For Rick Santorum, a Pregnancy That Is the Result of Rape Is a ‘Broken Gift’

Rick Santorum attempted to justify one of his most bizarre stances in an interview with Piers Morgan on Friday, and the results were predictably scary:

Morgan: Do you really believe, in every case, [abortion] should be totally wrong, [including] cases of rape and incest? You’ve got two daughters… If you had a daughter that came to you who had been raped, and was pregnant, and was begging you to let her have an abortion, would you really be able to look her in the eye and say “No,” as her father?

Santorum: I would do what every father would do, which is to try and counsel you daughter to do the right thing.

[Crosstalk]

Morgan: It’s almost an impossibly hypothetical thing to ask you, but there will be people in that position. And they will share your religious values…

Santorum: It’s not a matter of religious values…

Morgan: …and they’re looking at their daughter saying, “How can I deal with this? Because, if I make her have this baby, it’s going to ruin her life.”

Santorum: Well, you can make the argument that if she doesn’t have this baby, if she kills her child, that that, too, could ruin her life. And this is not an easy choice. I understand that. As horrible as the way that that son or daughter and son was created, it still is her child. And whether she has that child or doesn’t, it will always be her child. And she will always know that. And so to embrace her and to love her and to support her and get her through this very difficult time, I’ve always, you know, I believe and I think the right approach is to accept this horribly created — in the sense of rape — but nevertheless a gift in a very broken way, the gift of human life, and accept what God has given to you. As you know, we have to, in lots of different aspects of our life. We have horrible things happen. I can’t think of anything more horrible. But, nevertheless, we have to make the best out of a bad situation.

I really don’t like the way Morgan conducted the interview. By asking Santorum to imagine himself as the father of a pregnant rape victim, he may have thought he was putting the candidate in a difficult position. But evangelical men thrive on this line of thinking. I get the sense that Santorum wouldn’t mind being regarded of as a clear-headed Daddy to a nation of hysterical women who might not “do the right thing.” If you want to challenge patriarchal ideas, you don’t do it by framing women’s health issues as father-daughter conversations.

More revealing than Morgan’s inane question were Santorum’s explanations of what kind of God he believes in. For him, God (Sky Daddy, if you will) is responsible for each and every human life, all of which begin at conception. Each of these lives is a gift. When a man rapes a woman, sometimes God decides to give the woman a “broken gift” in the form of a pregnancy, in the hope that this will woman will “make the best of a bad situation” and give birth to the child of her rapist. But what if this imperfect woman starts to think that she might just be better off terminating the pregnancy she didn’t ask for? In that case, it is the job of her father, who is head of his household as Christ is the head of the church (Ephesians 5:23), to “counsel” her so she doesn’t “ruin her life.”

And why is it that the father and head of household gets to makes these determinations even though he never has been and never will be pregnant? That’s easy enough to explain. You see, the first defective woman that God made tricked the first defective man into eating a piece of fruit that would allow him to know things (Genesis 3:4-7) and be less reliant on his heavenly father. And so God punished her, and all the women who came after her, with the pain of childbirth (Genesis 3:16).

I’m fairly certain that Rick Santorum will not be the Republican nominee, let alone the next president. But let’s not forget that more than 150,000 American adults in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina have voted for him so far.

(Via ThinkProgress)

GloomCookie613

Some gift, Ricky. You shouldn’t have. No, you really SHOULDN’T have.

GOP: Small government so it can fit inside a woman’s uterus.
Anonymous

Poor little Ricky….. Hey Ricky, a brain as sick and twisted by religion as yours is, is just a waste of the Space between your ears…………… and that’s no ”gift”.
gonna_hurl

This is so absolutely disgusting, I can’t even find words……
Anonymous

“And so God punished her, and all the women who came after her, with the pain of childbirth.”

And then modern science invented the epidural. What now, god? What now?

…Yeah, that’s what I thought.
Jett Perrobone

Look what he’s called his new fundraising campaign:

Rick Santorum’s CUM

😀
Richard Wade

…the right approach is to accept this horribly created — in
the sense of rape — but nevertheless a gift in a very broken way, the
gift of human life, and accept what God has given to you.

“What God has given you”?? Let me get this straight. Does God give her the gift of rape and the gift of the pregnancy, or does the rapist give her the gift of rape, and God just gives her gift of pregnancy? Is the rape the act of man and the pregnancy the act of God, or are both the acts of God, or are both the acts of man? Mr. Santorum seems kind of unclear on this, and his confusion would effect hundreds of thousands of people if he were to become President.

This distinction between acts of man and acts of God seems to harken back to the days when people didn’t know exactly how pregnancy happened. Sex acts were observable, so were considered acts of man, but conception was invisible, intermittent, and mysterious, so it was attributed to an act of God, a “gift.” One event seemed to follow the other, and so the sex act might have been seen as a necessary first step, (with the exception of Mary) but somehow the pregnancy got attributed at least in part to God.

I wonder if Mr. Santorum actually thinks that his god lets rapists rape according to their “free will,” but then his god microscopically intervenes inside the victim’s uterus to either let the sperm reach the egg or not let the sperm reach the egg. This would be an interesting theological/biological follow up question to a man who would just love to force his Bronze Age views on everybody. Sort of “How many gods can dance on the head of a spermatozoa?
GentleGiant

Santorum: It’s not a matter of religious values…

Santorum:but nevertheless a gift in a very broken way, the gift of human life, and accept what God has given to you.

So… it IS about your religious values. Geez, own up to it already.
And researching the facts, Rich? Life begins at conception… technically, yes it does… sort of, in the very broadest sense. But “life” =/= personhood.
Maybe you should do some research with actual scientists, not just positions that’ll back up your already established religious views. Just a thought.
GloomCookie613

I found that while he was in office here in PA he had the amazing ability to not just stick his foot into his mouth, he could also change feet and sing a song while doing it. He owns up to nothing. Ever.
Kevin

It’s not a matter of religious values…It’s just a matter of accepting God’s gift.This is like a Christian saying Christianity isn’t a religion, it’s a personal relationship with Jesus.
natsera

Well, at least he’s being consistent with Catholic teachings, so far as I can tell. If, as the Catholics say, any union between ovum and sperm is a human being, then it’s just as much a crime to abort the conceptus of a rape or incest as any other conceptus. It’s only us, who see a difference between a fertilized egg, and a living baby, who can say that abortion is OK, but in that case, it needs to be OK in any early pregnancy, because there really is NO difference between the embryo of a rapist or an incestuous man than any other embryo. Either abortion is OK or it’s not, and these strawmen of rape and incest only serve to blur the line.
FSq

He is just a disgusting little turd. There is no polite or courteous way to describe this despicable “man”. Santorum, F-U-C-K Y-O-U-R-S-E-L-F you repugnant piece of shit.
Cobo Wowbo

This guy is a nutcase. Especially since he took home his dead infant to show his kids.
Mrs. B.

I think it’s time to put the old, tired chestnut to rest that women who have abortions suffer some sort of emotional trauma as a result. Yes, some women do come to deeply regret making that choice, but the vast majority of them are just deeply relieved that the option was available to them. No woman wants an abortion, but most women who have them are not as conflicted about it as religious conservatives would have you believe.

And if Santorum is saying that women should “accept what God has given you,” in the form of an unwanted pregnancy as the result of rape, then he IS basing his anti-choice stance on his religion, and he would enact and vote on any abortion legislation based on his religion. Anti-choicers have always been careful to claim that their opinion on the matter isn’t related to their religious beliefs because they know that the separation of church and state (or federal government) would prohibit legislation based on their religious dogma. Well, lying is a sin too Ricky, and your god won’t like the fact that you won’t just own up to working in his name. He can’t smite you soon enough for me.
Garren

Yes, he’s advocating a standard pro-life position that any human being — even ones very early in development — possesses human rights. Therefore he’s not going to see a significant moral distinction between killing an embryo that resulted from rape or a toddler that resulted from rape.

The appropriate reply is to say that not all human beings possess human rights, but a politician who said that would also generate “how appalling!” articles.

Unfortunately, the most common replay seems to be that embryos aren’t human beings, which puts pro-choicers at odds with science. Let’s avoid that, please.
Kevin Smith

How does this put pro-choicers at odds with science? I wasn’t aware that there’s any definitive scientific answer to the question of when an embryo becomes human, which is really a philosophical question.

In fact, I remember that Carl Sagan once proposed a cutoff for abortions at five months, when the fetus starts to demonstrate distinctly human brainwave patterns, arguing that this is when the fetus becomes a human being as opposed to a mass of tissue.
Nutz4mutts

How do these “pro-lifers” explain what happens to the unused embryos during in-vitro fertilization? Is that okay to destroy those? What’s the difference?
Dan W

Rick “Frothy Mix” Santorum continues to be a despicable, disgusting person.
baronvoncarson

Urgh, this pisses me off. I really hope Santorum doesn’t get elected. Peirs is also a bit of a douchebag.
Anonymous

What does atheism have to do with abortion? Can you scientifically prove when an embryo/fetus/infant/toddler should receive full rights under the law? Of course not. It’s always going to be a matter of opinion.

I’m an atheist, but I am annoyed to no end by secular people claiming that being pro-life is simply a religious thing. I even think women should be allowed to have abortions in the first trimester.

Try to imagine what it’s like if you believe that a person becomes a “person” at conception. Then abortion, regardless of rape or incest, is murder. Those who claim that life begins at conception but that abortion is okay in the case of rape or incest are the ones being morally inconsistent.

Anyway, this is one of the reasons I only occasionally check this blog. Mr. Mehta seems to often confuse his atheism with his statist and prochoice agendas.
Kevin Sagui

So why, again, didn’t his wife accept her own broken (in another way) gift? Oh, that’s right, because rules don’t apply to the moral scolds issuing them.
Anonymous

First of all, I wrote this post, not Hemant (check the bylines- he has a lot of contributors these days). Second of all, everything Santorum in the portions I quoted wreaked of God-bothering.

The reason that he wants to ban even the first trimester abortions you support, even in cases of rape, is that he believes that a personal God, responsible for all the lives created in this world, must also cause conceptions that are the result of rape. And God can never be wrong, and every life is a gift, so a woman who gets an abortion is turning down a gift. This is, as you put it, “morally consistent.”

If you have a secular view on abortion, then of course you’re free to share it. It may be different from mine or Hemant’s, but it will also be different from Santorum’s. His view on abortion come from his belief in God- a Biblically justifiable, Judeo-Christian version of God. Repudiating such an opinion has EVERYTHING to do with atheism.
Vbversprille

You have to remember, we elected George Bush, twice. I was still a teenager then, and my parents were so disgusted with the idiocy of America that we got as far as house hunting in Canada.
Garren

“I wasn’t aware that there’s any definitive scientific answer to the
question of when an embryo becomes human, which is really a
philosophical question.”

Check with just about any human embryology textbook. They state that the development of a new human organism begins at conception.

I realize there’s a vernacular use of “human” which can be used like “He’s so horrible, he’s not even human!” But, biologically, he would still be a human. Likewise, human embryos are still biologically humans, whatever our policy toward them might be.

Pro-lifers are very much correct in pointing out a conflict when some folks advocate human rights as intrinsic to all humans…but then deny human rights to humans in an early stage of development. This incoherent position is not the only option for pro-choicers.
Kevin Smith

“Check with just about any human embryology textbook. They state that the development of a new human organism begins at conception.”

And the development of a house begins with the pouring of the foundation. Does that make the foundation a house? Is it a house after the framework of wooden beams has been put up? After one wall is completed?

I realize that you don’t have an exact quote here, but if these kinds of statements in biology textbooks are the basis of your claim that science says zygotes are human beings, your case is pretty weak.
Dondonkay2002

If a gift is broken, dont you usually return it or throw it away? Abortion is not murder. I think its actually the opposite; saving one from whatever the mother feels is a threat from having a quality life. Its her decision. Why is abortion a political issue?
Theres so much horror, hate, abuse, autism, downs syndrome, psychosis, and on and on, not to mention parents are clueless on how to take care of kids and end up screwing them up anyway..Who would want children nowadays anyway?
Dont get me wrong, I do not condone abortion as birth control. But in the event pregnancy happens from whatever circumstances, I dont think an unwanted child stands a chance for proper development.
The only reason these brainwashed deluded bible thumpers think abortion is murder stems from the religious belief that people need to create as many souls as possible to give to jesus’ army for the rapture before the final battle against the devil. Are you kidding me? So beyond ridiculous. Religion is the root of all ignorance. It creates evil.
Larry Meredith

technically it does in the very broadest sense? In the broadest sense, the sperm is alive and therefore life began before conception.
Yukimi

In Medicine class they teach you that there isn’t a single answer as to when life begins and certainly not all books say that it’s at conception (perhaps metaphorically some can point that at the moment it passes from n to 2n you can say it has the potentially for being a complete human being). I’m the kind of person that believes you can only be considered a human being at birth, Neurologists tend to consider when the fetus starts having brain function, … In science, as far as I’ve been taught there’s not a fixed moment on ehich life starts.
Anique Van Berne

As a veterinarian, I had to study embryology as well. My teacher even recommended a human embryology book, as it explained the basics of vertebrate embryology so well.
My veterinary textbook states on the commonalities of embryonic development of different species:
“up to three days of incubation a chicken embryo is quite specific [meaning: good example] of vertebrates; the overall makeup of a chicken embryo 72 hours old shows marked similarities to a pig’s embryo of 18 days or a human embryo of a month” (apologies for less-than-fluent translation)
As I read this, the most important difference between the species in early embryology is the speed with which they develop. (and looking at pictures of embryo’s in these stages: I can’t see the difference)
It is still difficult to decide when an embryo becomes human just from looking at embryologic development. You would first have to decide what defines being human.
Hc Conn

I think it would have been better to ask “what would you do if your wife was raped?” Because that saddles him with the responsibility of raising the child of a rapist just as he’d expect a woman to.

that said, I am in the akward position of being a pro life atheist liberal T.T its hard disagreeing with the crazy God people and also holding an unpopular position with the people I usually agree with 🙁
Jeff

What a stupid thing to say. I received a broken gift for xmas. You know what happened? I returned it. Is that what he wants to happen?
TiltedHorizon

“I’ve always, you know, I believe and I think the right
approach is to accept this horribly created — in the sense of rape — but
nevertheless a gift in a very broken way, the gift of human life, and
accept what God has given to you. ”

Ricky appears to have impressive control over his gag reflex, I find it hard to believe anyone could use the words rape, gift, and god in the same sentence without choking on the impossibly large turd coming out of their own mouth.
Mike Williams

Except that Rick and his wife chose to abort their own child, who wasn’t conceived by rape, just to save the mothers’ life. Luckily Tebow-Jesus intervened before they had to follow through with that decision and the fetus aborted itself.

http://articles.philly.com/1997-05-04/news/25562508_1_fetal-abnormality-controversial-late-term-abortion-procedure-intact-dilation-and-extraction
Gus Snarp

Yeah, that moment where he said it wasn’t about religious values was such total BS, and I love how he made that crystal clear in his own response later. What a liar. But as to life beginning at conception, I don’t think we can draw such a clear line. As Larry points out, the sperm is already alive. More to the point, I think, the egg is already alive. A more reasonable question might be when some living subset of cells within a woman’s body becomes something other than a part of her body. But even that doesn’t work. We can talk instead about viability, but again, there’s no hard line, it’s all a continuum. It makes the most sense, to me, instead of setting a number of cells of a certain type beyond which life or personhood exists, or a particular set of functional organs, to let women and their doctors make the decision about what’s right as long as it’s living in the woman’s body, supported by her digestive, respiratory, circulatory, and excretory systems.
Garren

The species of an organism defines whether it is human, chicken, pig, etc.
Anonymous

First, I was well aware that he did not write the post; I was commenting on the content of this blog in general.

If there ever comes a time when this blog criticizes a Democrat for using Jesus’s message of helping the poor as a justification for some social program, then I’ll believe it isn’t promoting a separate agenda from atheism. But seriously, you can’t see how selective you’re being when you go after the abortion issue but leave that kind of thing alone? Democrats talk about God all the time too, they just use him to justify different policies, ones that Mr. Mehta generally supports.
Waltz707

Stay polite 🙂
T-Rex

So much for Ricky’s mom making the right decision in choosing to give birth to this abomination. The best part of Ricky ran down his momma’s leg.
Nordog

Dan, there is colossal irony in your statement.
Ottomaniac

This is such shitty rhetoric. You know what? If Santorum, or anyone else, wants to “counsel” rape victims to not have abortions, that’s great. Go nuts. That’s not what the pro-choice/pro-life debate is about. The question is whether all rape victims should be legally forced to carry all pregnancies to term, and asking Santorum about his feelings rather than what he wants the law to be is a disgustingly softball question.
Anonymous

took home his dead ~~infant~~ foetus
Anonymous

If someone else wrote the kind of article you describe, I would be likely to comment on it in the manner I recommended you comment on a liberal atheist’s writing: I would explain from a secular perspective why programs that help the poor are a good idea, perhaps using data taken from the social sciences. I would not tell the author or the publisher of the blog that their atheism has nothing to do with their libertarian or conservative opinion.

I don’t see myself writing getting in the habit of writing “this person I otherwise agree with said something about Jesus” pieces, because I’m more interested in those whose religion has really poisoned their way of thinking. A few months before Hemant invited me to contribute here, I did write a critical piece which hardly anyone read about Chris Hedges and Jeremiah Wright on my own blog.
http://zyxek.blogspot.com/2011/09/chris-hedges-and-rev-wright-were-made.html

There is no neat separation between political views and atheism. That’s true of liberals, conservatives, moderates, and libertarians.
Anonymous

You are conflating “human” with “person”. A person has human rights, human tissue does not. This is a legal question, not a biological one. When there are two persons in a room, one does not have the right to enslave the other. Even less does a blob of human tissue have the right to enslave a person.
Anonymous

Dont get me wrong, I do not condone abortion as birth control.

And you are being just as paternalistic and wrong as the bible thumpers. Abortion is birth control. And it’s none of your or anyone else’s business what motivation or reasons a person has for their own medical decisions.
Richard Wade

Yeah, like about 3.8 billion years before.
Kevin_Of_Bangor

Thanks for the laugh 🙂
Anonymous

I also love the part where his wife used to date the abortion doctor who delivered her when she was in her 20s and he in his 60s.
Garren

How can I conflate humans and persons, without mentioning persons?

And if human rights are for persons rather than humans, why not call them personal rights?
Mike Gantt

I wonder why pro-abortion rhetoric (like Piers Morgan’s in this case) always seem to begin with reference to cases of rape and incest? I also wonder what percentage of abortions performed are for those cases of rape and incest?
Gus Snarp

Some of them are consistent in opposing in-vitro fertilization on just those grounds. Others, not so much.
GentleGiant

Both you and Larry are absolutely correct. I was simply referring to the fact that, at conception, the cells are living cells, thus you could call it “life.” Santorum, and other “pro-life” people, just equate these living cells with personhood, which is the distinction I wanted to make. 🙂
And I’m 100% behind the thinking that the woman in question is the one who gets to make the decision in the end.
GentleGiant

If you want to get some atheist perspectives from a more Libertarian/Conservative (at least fiscally) source, I’d suggest The Thinking Atheist. Seth (aka The Thinking Atheist) doesn’t hide that he’s basically a gun-owning, fiscally conservative Libertarian (although still a bit more liberal on social issues) with no high regard for President Obama.
SJH

I do not think that you are accurately summarizing his beliefs in abortion or of God. You may want to consider digging a little deeper in your analysis before you make a judgement on Santorum.

As far as I can tell, I do not have a problem with Santorum’s beliefs and likely agree with him. I do not understand the difficulty in making it illegal to kill another human being no matter how they were conceived.
SJH

Why are you choosing to draw the line at the point in which the person is living within the woman’s body. It seems that you are interjecting your opinion as to when the woman and her doctor can make that decision.

You said it is all a continuum but this “continuum” has a beginning. There is a distinct difference in personhood between the mother’s egg, the father’s sperm and the person within the mother. The moment that this distinction is created is the moment that this “continuum” begins and the moment a separate human life begins.
SJH

I don’t think that people are using the term life to represent actual life. Obviously, everyone knows that the sperm and egg are living cells. Obviously they are talking about when a distinct human being has come into existence.
SJH

Perhaps you are over-analyzing. By gift from God he likely does not mean that God has actually implanted a gift in her uterus at some point after being raped. I believe he is likely referring to the fact that all life can be seen as a gift because all life is precious even if it came from a violent act.
Maybe you are not giving him enough credit. It seems that this is a small part of a complex belief system and he is left to give you a snap shot of part of that system.
Dondon

Paternalistic? I am a woman arguing to get religion and politics away from personal choices. I wanted to be clear that I dont condone multiple abortions as a method of birth control when there are other ways to of prevention.(An entirely different subject). But for whatever the reason, it is a choice, especially in rape cases. This should never be a political issue. It will always be a personal one. Religious people brought this subject to the table. Im just making the point that if you force unwanted children to be born, you are looking at whole new set a problems.
Parse

“How many angels can dance on the head of a spermatozoa?”
Just one, doing the gavotte; the rest don’t dance.

(What? It’s just as accurate as any other possible reference on angels!)
FSq

And monkeys might fly out of my ass, or a butterfly flapping its wings off the Chinese Coast could cause a typhoon off the Hawaiian Coast, but neither are very likely. Santorum is a fucked up man, espousing an archaic, disgusting and vile set of myths as morals. Gross, vile, inhumane and disgusting.
colluvial

This typical use of the phrase “all life is precious” is sanctimonious hypocrisy. Or maybe you’re claiming that Santorum is a staunch antiwar activist, an opponent of the death penalty, an unwavering advocate for the homeless, a campaigner for the preservation of endangered species, and a strict fruitarian?

Complex belief system? Give me a break. He’s trying to channel the pope and pander to clueless religionists who don’t have the time to think outside their indoctrination.
SJH

It wold have probably been better to say that all life is precious but human life has an innate, distinct value that exceeds the rest of the natural world.

If he is true to his catholic faith, then he should be an antiwar activist and an opponent of the death penalty, and an advocate of the homeless, and campaign to protect all wild life, endangered or not, though probably not a fruitarian since the world’s wildlife and vegetable life serves the purpose of nourishing us.

Perhaps I am wrong and forgive me if I am but you seem quick to judge him. Do you think that you know his inner thoughts and beliefs.
Anonymous

I’m interested in specifics. What is he really saying?
Anonymous

//Yes, some women do come to deeply regret making that choice, but the
vast majority of them are just deeply relieved that the option was
available to them.//

I think this is the study you’re referring to:
http://msmagazine.com/blog/blog/2011/12/19/yet-another-huge-comprehensive-study-finds-that-abortion-doesnt-cause-mental-health-problems/
momma J

But there are possible side effects. I have read studies of spinal headache lasting 2-3 days, loss of sensation, spinal cysts, PPD, permanent back pain and even death. So………what now?
momma J

Maybe, but there is nothing in this story about him saying that rape is a gift from God. That’s just being ridiculous!

He even mentions what a horrible act rape is. So to say he thinks it is a gift from God I don’t think is his point. I think SJH got it right: Santorum sees all life as a gift. Maybe that gift is meant to help someone out to see that good can still come from a bad situation. Remember, it’s not just the rapists baby, it’s your baby. The woman is going to be the one who raises it. Therefore it’s 99.9% hers and .1% his.

Again, seeing the silver lining would be a good thing in times of struggle.
momma J

Try looking at an ultrasound and THEN proceeding with the abortion. Do you have a cited reference to show what % of women suffer from depression afterwards?
momma J

Wow. Seriously? And being a Christian, I get called the person who is so terrible and immoral for what I believe? You aren’t helping out whatever position you stand for with that comment.

I promise you I’ve never had that thought cross my mind towards anyone. I’m not saying that I’m so wonderful or anything, because I’m wrong on a lot of things. But wow.

There’s a saying, out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks, meaning that if you said it, then you somewhere down inside it is what you believe. (without taking misunderstandings or misinterpretations in account). Those words and thoughts are NEVER in my heart. Not even after visiting this board where most of the time the views are in direct opposition to mine.

I’ve never heard anyone from my church say that about a person. And yet supposedly we are both supposed to equal in moral or even less moral according to some on this board. Yikes!

Trust me, my morals and waaaaaaay different than yours buddy.

Classy post FSq. Classy.
JimmyBoy99

@mommaj
I’ve never heard anyone from my church say that about a person. And yet supposedly we are both supposed to equal in moral or even less moral according to some on this board. Yikes!
Well you could just have a look at what al of your lovely Christian brethren post regularly to people like Ms Watson, PZ, Richard Dawkins – or that brave young woman, Ms Alquist, recently. It is an awful lot more serious that anthing posted here: many, many threats of rape and murder – by professing Christians.

So while they may not have sa it to you – they do say it al the time.

I don’t think anyone her would claim moral equality with Christians. More they woul challenge the often repeated lie that people of faith have better morals than those who don’t. The opposite seems to be true in aggregate if we look at crime statistics. But of course you can find some people of no-faith to feel smug about if you want to.

Doesn’t demonstrate much but a little insecurity on your part though: right?
babybear

sure, after conception the cell is diploid. But that doesn’t mean much. There has been no implantation so there is a 1/3 (don’t remember if this is the right number) chance of spontaneous abortion or no implantation. And once this clump implants (if it does) there is very little difference between it and a tumor cell: The DNA is similar but slightly different from the host’s DNA, the host’s immune system may or may not attack it, it draws blood vessels from the host’s body so that it can get nourishment, it causes discomfort and harm to the host’s body, and it provides no function or benefit to the host. So really a fetus is just like a tumor. What can be different is the mother’s feelings about it. So it should be the mother’s choice whether or not that little parasite stays.
Demonhype

http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/gpr/09/3/gpr090308.html

The history of “post-abortion syndrome” is similar to the rise of the anti-vaxx movement–that is, perpetrated on frauds with vested interests.
Demonhype

http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/gpr/09/3/gpr090308.html

The history of “post-abortion syndrome” is similar to the rise of the anti-vaxx movement–that is, perpetrated on frauds with vested interests.
Demonhype

http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/gpr/09/3/gpr090308.html

The history of “post-abortion syndrome” is similar to the rise of the anti-vaxx movement–that is, perpetrated on frauds with vested interests.
Demonhype

http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/gpr/09/3/gpr090308.html

The history of “post-abortion syndrome” is similar to the rise of the anti-vaxx movement–that is, perpetrated on frauds with vested interests.
Demonhype

some evidence

The history of “post-abortion syndrome” is similar to the rise of the anti-vaxx movement–that is, perpetrated on frauds with vested interests.
Demonhype

some evidence

The history of “post-abortion syndrome” is similar to the rise of the anti-vaxx movement–that is, perpetrated on frauds with vested interests.
Demonhype

I HATE Disqus! Sooo much!

Hey, Hemant, any chance of deleting extra posts?
Demonhype

It’s pretty damn obvious he’s a sanctimonious hypocrite. I’m pretty damn sure he’s not anti-war or anti-death penalty or anti-poor people dying of starvation or preventable health problems and, as an extension of that, not anti-children who are the product of forced birth starving or dying due having been forced to be born to a woman who can’t afford them (hello, Republican? It’s their Holy Standard!).

I’ll be damned if some santorum-faced panderer is going to force me to carry a blob of cells to term against my will due to his magical beliefs that it has some mystical soul or his conviction that I will somehow “find the silver lining” or “make the best of it” or that I somehow have “some lesson to learn”. How fucking generous people can be when they are imposing this on other people’s lives and bodies–“oh, I’m sure Jebus just has magical lessons for you to learn from this!” Kind of like how my mom argued that we should stop trying to find cures for diseases because “God sends that pain to us so we can learn spiritual lessons”. I told her she was a hypocrite to her face, because the moment she feels any pain she does whatever she needs to to fix it rather than suffer through it and find this purported spiritual truth, and if I had cancer she wouldn’t be vacillating about “spiritual lessons”–she’d want a damn cure!

Makes it even more nauseating when the ass in question is talking about a condition that will never actually affect him directly, and even if his daughter got preggers out of wedlock he’s rich! It’s like Sarah Palin touting how her daughter kept her pregnancy, as if rich-white-girl situations are exactly the same as poor-black-girl (or poor girl in general) and that if her rich princess’s life wasn’t ruined then no one else’s would be either.
Demonhype

It’s pretty damn obvious he’s a sanctimonious hypocrite. I’m pretty damn sure he’s not anti-war or anti-death penalty or anti-poor people dying of starvation or preventable health problems and, as an extension of that, not anti-children who are the product of forced birth starving or dying due having been forced to be born to a woman who can’t afford them (hello, Republican? It’s their Holy Standard!).

I’ll be damned if some santorum-faced panderer is going to force me to carry a blob of cells to term against my will due to his magical beliefs that it has some mystical soul or his conviction that I will somehow “find the silver lining” or “make the best of it” or that I somehow have “some lesson to learn”. How fucking generous people can be when they are imposing this on other people’s lives and bodies–“oh, I’m sure Jebus just has magical lessons for you to learn from this!” Kind of like how my mom argued that we should stop trying to find cures for diseases because “God sends that pain to us so we can learn spiritual lessons”. I told her she was a hypocrite to her face, because the moment she feels any pain she does whatever she needs to to fix it rather than suffer through it and find this purported spiritual truth, and if I had cancer she wouldn’t be vacillating about “spiritual lessons”–she’d want a damn cure!

Makes it even more nauseating when the ass in question is talking about a condition that will never actually affect him directly, and even if his daughter got preggers out of wedlock he’s rich! It’s like Sarah Palin touting how her daughter kept her pregnancy, as if rich-white-girl situations are exactly the same as poor-black-girl (or poor girl in general) and that if her rich princess’s life wasn’t ruined then no one else’s would be either.
Ben Motz

Rare anecdotal occurrences, while often psychologically moving, do not make good rational arguments. I also believe “loss of sensation” is kinda the whole point of an epidural.
HEYBUTTFUCK

Scientifically – it is not life until there is a hearbeat and there is not a heartbeat until day 21… just saying
HEYBUTTFUCK

Oh and Rick Santorum is a douchebag and has some real issues to sort out on his own, on a secluded island that he cannot get off of!!
Treatment for CCSVI

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