This will be the result of the Akin/Ryan/Romney et. al. GOP platform : Criminalizing Miscarriages

[TalkingDog]

http://feminismandreligion.com/2011/10/06/criminalizing-miscarriages-latin-america%E2%80%99s-zero-tolerance-policy-on-abortion-by-michele-stopera-freyhauf/

Imagine suffering a miscarriage. All of us have or know someone who has suffered one; I had two. For me it was a terrible time and I still remember the day of loss and the expected due date. We all cope differently with this loss, but it is just that – a physical and/or emotional loss. Statistically 15-25% of women in childbearing years will suffer a miscarriage anywhere from 5 to 20 weeks gestation. In the United States, when we suffer a miscarriage we go to the hospital. Often times the visit results in a dilation and curettage (or D&C) to stop bleeding and possible infection. For me this was also done after the doctors removed the baby girl that was dead inside of my womb.

If this would have occurred in certain Latin American countries, especially in El Salvador, Chile, Colombia, Malta, Nicaragua, and even Mexico, the emergency room doctor would notify the authorities of my miscarriage and I would be arrested and jailed anywhere from 3-50 years for having an “abortion.” El Salvador even has a prosecutor’s office responsible for crimes against minors and women whose responsibilities are capturing, trying, and incarcerating women who have abortions and miscarriages. In this office, there are police, investigators, medical spies, and forensic vagina inspectors. Medical providers have an obligation to report abortions; this is focused more on young uneducated and impoverished women. For these women, there is no presumption of innocence; they are guilty.

[dkf]

1. It's the opposite...hasn't Akin actually just stated it is okay if the body does it on its own?

He doesn't seem upset at the thought that a woman's body could secrete something that prevents conception.

[The Magistrate]

2. You Really Need Tio Think These Things Through, Ma'am

It is indeed quite likely that miscarriage would be investigated as a possible criminal act of abortion, certainly if the so-called 'person-hood' amendments were in place. Any death of a person requires some attention of the legal authorities, and if there is anything suspicious about its circumstances, some looking into by the police.

[dkf]

5. You aren't seeing the initial contradiction in his thinking.

He thinks it is okay for the body to do its own contraception. He isn't condemning women for secreting this whatever it is when raped.

[The Magistrate]

8. Miscarriage And Contraception Are Different Matters, Ma'am

Again, you need to think these things through, and stifle your apparent instinct to engage in apologias for whatever right-wing nostrum is on offer currently.

Akin's belief is that a woman's body will of its own capacities prevent conception in certain circumstances, essentially circumstances in which she is stressed and frightened.

Akin's belief is that, once conception has occurred, the end of a pregnancy is the death of a person, of a human being interchangeable with any other. It would not matter whether this occurred naturally or by human agency; it would be the death of a human being. It would not be criminal if it were a natural occurrence, just as the death of an elderly person from pneumonia would not be criminal. Such a death of a person inside a woman's body would, however, certainly be criminal were it the result of human agency. There would have to be an investigation to determine whether there had been a killing when a miscarriage occurred, if there were any suspicion that the event was not wholly natural. People of the ilk that support this view would certainly be inclined to doubt the word of a woman, particularly a young, single, poorer woman, that she had not taken any action to kill the person inside her.

And it should be emphasized that this is not just Aiken's view: it is the predominant view of Republicans, certainly of Republicans affiliated with the religious right, and most active in the party machinery.

[jeff47]

22. I don't think you're taking it quite far enough.

Any miscarriage would indeed have to be investigated, since it's the death of a human being according to the Republicans.

But what, exactly, would that investigation find?

"You drank a cup of coffee, and caffeine is known to harm a pregnancy." Or a glass of wine before she knew she was pregnant. Or any other activity that has the remotest chance of harming her pregnancy would become a giant issue.

Gonna be a lot of women charged with manslaughter or similar.

[Aerows]

3. You completely missed what Akin was trying to do

By saying that in a case of "legitimate" rape, whatever that is, a woman wouldn't get pregnant, so if a woman is raped and gets pregnant, she wasn't really raped, so she shouldn't be allowed to have an abortion.

It had nothing to do with contraception or preventing pregnancy, and everything to do with the fact that he believes that even if a woman is raped she should be forced to carry the child. It's as barbaric of an idea as they come.

[dkf]

6. Yes but the initial assumption is that it is okay that she secretes this whatever it is.

He thinks it is so obvious a child ought not to be born of rape that the body naturally takes care of it on its own. Otherwise he should be outraged that this secretion happens in the first place.

His thinking is contradictory.

[Aerows]

7. I can't believe you are defending his comments

There is nothing contradictory about his motives in this - the idea behind all of this is that a woman should bear a child no matter the circumstances under which she is impregnated. Tell me, to my face, that an 11 year old that gets pregnant from a rape - and make no mistake about it, sex with an 11 year old is RAPE - should be forced to bear the child.

Tell me to my face that a woman violently raped should be forced to carry the child to term, because by defending Akin's statements, that is exactly what you are saying. I've long since figured out that you are a right winger because you are always defending whatever silliness they come up with. You don't come right out and say "I'm defending these statements", but you do it anyway.

Here, you are trying to minimize the horror of what Akin said by merely saying it is "contradictory". It's not a contradiction - his true intent is horrible, and your attempts to minimize the horror of his statements is nothing but an attempt to make them more palatable.

There is nothing palatable about his statements and his intentions.

[dkf]

9. Oh for goodness sakes I'm not defending him. I'm showing that he actually believes in

Stopping or preventing conception contrary to what he may think.

[Aerows]

11. You are defending him

You are trying to say that he agrees with contraception, which he clearly does not. The man clearly stated that he believes that if a woman enjoys sex she will get pregnant, so she should be forced to have the child. He couldn't have said it any more clearly than if he used that language.

Woman has sex (or sex is forced on her), should bear child. Period. That's what he believes. That's what most anti-choicers believe, too. Women should not have sex without getting pregnant. That's their views on contraception, and why they also hate contraception, too. No one with a functional intellect believes there is anything more behind attacks on abortion. It's about relegating women to the role of babymaker.

[dkf]

13. I'm not defending him. I'm showing he is contradicting himself.

You seem not to get the point I am trying to make. I am laughing at his inability to see what he is espousing...control of conception.

He is an idiot is the point I'm trying to make. I can't believe you think that is defending him.

[Aerows]

14. "No, no"

"It's really rain you are feeling."

[dkf]

16. Whatever. The guy just said that the female body prevents conception when raped.

But he is supposed to be against barriers to conception. Rain on that.

[Aerows]

18. Todd Akin and Paul Ryan

co-sponsored a bill that would ban many forms of birth control. If you want to try to paint that as a pro-birth control argument, I really don't know what to tell you.

I guess you think terror, fear and trauma are great ideas for contraception.

[The Magistrate]

15. No, Ma'am: At Best You Are Showing That You Do Not Understand His Thinking Yourself

Whether that makes him or you the brighter is an interesting subject for speculation....

He and his ilk have no objection to a natural failure of conception; witness even the Vatican with its so-called 'rhythm method' of birth control.

What they object to is conscious human design to prevent conception, and they have a mortal objection to any conscious human act which interferes with gestation of a fertilized egg, viewing a great proportion of hormonal birth control methods, which prevent implantation of a fertilized egg in the uterine wall, as abortion, which they consider the killing of a person, a human being.

There is no contradiction whatever in the line of thought.

It is a line of thought, however, that would demand investigation of any miscarriage which seemed 'suspicious', just there is a demand for investigation of any death of a person in circumstances which raise some possibility of foul play. For an artificially induced miscarriage would be murder, the unlawful killing of a human being, a person.

[Aerows]

19. Well, you know

Terror, fear and trauma are certainly better forms of birth control than taking a pill every day.

[classof56]

10. Well said.

[Brewinblue]

4. In 1995

I was living in Louisiana with my wife when she suffered a miscarriage. The doctors at Ochsner Hospital (a very respected institution), at first would not perform a D&C out of fear for their personal safety. All D&C's in LA had to be reported to the authorities as abortions, and the information was available to the public. Only after my wife developed a fairly serious infection from the remains of the dead zygote did a doctor agree to perform a D&C.

So the OP's point is not as impossible as it may seem at first.

[Aerows]

12. My father

had to move my mother from a Catholic hospital because they wouldn't do a D&C, and she was about to die. I wouldn't be here had he not made that decision, because my mother would have died. He said that you could smell the infection before you even got to the room, but they were prepared to let her die.

[hifiguy]

17. The Handmaid's Tale has been the long-term

game plan for the radical right and religulously insane for a long while now.

[Aerows]

20. Yep

And sane people know it. The saddest part of it is that those who would suffer under such laws are some of the ones supporting them.

My sister, for example. She has a heart condition. A pregnancy would likely kill her. She takes birth control. I wouldn't be here if my mother hadn't had a D&C when she miscarried, and my sister would have grown up without a mother. Yet she is the one that supports these types of bills. Now maybe she hates sex with her husband - I don't know, if he was mine, I'd hate it, too.

My mother pointed out how foolish her stance was on this. She blithely continues on supporting every nutcase that comes up with this stuff, though.

[Aerows]

21. That isn't the endgame they are looking for

But it is the result.