After claiming female victims of “legitimate rape” could not become pregnant due to the uterus’s ability to “shut that whole thing down,” Missouri congressman Todd Akin took to Mike Huckabee’s radio talk show to ‘pologize…
…for using the term “legitimate rape,” as opposed to “forcible.”
“I was talking about forcible rape, and that [‘legitimate’] was absolutely the wrong word,” Akin said, using a still-infamous rape descriptor that made waves upon its inclusion in the 2011 “No Tax Payer Funding for Abortion Act.” The bill, which both Akin and VP hopeful Paul Ryan sponsored, had originally stated that exceptions from the bill would only be made for underage victims of incest and women who conceived during “forcible rape.” The word “forcible” was dropped before the act was passed by Congress in a 251-175 vote (it was never introduced in the senate, nor would it be expected to garner the necessary votes) due to considerable outrage from rape and violence-awareness groups and the Democratic party.
Though as the term “forcible” rape did not die alongside the NTPFAA and is currently floating around public discourse, it seems an appropriate time to remind Republicans that all rape is “forcible.”
That is what rape is- forced sex.
Jenny, who was raped at gun point, was just as “forced” as Betty, who was raped after being drugged. Incidentally, Billie was just as “forced” as Betty and Jenny when her boyfriend continued to have sex with her after she told him to stop. All three girls did not want to have or consent to sex. Therefore, they were forced.
Because that is what all rape is. Forced, or “forcible.”
And, unfortunately, all of these rapes could yield a pregnancy.
Women reach their peak age of fertility in their 20s, with 22.5 being the average age of rape victims in the United States. With so many women being fertile at the time of their assault, pregnancy resulting from rape may be a real concern for many- and a frightening reality for the estimated 32,101 women who will become pregnant by their attacker each year. That is 32,101 scared women who do not need Todd Akin, Paul Ryan, or any other (usually male) Republican politician to decide whether or not their story is, essentially, frightening enough to actually be deemed “rape.”
Of course, Akin was not totally incorrect in (very inarticulately) asserting that rape does not always lead to pregnancy. This has nothing to do, however, with the female body being able to “shut the whole thing down.” Though a uterine rape sensor would have been a phenomenal evolutionary trait to have picked up, this is something the female reproductive system does not yet come equipped with. Instead, rapes do not consistently lead to pregnancy for a variety of reasons, including the victim being on birth control, infertile (perhaps due to age or health), or, of course, male. (It is curious whether the GOP recognizes male victims of rape as such, as the party has expressed no interest in penning any laws that control male bodies. Is male rape more or less “forcible” if the perpetrator was a decrepit priest, as opposed to a hulking gym bunny hopped up on steroids? Can the rape be “forcible” if carried out by a woman? Or is the rape even “legitimate,” since no real, burly, macho, “legitimate” man could ever possibly get raped?)
Rape is one of the most soul-crushing, self esteem-shattering, life-ruining, dehumanizing, and painful (both emotionally and physically) experiences a person can be subjected to. Victims of sexual assault deserve nothing less than sympathy and assistance in obtaining any and all resources necessary to regain their well-being. This includes (free) rape kits, counseling, accurate information on what they (and their body) have experienced, and sometimes abortion; it should never include politicians trying to refute and belittle the nightmare that is rape, especially in a bizarre attempt to pass legislation denying victims adequate care.
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