Going Medieval on your hiney

The blogosphere and the twitterverse are alive with chatter about the absolutely stoopid statements that GOP'er Todd Akin made yesterday.

Senate Candidate and Rep. Todd Akin (R-MO) told a local television station on Sunday that “legitimate rape” rarely produces pregnancy because “the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.” Akin cited conversations with unnamed doctors for the bizarre claim.

The GOP is even backing off from supporting him in his senate race.

I don't actually think they disagree either, they are most likely just horrified that someone said it out loud. For women voters to hear. Oh My. They still try to hide some of their crazy.

Where do they get this crap from anyway? The Guardian wanted to know too, and it turns out it was just another way to play that other game; blame the victim! Medieval style.

The idea that rape victims cannot get pregnant has long roots. The legal position that pregnancy disproved a claim of rape appears to have been instituted in the UK sometime in the 13th century. One of the earliest British legal texts, Fleta, has a clause in the first book of the second volume stating that:

"If, however, the woman should have conceived at the time alleged in the appeal, it abates, for without a woman's consent she could not conceive."

This was a long-lived legal argument. Samuel Farr's Elements of Medical Jurisprudence contained the same idea as late as 1814:

"For without an excitation of lust, or the enjoyment of pleasure in the venereal act, no conception can probably take place. So that if an absolute rape were to be perpetrated, it is not likely she would become pregnant."

Don't you just love that? 

This "absolute rape" is not quite the same as Akin's "legitimate rape". Akin seems to be suggesting that the body suppresses conception or causes a miscarriage, while the earlier idea of Farr relates specifically to the importance of orgasm. Through the medieval and early modern period it was widely thought, by lay people as well as doctors, that women could only conceive if they had an orgasm.

And do not get me started on all the children born to women who didn't have an orgasm when they conceived. Half the population wouldn't be here if that was true. 

These bizarre ideas have been carried on apparently by some new crackpot. 

The GOP is in panic mode, and asking Akin to step down from the race where he is running against blue dog Claire McCaskill. The woman is most definitely a far cry from an ideal candidate, but by all accounts at least she is pro choice. (more than I can say about some so-called Liberals here in Canada)

The guy is toxic, although he did get some support from a Politico reporter. Who has since been removed from doing any coverage of Akin. Even Politico, the online rag that is always trying to show "both sides" even when one side is crazier than a shithouse rat can smell trouble in that.

In short according to these disgusting puddles of pond scum, women who get pregnant when raped, were not really raped.

And this is just yet another way to excuse sexual violence against women and force them to incubate the result of their attackers sperm.  The same as the time not so long ago that the GOP in the US tried to redefine rape.

What's off the table? Well, if you are a woman coerced, drugged or otherwise incapacitated by a rapist, too bad! Also, if you are a young child, statutory rape is off the table, too, unless incest is involved. (The incest exception lapses for adults, crazily.)

And yes, we have our own disgusting puddles of pond scum here in Canada too. 

(Going Medieval on your hiney, is a line from a song by Weird Al Yankovic. It popped into my head this morning when I read the Guardian article. Amish Paradise.)