Two Gentlemen from Errona

"Well it just seems that I just misspoke one word in one sentence on one day." 

That was what six-term Republican Representative Todd Akin (Missouri) said to justify his comment on pregnancy resulting from rape, “If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.”

To which one word was he referring?

‘Cuz I’m reading this and thinking that there’s a whole lot more wrong than just one word.

First of all, what is a legitimate rape? 

• Is that a rape where the rapist has the blessing of the father of the woman, her clergyman, and the valet at the restaurant serving the bull?  
• Is it a rape that has been documented by at least seven witnesses, three of whom are not related to the perpetrator or the victim?  
• Is it a rape where the rapist is caught, confesses, is convicted of a crime, and serves jail time? 

Exactly what is it that legitimizes rape?  I’m pretty sure nothing legitimizes rape.  NOTHING.  Rape is an act of violence.  It is never, never ever, the victim’s fault.  It is a crime.  And it is never legitimate.  NEVER.

Secondly, what is this mystical power of pregnancy rejection of which Rep. Akin speaks? 

• From what I remember when I was taught sex ed in sixth grade, it doesn’t really matter to either the sperm or the egg how they get to party in the right place at the right time.  
• I’m also pretty sure that the “Think System” isn’t valid birth control, whether or not a woman has been raped.  You can't think a pregnancy into not happening.
• And if he’s talking about a vagina that, I dunno, has serrated teeth that mutilate a rapist during the act, I don’t know of any woman with this ability -- though I’m pretty sure that any woman would trade just about anything to have a defense system like that.

So, again, Representative Akin, which one word was wrong?

Lest we think that Representative Akin’s indefensible thoughts on sexual violence are isolated, consider the case of Iowa’s own Representative Steve King.  When discussing statutory rape and incest resulting in pregnancy for a girl as young as twelve, King said "Well I just haven't heard of that being a circumstance that's been brought to me in any personal way.”

Yeah, he thinks that a kid can’t get pregnant from the crimes of incest or statutory rape because he's never met someone to whom that happened.

Here’s the deal: if a girl is old enough to start menstruation, she is old enough to get pregnant.  For some girls, that milestone happens as young as eight or nine years old.  So a twelve-year-old is surely a seasoned professional when it comes to avoiding pregnancy while being subjected to incest, right?  Because she totally knows how to use the “Think System.”

Just because you don’t personally know of any poor child to whom that has happened, it doesn’t mean that it is a figment of imagination.   By that logic, since I don’t know anyone who has drowned in a boating accident, fatal boating accidents don’t happen.  Or since I don’t know anyone who has been to Antarctica, that continent is absolutely fake.

Gentlemen, get real.  I don’t even have words for how ridiculous these positions are.  I get that Akin and King are not going to support any bill legalizing any abortion ever – I’m not even talking about that.  The problem with their positions is a crude misunderstanding of how the female body even works.  I gotta say it – if you don’t know that rape is always a crime and that girls as young as twelve can get pregnant, you are grossly unqualified to pass legislation which affects human reproduction.