Rape is only rape if forced*!
Triggers for rape, incest, and rage apply.
Banning publicly funded abortions for victims of "non-forcible" rape is one of the House speaker's top priorities.
Rape is no longer when a girl gets drugged and used as a sex toy. Nor it is if an adult gets assaulted by a family member, and statutory rapes will no longer count as well. Oh, and if the guy is armed with a gun? That's coercion- he didn't actually* shoot you. That's also not rape. According to John Boehner.
Banning publicly funded abortions for victims of "non-forcible" rape is one of the House speaker's top priorities.
H.R. 3, the "No Taxpayer Funding For Abortion Act", is bad in all the ways that Hyde and Stupak-Pitts were bad, but it's worse, too: It seeks to make Hyde federal law. Like previous measures, H.R. 3 would have been widely decried, regardless of anything else it contained. But it just so happens to contain one clause that makes it worse than all of those previous measures. It just so happens to redefine rape.
Whereas Stupak-Pitts provides an exemption if "the pregnancy is the result of an act of rape or incest," and Hyde contains exemptions that are similar, H.R. 3 only provides exemptions if the pregnancy results from "an act of forcible rape or, if a minor, an act of incest."
There's no way this change is accidental. And there's no way it's minor. Dan Lipinski, one of the few Democrats co-sponsoring the bill, insists that "the language of H.R. 3 was not intended to change existing law regarding taxpayer funding for abortion in cases of rape." At best, he's tragically misguided. This is a calculated move, which will make exemptions for rape and incest survivors practically unenforceable.
First, there are the people who would be overtly denied coverage, as outlined by Nick Baumann at Mother Jones. Those who were raped while drugged or unconscious, or through means of coercion, would not be covered. Survivors of statutory rape would not be covered: "if a minor," one is only covered in case of incest. And if one is a survivor of incest, and not a minor, that's also not covered. Studies of how rapists find and subdue victims reveal that about 70 percent of rapes wouldn't fall under the "forcible" designation.
Which leaves us with those rapes that could be construed as "forcible." Except that this clause doesn't guarantee an exemption for them, either. The term "forcible rape" actually has no set meaning; legal definitions of "force" vary widely. And every survivor who finds herself in need of abortion funding will have to submit her rape for government approval.
----
There's the rest at the source.
Thanks to Somato for two links:
The Petition
The Twitter Hashtag #DearJohn
Banning publicly funded abortions for victims of "non-forcible" rape is one of the House speaker's top priorities.
Rape is no longer when a girl gets drugged and used as a sex toy. Nor it is if an adult gets assaulted by a family member, and statutory rapes will no longer count as well. Oh, and if the guy is armed with a gun? That's coercion- he didn't actually* shoot you. That's also not rape. According to John Boehner.
Banning publicly funded abortions for victims of "non-forcible" rape is one of the House speaker's top priorities.
H.R. 3, the "No Taxpayer Funding For Abortion Act", is bad in all the ways that Hyde and Stupak-Pitts were bad, but it's worse, too: It seeks to make Hyde federal law. Like previous measures, H.R. 3 would have been widely decried, regardless of anything else it contained. But it just so happens to contain one clause that makes it worse than all of those previous measures. It just so happens to redefine rape.
Whereas Stupak-Pitts provides an exemption if "the pregnancy is the result of an act of rape or incest," and Hyde contains exemptions that are similar, H.R. 3 only provides exemptions if the pregnancy results from "an act of forcible rape or, if a minor, an act of incest."
There's no way this change is accidental. And there's no way it's minor. Dan Lipinski, one of the few Democrats co-sponsoring the bill, insists that "the language of H.R. 3 was not intended to change existing law regarding taxpayer funding for abortion in cases of rape." At best, he's tragically misguided. This is a calculated move, which will make exemptions for rape and incest survivors practically unenforceable.
First, there are the people who would be overtly denied coverage, as outlined by Nick Baumann at Mother Jones. Those who were raped while drugged or unconscious, or through means of coercion, would not be covered. Survivors of statutory rape would not be covered: "if a minor," one is only covered in case of incest. And if one is a survivor of incest, and not a minor, that's also not covered. Studies of how rapists find and subdue victims reveal that about 70 percent of rapes wouldn't fall under the "forcible" designation.
Which leaves us with those rapes that could be construed as "forcible." Except that this clause doesn't guarantee an exemption for them, either. The term "forcible rape" actually has no set meaning; legal definitions of "force" vary widely. And every survivor who finds herself in need of abortion funding will have to submit her rape for government approval.
----
There's the rest at the source.
Thanks to Somato for two links:
The Petition
The Twitter Hashtag #DearJohn