I WAS profoundly saddened to read of Todd Akin’s comments about the supposed low incidence of pregnancy from “legitimate rape” as he sought to justify his position against allowing abortion regardless of the circumstances surrounding a pregnancy (“Mo. congressman’s rape remarks bring national firestorm,” Page A1, Aug. 21).
Such words betray an appalling and dangerous ignorance, and an absence of simple human compassion. Akin suggests that a woman’s body mysteriously ends a pregnancy by “shutting the whole thing down.” If only. Politicians are policy makers. Akin’s utter lack of facts (let alone tact) should disqualify him from a position where he has the power to change lives.
Comments
I am so sorry about your experience, Amy. Thank you for writing such an honest and articulate letter.
Its very brave of you to share your experience, and there can be no doubt that Akin's comments were horribly wrong and offensive. But I have to take issue with this: "Akin would prefer a world in which barely pubescent girls like me would be forced to endure not only the unspeakable trauma of rape by a psychopath" The man may be stupid, but he is not pro-rape. This sentence sounds like an implication of that.
Amy: Thank you for your courageous letter. I am so sorry to hear of your horrifying experience. I think that alby45 below in her comments is wrong and fails to understand the real implication of the sentence she cites: But I have to take issue with this: "Akin would prefer a world in which barely pubescent girls like me would be forced to endure not only the unspeakable trauma of rape by a psychopath" The man may be stupid, but he is not pro-rape. This sentence sounds like an implication of that. Where in that sentence is there an implication that Akin is pro-rape? The sentence merely suggests that in the real world where rape happens to real girls and women, to Akin, the rape itself seems to be a mere hitch in the God-proscribed way things should be: a girl or woman gets impregnated, regardless of how, and she has no choice but to accept being the petri dish for the aggregate of cells resulting from the rape and then the incubator for the duplicating cells. Akin lives in a world in which it is preferably to simply ignore "the whole thing" to use some of his words. In his world, rape is just an annoying occurrence that conflicts with the dogmas of "life at all cost," including the life of a mother should the fetus she carries endanger it.
This was a powerful and courageous letter. The last line especially will stay with me for a long time.