Why fighting over who should be allowed abortions undermines us all
You know your party’s in trouble when you read this:A: The rape guy lost. B: Which one?
— ABFoundation (@ABFalecbaldwin) November 7, 2012
It’s been a month since the “rape guys” were vanquished on election day but really, they never go away. This last year the crazy quotes have been inescapable and the topic that they kept coming back to were rape exceptions. I hate the topic of rape exceptions with every fiber of my being. I hate that we allow any quibbling about what circumstances make it acceptable (and in whose eyes it is acceptable) to obtain a medical procedure.
Oh, maybe, just maybe if a woman has been violated and had her sense of safety, control and dignity and control taken from her then possibly you’ll consider the idea that she could be permitted access to a medical procedure rather than being forced to allow a piece of her attacker to take up residence in her body for nine months? How big of you. Oh, you struggle because maybe it was in the plan of an entity whose existence you can’t prove to kill this woman because the lump of cells (it’s not a baby, no matter who many sadly captioned posters you make) is super-important, way more important that the living, breathing woman who probably has a life and job and people who love and depend on her in tangible ways? That’s rough. Okay, it’s obvious I have feelings about why victims of rape and incest and women in medical peril should face no questions about abortion access but, believe it or not, that’s actually not what I’m here to talk about. Today I’m talking about why this conversation shouldn’t even exist at all.
Look, I know when folks are trying to ban ALL abortion it makes sense to try and protect the rights of those who have been victimized and those who are in the most immediate danger, I get it. I know why it’s important but it’s still bullshit. When you are pro-choice abortion exceptions are about trying, when all women are under attack, to at the very least, protect those who have already had the control of their bodies taken from them and those who will actually die. Now, the anti-choice would have you believe that they are out fighting because the “baby” did nothing wrong and shouldn’t be “killed” because its father was a rapist (and you know, who the hell cares about the emotional turmoil of the mother?) and it’s not fair to “play God” and pick the mother’s life over the baby’s (better to just wait and see if everyone dies!) because they are all about saving the babies. Right? Right?!!
This past year was a veritable shit-storm of ridiculous rape/”science”/abortion quotes, there were some real doozies that proved that, for the most part male politicians should keep their mouths shut about women’s health but really they were mostly just ignorant imbeciles. But as much ninja uteri and unspecified “science” that means no pregnancy will ever endanger the life of a woman again are insane and offensive, for me none of that really but for me none of that beat out this oldie but goodie in terms of cutting to the heart of why abortion exceptions are bullshit. In 2006 South Dakota lawmaker Bill Napoli was asked for a scenario in which he thought an abortion exception would be appropriate. What follows is the response (that I wish I was making up):
Bill Napoli R-SD: Rape Expert
“A real-life description to me would be a rape victim, brutally raped, savaged. The girl was a virgin. She was religious. She planned on saving her virginity until she was married. She was brutalized and raped, sodomized as bad as you can possibly make it, and is impregnated. I mean, that girl could be so messed up, physically and psychologically, that carrying that child could very well threaten her life.”
So, let’s take that apart for a minute. Clearly, Napoli understands the intricacies of rape and since he knows that some rapes are downright pleasant he wants to really make sure a woman is good and horrifically raped before showing compassion. A rape victim is permitted the abortion if her rape is “brutal”, “savage” and includes sodomy which strikes me as a random addition as sodomy wouldn’t result in pregnancy but again, Napoli wants to be thorough and make sure this rape is in his own words “as bad as you can possibly make it” AND she was a virgin who was religious and planning on saving herself for marriage. So, if the victim underwent this horrific mega-rape that Napoli envisions but was sexually active, too damn bad. Looking at this logically even the super-religious virgin isn’t safe because under Napoli’s guidelines if she had been raped but not sodomized or even raped and sodomized but it wasn’t as bad as possible she is not eligible- she must carry her rapist’s child. What is the crux of Napoli’s argument? That a woman should be permitted an abortion only if there was no chance she would want to have sex and no chance she could enjoy sex, any sex, ever- proving once again that some folks have no understanding of rape as an act of violence and control and still see it as a sexual act that one could potentially enjoy like they might a night at Mt Airy Lodge. Only rape that forces sex on the non-sexual is worthy of compassion, otherwise carry those rape babies you sex-loving skanks! Abortion exceptions don’t exist to protect Napoli’s sodomized virgin, they exist to shame the rest of the sexual female world, to divide us up according to who should have to face the consequences of sex and who shouldn’t.
Napoli is the perfect example of why abortion exceptions and frankly the anti-abortion movement are bullshit. Let’s take a closer look at the “anti-abortion folks want to save ‘babies'” thing. A movement that was interested in saving babies would logically support birth control, education and resources for women, working to prevent the pregnancies and give women support thus lessening the need for abortions. As we saw ad nauseam this last year this is often not true. The same folks fight against abortion are also often against birth control, resources like Planned Parenthood and community support. Now, I could go on and on about this but I couldn’t say it any better than Libby Anne in her amazing How I Lost Faith in The Pro-Life Movement .None of this is about “saving babies”, all of it is about judging women for having sex.
At the end of the day, all of these arguments come down taking away options, telling women “if you want to have sex, deal with the consequences” At the end of the day fighting about abortion exceptions makes all of us part of a system that punishes women for their sexuality. At the end of the day engaging in this debate acknowledges that there are some people who don’t deserve unfettered medical access. At the end of the day, abortion exceptions are bullshit.
