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| Oh that Marco Rubio! Always surrounding himself with the best of the Republican party! |
A California Republican leader may have inadvertently revived the controversial subject of rape and pregnancy.
Before arriving at the state GOP's spring convention here, Celeste Greig told this newspaper that pregnancies by rape are rare "because it's an act of violence, because the body is traumatized."
Grieg is the president of the conservative California Republican Assembly, the state's oldest and largest GOP volunteer organization. Ronald Reagan once called it "the conscience of the Republican Party."
Ironically, Greig was in the midst of criticizing former Missouri U.S. Senate candidate Todd Akin for saying that victims of "legitimate rape" rarely get pregnant because "the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down." It was a remark that many believe led not only to his defeat in November but also helped tarnish the Republican brand around the country.
"That was an insensitive remark," Greig said. "I'm sure he regretted it. He should have come back and apologized."
Greig, however, went on to say: "Granted, the percentage of pregnancies due to rape is small because it's an act of violence, because the body is traumatized. I don't know what percentage of pregnancies are due to the violence of rape. Because of the trauma the body goes through, I don't know what percentage of pregnancy results from the act."
You know perhaps we ought to take our focus off of teaching sex ed classes to kids, and instead start offering them to Republican politicians.
Hey maybe THIS is why their are fewer and fewer Republicans these days, They don't understand how reproduction works!
another one with a wonky eye.
ReplyDeleteEven grown conservatives, parents and grandparents over, need sex education. They don't know how anything works. And we trust them to balance out nations path?
ReplyDeleteFirst Of All, Republicans, 88 Pregnancies A Day From Rape Is Not ‘Rare’
ReplyDeleteRepublicans are rebranding!
2013 is a whole new ballgame for the GOP. Instead of Todd Akin and Richard Mourdock making disgusting comments about rape, a Republican woman has decided to invent biology to justify making all abortion illegal even in cases of rape, a belief that only 9 percent of Americans share.
Celeste Creig, president of the volunteer organization California Republican Assembly, told The Bay Area News Group that pregnancies from rape are rare “because it’s an act of violence, because the body is traumatized.”
She didn’t go quite as far as Akin, the former Republican nominee for U.S. Senate in Missouri, who suggested that the female body had a way of shutting down when raped or Mourdock, former Republican nominee for U.S. Senate in Indiana, who said, “I think that even when life begins in that horrible situation of rape, that it is something that God intended to happen.”
Greig just wants us to believe that the chance of pregnacies is so slight it’s not even worth allowing women to make the choice whether to keep her rapist’s baby.
She went on to add, “I don’t know what percentage of pregnancies are due to the violence of rape. Because of the trauma the body goes through, I don’t know what percentage of pregnancy results from the act.”
Writer Amanda Marcotte offered Greig a bit of education:
88 women get pregnant from rape a day in this country. That's a lot of things, but rare isn't one of them.
Marcotte then linked her followers to a study that found 32,101 pregnancies every year are a result of rape, which is not surprising when you find out that 1,870 women in America are raped every day, about 9 out of 10 of the victims are women– a fact that only comes up when Republicans say dumb things about rape.
To put this in some perspective, about 93 Americans die from car accidents every day, our leading cause of preventable death. We spend billions trying to prevent these deaths. Needless to say, if men could get pregnant from rape, we wouldn’t be able to build enough electric chairs or Guantanamo Bays to punish the perpetrators. Especially considering that 31 states grant rapists visitation or custody rights.
These continued rape gaffes suggest that the problem isn’t Republican candidates. They say terrible things all the time without destroying their careers. The problem that banning abortion in cases of rape is indefensible. Despite this, this exact position is in the GOP platform and advocated by leading Republicans including former vice-presidential nominee Paul Ryan.
If the GOP won’t give up this ridiculous stand, I’d at least ask them to save their best rape gaffes until we’re a few weeks from the 2014 election.
http://www.eclectablog.com/2013/03/first-of-all-republicans-88-pregnancies-a-day-from-rape-is-not-rare.html
"Rape" -- we should rebrand the transvaginal ultrasound legislation as legal rape -- government-sponsored involuntary invasion of a woman's body. Let's eliminate government when we want to, such as with public education, but demand that the state owns a woman's body when it suits the demands of a theocracy.
DeletePregnancy occurs only during a few days of the month. So rapes during the rest of the month don't count? What about male/male rape? What about statutory rape, where the child is too young to conceive anyway? These are thus not "rape"?
Ummm. That's like saying, you can't get pregnant the first time. Remember that one folks?? Jeeze Louise! It's 2013 for cripe sakes. Will the party of stupid please, just go away now??
ReplyDeleteYIKES! What's wrong with her right EYE! She being hanging out with Baldy?
ReplyDeleteLatest GOP shocking rape gaffe
ReplyDelete...Some studies have found that women are actually more likely to get pregnant from rape, because contraception is often not used, while others have found the rate is similar to that of consensual sex. In any case, pregnancy from rape is very very real.
The remark drew immediate rebuke from California Democrats. “It’s just outrageous, beyond absurd. It’s insulting. It’s the same line of thinking of ‘If we just dress differently, or behave differently, we won’t be raped.’ They’re basically saying ‘while we’re being raped, if we hate it enough we won’t get pregnant,’” Democratic Assemblywoman Nancy Skinner of Berkeley told the newspaper.
Republican pollsters and other strategists have warned GOPers to stop talking about rape all together, as it never leads to good things, but that moratorium sometimes seems impossible considering the obsession with abortion of many in the party.
http://www.salon.com/2013/03/02/another_goper_has_a_todd_akin_moment/
GOP Ignorance About Rape And Pregnancy Not Limited To Men
ReplyDelete...Oh, for the love of all that’s holy, don’t. Just. Stop. Talking.
No such luck. “I don’t know what percentage of pregnancies are due to the violence of rape,” she went on, to the mortification of intelligent people everywhere. “Because of the trauma the body goes through, I don’t know what percentage of pregnancy results from the act.”
Groan. It’s simple biology, as Berkeley, CA Democratic assemblywoman Nancy Skinner had to explain to Mrs. Greig like she’s five. “If a woman is near-ovulating or ovulating, and sperm comes in direct contact, she gets pregnant — it doesn’t matter what the nature of the act was,” said a clearly exasperated Skinner.
The good folks over at the Bay Area News Group shed some light on the actual correlation between pregnancy and rape:
Most research on rape and pregnancy has shown roughly the same rates of pregnancy as pregnancies resulting from consensual sex. But one 2003 study from St. Lawrence University showed the rate at which women get pregnant after rape to be more than double that of a single act of consensual sex. The study used data from the United States National Violence Against Women survey.
With consensual sex, the authors theorized, women have the option of declining sex or using contraception when there is a high likelihood of getting pregnant because of their ovulation cycle.
The per-incident rape-pregnancy rate was 6.42 percent, according to the report, which was published in the journal Human Nature. Of women having consensual sex, the per-incident pregnancy rate was 3.1 percent.
“It’s just outrageous, beyond absurd. It’s insulting. It’s the same line of thinking of ‘If we just dress differently, or behave differently, we won’t be raped,’” said Assemblywoman Skinner. “They’re basically saying ‘while we’re being raped, if we hate it enough, we won’t get pregnant.’”
http://www.nationalmemo.com/gop-ignorance-about-rape-and-pregnancy-not-limited-to-men/#.UTNgYuv89To.reddit
Sailors sentenced for gang-rape in case that sparked curfew - One sailor covered her mouth; the other grabbed her by the legs. They then took her to the parking lot where they repeatedly choked and raped her.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.stripes.com/news/sailors-sentenced-for-gang-rape-in-case-that-sparked-curfew-1.210106
Yeah, Rah Rah our noble military men. FUCKERS.
Here’s a clue for Republicans. If you don’t “know”, then you probably shouldn’t say anything. Here she is saying rape from pregnancy is small, but then she goes on to say she doesn’t know the percentages, “Granted, the percentage of pregnancies due to rape is small because it’s an act of violence, because the body is traumatized. I don’t know what percentage of pregnancies are due to the violence of rape.”
ReplyDeleteSad to say that Greig is a female, who might be expected to understand that indeed the female body does not shut down when traumatized. But in case that fact escapes her, there’s always history. Rape is a weapon of war WHY, Republicans?
The truth is that Republicans are not this stupid. While it’s true that they put on a good show denying science and defying logic, they say things like this because it is the only defense they have for their policies that protect the “preborn” more than they do the already live human body carrying the preborn. Faced with the reality that their policies force women to carry pregnancies to term and therefore remove liberty from women, Republicans have to pretend like pregnancy from rape is rare.
The party of alleged personal liberty can’t find any way to reconcile their extremist religious views and desire to impose those on all Americans other than to deny reality.
So we get variations of “rape from pregnancy is rare!”
Mercury News pointed out that most studies show women get pregnant at the same rate from rape as they do from consensual sex, although one study showed women getting pregnant at more than double the rate as consensual sex. Since we don’t like to make up our own science, and that study hasn’t been duplicated, let’s just go with it’s the exact same odds as consensual sex. That means that Republicans want to force rape victims to carry their rapist’s preborn to term.
Once a woman does that, it’s relevant to note, this is the same party killing aid to impoverished children and single mothers, as well as the party trying to kill public education. This is also the party whose national platform, when followed through logically, makes some forms of birth control illegal. This is called “freedom” GOP style.
The California Republican Assembly describes themselves as “Chartered in 1934, the CRA is the state’s oldest and largest Republican volunteer organization. CRA has been working to elect Republican candidates who stand unwaveringly for Republican principles.”
Here’s Reagan praising the CRA:
video
The California Republican Assembly doesn’t believe in federal taxes, believes in “traditional families”, the “preborn” and national defense (ha ha, has anyone told them what the Republicans in Congress did to national defense?).
And also, the CRA believes that women don’t get pregnant from rape very often because the body shuts that crap down!
http://www.politicususa.com/president-the-conscience-republican-party-pregnancy-rape-rare-body-traumatized.html
It's bad enough when men don't understand how the female body works, but when women don't even understand it...
ReplyDeleteWe definitely need sex education in schools.
Please don't make it easier for the Repugs to multiply by teaching sex education to them!
ReplyDeleteRapists never use condoms and always shoot out healthy swimmers? Rapist always get off? Victims never use birth control pills (even for non-reproductive reasons)? Women who have been raped never go get the morning after pill and are always menstruating regularly?
ReplyDeleteHow does this woman's interpretation of the law define rape? Coitus? What if I got tied down by some sick fucks and got raped with every kitchen utensil I own, but no dick? (And don't tell me that sick shit doesn't happen-- I about throw up on myself every time I read another article about an autistic girl getting sexually assaulted by fill-in-the-blank). Obviously the kitchen broom isn't packing any sperm, dumbass, so it's not going to lead to pregnancy. But IT'S STILL RAPE.
Learn a thing or fucking two about the kinds of things that can skew rape-pregnancy statistics before you just go off trying to sound all pity-troll about how if you were REALLY raped, you'd be traumatized but not knocked up.
This is obviously a woman who has never been raped, sexually assaulted, or sexually threatened in her sad, smug life.
Oh, and let's not forget that gender also skews rape statistics. Here's what I mean by skewed (and this is an example): She's basically saying that say 100 people report getting raped, that maybe one gets pregnant. How many of those are men? How many are CHILDREN? How many are postmenopausal women living in rest homes?
ReplyDeleteDo you see how lumping everyone in under "rape victim" can drastically skew statistics? For the record, your chances of getting pregnant from rape are just the same as your chances of getting pregnant from a round of consensual sex. Your reproductive system doesn't give a shit either way. Forty-four percent of victims are UNDER THE AGE OF 18. And a whopping 80% are under the age of 30. [http://www.rainn.org/statistics]
The statistics for "unreported rapes" swing a lot. I've seen them as high as 90% and as low as 40%, I'm honestly not sure how they get either figure (if they're unreported, yknow?). But I will say that I knew someone (who knew someone) who used to brag to his friends about having coke parties in college with all the new freshman girls. About 20-30 would show up and he'd tell everyone to take a line to get he party started. Except it was crushed up roofies, not coke. When they passed out he'd go around the room and have his way with all of them and in the morning they were none the wiser. You have to know you've been raped in order to report it, so there's not a goddamn doubt in my mind that every rape stat we read about is drastically understated.
Perhaps we should take the focus off the rate of pregnancy during rape because, it's only being discussed in the context of 'should we or shld we not ALLOW women to terminate a pregnancy that results from rape?' Who the fuck's business is it how she got pregnant, except to the extent that her rape should be investigated and prosecuted? She should NOT have to EXPLAIN THE CIRCUMSTANCES of her pregnancy to exercise her legal right to terminate it!
ReplyDeleteYeah, sadly far too many people make the assumption that consenting to sex is consenting to get pregnant...They're either too religionized or too dumb to realize that these are two very different things.
DeleteThe sooner these assholes die off (or end up in the situation themselves and learn) the better.
Another example of the Republican Party's new outreach to women voters! I could almost give Todd Aiken a douchebag pass, afterall he doesn't have a vagina, uterus or ova and never carried a child. But WTF?? It's still bullshit coming from a Republican Woman's mouth, she should know better.
ReplyDeleteConsentual Sex is one thing, Rape is another.
People who have no understanding of the facts regarding rape and pregnancy have two choices:
ReplyDelete1. Shut your mouth and keep your ignorance to yourself.
2. Take the time to learn some facts before shooting your mouth off in public.
Anyone who does not choose between these two options but, nevertheless, feels compelled to spread misinformation and/or deliberate lies, should be forced to volunteer their time in a rape crisis center or women's shelter and face their ignorance head on.
Gah, these people make me want to throw something!