and game consenting adults. It’s an insult to butt-froth.
So what are the odds that ricky boy would be singing always look on the bright side of life when someone was crushing his knees with a sledgehammer? Oh wait no, he’s a man so he counts…
Why didn’t Xenu throw this one back in the volcano? He’s not done yet.
Canadian Immigration will be very busy processing applications if Frothy Rick is on the ballot. Just be warned, Canada has its lunatic politicians too, some of them are crazy in two languages.
However, to continue to say that his wife had an abortion, implying that they had a procedure with the intent of ending a pregnancy is, at best, misleading.
It’s not misleading, it’s what happened. From your link:
Although doctors successfully performed intrauterine surgery to temporarily correct the defect, she developed an infection from the procedure and went into premature labor.
The two choices here are 1) continue pregnancy (IV antibiotics to treat infection and drugs to stop labor in an effort to buy time), or 2) terminate pregnancy (surgical intervention to evacuate uterine contents). Given the extreme prematurity and the infection risks vs. the questionable benefit of extending pregnancy (unlikely you’d be able to stop labor/infection long enough to make a difference), she made the medically reasonable choice to terminate.
Two more points. First, once abortion is banned, pregnant women in the same situation as Ms. Santorum will be unable to choose to terminate. If the ban has an exception for woman’s health/life, you will be forced to sit on your hands and wait until she goes into organ failure before you’re allowed to render care. [This goes against the very foundation of medical care; you do everything you can to prevent the patient reaching a life-threatening, terminal state. Luckily, this will not affect real patients, just pregnant women.] Some women will survive, for some it will be too late.
If the ban does not have an exception, you will be unable to provide any proper care and most women will die.
Second, if you needed more proof of the hypocrisy, here it is:
At the time of his family’s crisis, Rick Santorum was, by coincidence, leading the fight against partial-birth abortion on the Senate floor.
“There is another way. We know, because we chose it,” Karen Santorum writes. “It was to deliver you and allow you to die a natural and peaceful death in the loving arms of your parents.
The Santorums were able to chose to terminate in the safest medical way (by having an intact delivery). This, in turn, allowed them to properly grieve their loss.
At the same time, Mr. Santorum was fighting to deny the very same choice to other women. He made sure the riffraff won’t be able to have safe terminations and a chance to grieve by banning intact deliveries (often the safest method, especially when you have an infection) and mandating fetal dismemberment. It’s good to be the Santorums, no?
First, once abortion is banned, pregnant women in the same situation as Ms. Santorum will be unable to choose to terminate. If the ban has an exception for woman’s health/life, you will be forced to sit on your hands and wait until she goes into organ failure before you’re allowed to render care.
Which is going to be more dangerous for a number of reasons. As you already pointed out, patients will be in worse shape because they are forced to wait until the damage is bad enough that the risk to life/health is definitive. Second, providers will have less experience with the necessary procedures so you’ll have inexperienced people performing riskier surgeries. Just the set up for increased mortality. Very, er, pro-life.
Third, an illegal abortion market will evolve where women will pay for a procedure that probably won’t be performed by a doctor and will be far riskier than an abortion done in a hospital or clinic. Forth, women who can’t afford an illegal abortion may go back to the coat hanger method which is also unsafe.
Banning abortions may reduce the number done by a little bit, but it will not eliminate them, just make them far more dangerous than they need to be.
Actually, Erin, nope.
(One of the rare occasions I’ve ever been able to prove you wrong on, basically, anything! I’m marking my calendar. 😀 )