Trent Franks is the latest Republican amateur gynecologist to mansplain how rape doesn’t cause pregnancy. Wonder where that idea came from:
“In the aftermath of Akin’s statement, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported on a 1972 essay by an obstetrician named Fred Mecklenburg, who cited a Nazi experiment in which women were told they were on their way to die in the gas chambers—and then were allowed to live, so that doctors could check whether they would still ovulate. Since few did, Mecklenburg claimed that women exposed to the emotional trauma of rape wouldn’t be able to become pregnant, either. (He also argued that rapists are infertile because they masturbate a lot.) The essay was published in a book financed by A.U.L.”
A.U.L. is Americans United for Life, a pro-life advocacy group with increasing clout because of its success in drafting model state laws to restrict abortion. The line from the Nazis to Mecklenburg to Akin and Franks runs through Jack Wilke, a doctor who is the former head of the National Right to Life Committee. He said, “What is certainly one of the most important reasons why a rape victim rarely gets pregnant, and that’s physical trauma.” And he stuck with this when the Los Angeles Times called to ask him about Akin last year. When I asked A.U.L. head Charmaine Yoest about the claim that rape rarely results in pregnancy, she was smarter and called it “a distraction.” Abortion opponents sure do keep bringing it up, though.
The masturbation corollary to the unified theory of no rape pregnancy is a nice touch.
muddy
I don’t suppose it occurred to the Nazis that ovulation probably ceased due to malnutrition and disease. Years ago I was very sick, I quit having my monthly after only a couple of months of it.
Stupid Nazis. Stupid Republicans. Sorry, I repeat myself.
Tone in DC
These rectal passages are using “research” from the Third Reich???
WTF???
What, was Attila the Hun’s philosophy not sufficiently foul?
Comrade Mary
Huh. The theory that masturbation depletes a man’s stock of little swimmers is certainly out there, but the Mayo Clinic disagrees. This conception site says that the evidence is mixed, but they come down on the side of no direct correelation:
But nobody sane out there is claiming that wanking = infertility.
Omnes Omnibus
They can’t help themselves. It is like a compulsion.
Biscuits
As much as I hate hearing about these people and their lady bits logic, I hope they keep talking so every woman out there has absolutely no doubt about where they stand. Give these idiots the spotlight, a mike, and the podium. And then ask their eventual nominee what HE thinks. I’d especially like the republican nominee to be asked if he believes vaginal probes are a states rights issue. A girl can dream.
YellowJournalism
So when people quip, “You know who else believed that rape doesn’t result in pregnancy,” it will be true!
Matt McIrvin
@Comrade Mary: Even if there were some connection, surely a man of average fertility could build up an adequate stock by not doing it for, like, two days.
negative 1
If they believe the infertility bit, let’s start a program to send Playboy to sex offenders. It will, after all, make them infertile. I’d love to see them try and argue out of that.
Shirt
They are shifting the debate that abortion should only be done in the case of rape caused pregnancy.
Why a woman wishes to terminate a pregnancy isn’t my concern (sort of) That she can, without hindrance is a concern
ppcli
The Post-Dispatch headline might be the the most outrageous example of “Earth flat or round? Opinions differ” journalism I’ve ever seen.
“Akin appears to have picked up conclusions from 1972 article now hotly disputed”
Hotly disputed? An article by a professional non-entity citing Nazi research, that is now viewed by everyone but rabid anti-abortion hacks as worse than worthless. By this standard the Protocols of the Elders of Zion is “hotly disputed”.
GregB
This theory gives new meaning to the term: all whacked out.
beltane
I think the women of this country need to know that Dr. Mengele is the GOP’s new (or not so new) science and women’s affairs adviser. One has to wonder if Trent Franks’s offices are illuminated by lamps having shades made of human skin, because his beliefs emanate from the same source.
Shakezula
Yes and gays and lesbians are rampant junkies who want to molest your kiddies. And brown people want to steal your car, do drugs and rape your women. I read it so it must be true!
How is trying to pretend the fact that one’s allies keep yapping about rape isn’t relevant “smart”? It is the same dodge the assholes in the GOP use when someone asks them about their latest sharing of their rape fantasies.
beltane
@Matt McIrvin: Wouldn’t this also imply that virile, manly-men who have sex with their wives on a daily basis are incapable of fathering a child? Does this mean that regular sex is a reliable form of birth control?
mistermix
@beltane: Well if you’re trying to argue, essentially, that fucking doesn’t lead to babies, you’re pretty close to arguing that the more sex you have the better your chances of not having a baby.
Cassidy
How long before T&H comes to tell us tha tthe dude was just moving his hips back and forth and that it’s the woman’s fault for being in the way?
RSA
From the Post:
Thanks for the “clarification”.
Kay
@Shirt:
I agree but no one listening will understand that. It’s too insular, insidery, specific to the anti-abortion movement. People will just hear “rape” and wonder why they talk about rape constantly.
Remember when they had the billboard that read “where’s the birth certificate?” and people driving by didn’t understand it? Only birthers make the connection between Obama and a birth certificate.
They have to get out in the world once in a while :)
beltane
@mistermix: This does sound like the type of family planning advice one would get from the James Dobson crowd. Babees come from God anyway, so human biology has nothing to do with it unless it has something to do with a sperm-trapping, food stamp seeking slut who needs to be punished.
Forum Transmitted Disease
Oddly enough, the same crowd that doesn’t believe in rape babies are the first ones through the door of the local abortion clinic begging for help if the rapist is black. I wonder why that is?
beltane
Perhaps all these theories should be tested on Charmaine Yoest. As head of the A.U.L. you’d think she would relish the chance to personally validate the claims of her organization.
gbear
@mistermix: I do remember a radio program in the 70’s where a couple was making this argument. The reason I remember this is because one of the hosts said ‘Do you know what they call men who practice this form of birth control? Fathers!’ It struck me as funny at the time…
Kay
For me, the reason they have so much trouble with it is because if one believes that life begins at conception and abortion is murder, there can’t be an exception for rape or incest. Why would there be? They’re always going to trip over it, because they aren’t telling the truth.
Gin & Tonic
@Matt McIrvin: by not doing it for, like, two days
Now that’s crazy talk!
danah gaz
Oh no, this is too easy.
You know who *else* believed in “legitimate rape?”
BGinCHI
Wow. It’s like violence against women has a whole history and stuff.
How the fucking hell did 27% of the population get this fucking stupid?
Re-education camps? We just need education camps.
piratedan
@Tone in DC: hey now, we all know that liberals are the true Nazi’s, after all, they were herded into concentration camps when Dolf ran things, so naturally it stands to reason that red is blue and poor people should starve lest they come for my guns, see?
ricky
Whatever happened to the Republican 10th Amendment principle? Masturbation is a state’s rights issue (or should I say “matter”).
MattF
Unfortunately, the debate keeps descending to this level because it just can’t get any lower. If the zealots could get away with suggesting capital punishment for women who have abortions, they would. But a little birdie tells them that proposal would be a bit unpopular.
Zifnab
Nazi scientists? Really? Did we just witness the rare but always highly amusing self-Godwin?
Soonergrunt
@Kay: Their real problem is that if abortion is murder without exception, they must then logically support the arrest and prosecution of women who seek and/or obtain abortions. But they don’t want to do that because they lose huge swaths of support when they do that. So they must either remove the woman’s agency completely–“OF COURSE we won’t prosecute women. They’re as much victims as the babies!” or they must minimize the circumstances under which most moderates would allow abortion–“it can’t have truly been rape if she got pregnant because a true rape is so traumatic that the body has ways of shutting that whole thing down. So there shouldn’t be a rape/incest exception because if she’s pregnant she wanted it, the little slut.”
Randy P
Maybe we should just start referring to it Dr. Mengele’s theory in public discourse. Really cement the connection. “Congressman, you recently cited Dr. Mengele’s theory that pregnancy from rape is rare. Can you explain yada yada…”
NotMax
Somewhere, Joycelyn Elders is banging her head against a wall.
Villago Delenda Est
@mistermix:
This flows, logically, from the idea that the more a man ejaculates, the less likely he is to have viable sperm that can fertilize an egg.
I am not a physician, but I play one on the internet, so let me explain what is going on here. All you guys who have had wild weekends with a partner n in which you repeatedly did the wild thing, didn’t this cause your semen to go from whole milk appearance to skim as the weekend progressed? Is this what these idiots are talking about? My understanding is that the sperm quantity may still be more than enough to fertilize even if the seminal fluid loses it’s whole milk appearance. Any ACTUAL doctors out there who can confirm that perhaps the problem is these morans are taking surface appearance to indicate sperm count in ejaculate? I mean, the buggers are tiny…smaller than the eye can see, so the appearance of the seminal fluid is what these dumbshits are talking about? So they’re jumping to a conclusion that will make you a dad if you take their theory at face value?
BGinCHI
What’s the difference between anti-choice fundamentalists and the Nazis?
Say what you want about the tenets of National Socialism, Dude. At least it’s an ethos.
maurinsky
@RSA:
Well, it is pretty hard to get pregnant when you’re already 6 months pregnant.
beltane
@BGinCHI: The Nazis had a stricter dress code. Other than that, I can see no differences at all.
scav
@Zifnab: Unintentional one, probably. I somehow doubt they actually read all the way through any research they cite, let alone wander into the dangerous areas of footnotes and references, let alone background knowledge of references. Between the abstract and the concluding paragraph could be Harry Potter and the Quest for the Uterine Depths (with Illustrations of Wand) and they’d find it equally persuasive. It’s not reasearch Jim, it’s buttressing.
Poopyman
@NotMax: I prefer the thought of Jocelyn Elders banging someone else’s head against a wall. There’s plenty of prime candidates out there.
Poopyman
@Villago Delenda Est: I think the key is to keep yourself hydrated.
Villago Delenda Est
@Kay:
They’re always going to trip over it because it has NEVER been about “saving babies”. It’s always been about punishing and controlling the sluts. ALWAYS.
ricky
Fallacy of Soonergrunt:
“they must then logically”
There is no need for logic in politics based on faith in an omnipotent one. Which is why the omnipotent made the unrepentant rapist impotent.
Villago Delenda Est
@BGinCHI:
WIN!
Villago Delenda Est
@Poopyman:
So mainlining tequila probably won’t help?
balconesfault
I think the next theory that needs to be developed and expounded upon is the idea that women can only become pregnant if they really WANT to become pregnant … and that women whose eggs actually accept sperm into them are either wanting to bear children, or secretly deviants who wish to conceive and abort for the sadistic pleasure of legally sanctioned baby killing.
Coming soon, to a GOP primary debate near you!
SatanicPanic
@NotMax: certainly fundies are a group that would very much benefit from her advice
Mike in NC
@MattF: No, they really would like to go there.
Are all male GOP politicians rapists or at least fantasy rapists? It would be irresponsible not to speculate.
Shakezula
@Cassidy: You mean that hasn’t happened yet?
ricky
@Poopyman: I think the key is to not take drugs that make you thing there is a visual difference in whole and skim milk or that all us guys eyeball our jizz to detect its visual appearance during the course of a wild weekend.
rk
Ovulation is effected by stress, at least that’s what I was told by my doctor when I stopped having my periods for 3 months. I had moved to a different country and stopped my regular cycles. Dr said it was due to stress and gave some medication to restart the process. I know a few moms who tell me that their daughters will stop menstruating around the time of their finals. Also many women are told to relax if they are trying to get pregnant and get overly concerned when it does not happen. Sudden stress can affect the body (female or male in many different ways), but like everything else evil politicians will take a little bit of truth and a whole lot of BS to push their own agenda.
Another Halocene Human
Are we reaping the whirlwind of grown people who are mentally and emotionally like children because of lead poisoning first and social isolation in the ‘burbs second, peaking now and soon to be replaced by a generation in which lead levels plummeted and immigrants who came from areas too poor and rural to be constantly inoculated with poison metal vapor, and Europe, which rolled out the lead later and rolled it off later, suffering a milder, delayed effect?
As a child I could never understand how GROWN PEOPLE kept signing up to the idea of increasing revenue by cutting taxes (now I know it’s the “Laffer curve”). Nor did I get what could be wrong about “tax and spend”. I mean, isn’t that the correct order of business? What’s up with spending and then taking out a loan… that’s kind of dumb… anyway.
There’s other factors here, of course, like racism, but the concentrated political stupidity, and it’s sweeping rejection by younger folks… gotta wonder. I know some of you are going to say “but libertarians”, but remember how they poll. They just happen to be a group that spends a FUCKTON of time online making them seem very numerous there when in fact they are not numerous at all.
Villago Delenda Est
@balconesfault:
Ah, I see. Women (and girls, for that matter) have total conscious control over the fertilization process, and thus must will a pregnancy, presumably by sending mental beams into the uterus to aim sperm, ala a video game, at the egg. Furthermore, they can determine the sex of the child by mentally controlling the sperm with the unwanted chromosomes to stay away from the egg and go fuck off and die somewhere near the uterine wall.
Well, it could happen!
Another Halocene Human
Other than paid shills like Meghan McKochbros, most ‘net libertarians are probably very socially isolated people who grope towards some sort of human contact online (sometimes in ways that exacerbate that same social isolation).
HelpThe99ers
@Biscuits:
Agreed: in states like Wisconsin, where the GOP is ramming through transvaginal ultrasound bills, because they have majority control over the state government, local Democrats should stand, and point, and tell the press in calm and measured tones:
“This is what passing this bill means. The GOP is telling you that they know best: their judgement should take precedence over yours, and over your doctor’s. We can’t stop them today, but we’re going to fight like hell come election day, and that’s why we need you.”
Cassidy
@Shakezula: Not today.
Redshirt
Put this into your perspective pipe: Romney won white women in 2012. Even with all the legitimate rape and vaginal probe chat.
Illuminating.
Another Halocene Human
@Comrade Mary: Quite the opposite, in fact–men with low sperm counts who were trying to conceive with their partners were being encouraged to ejaculate more frequently so that they could inoculate their partner with fresher, better quality sperm. It was a reversal of advice to “save the seed” if you will which had been completely unsuccessful.
Of course these were Israeli doctors who didn’t know the theologically correct Roman Catholic method of fertilization. //
piratedan
@Redshirt: tribal ties are strong, how else do you explain so many poor whites continually voting against their own economic self interest?
Another Halocene Human
@beltane: burn.
I’m scared to put that in my fb feed. It sounds like Godwining. Ideas?
Frankensteinbeck
@Villago Delenda Est:
It bears the same theoretical relation to science as their claims about rape. It’s about hating sex, period. ‘Diluting your vital essence’ type arguments used to be completely mainstream, and were used to shame young men into believing that any sexual activity, even lustful thoughts or wet dreams, were evil. Immoral behavior MUST be unhealthy in their eyes. It’s just obvious. These days the debate has moved on, and without misogynists like Rush they can’t sign up enough believers to be more than a fringe, so the moralists are stuck bashing women. They’d LIKE to go back to the old days of shaming everyone, but they’re hateful self-righteous asses and they’ll take the opportunity to hurt women that the conservative existential crisis has offered them.
Shakezula
@Cassidy: Well, it isn’t quite 11 am here.
low-tech cyclist
Someone’s probably said this already here, but if masturbating a lot made a guy infertile, teenage boys would almost never get anyone pregnant.
Another Halocene Human
@Redshirt: White, married women still think their abortion is the only justified abortion and that they will not run into any trouble when they need it.
Just look at advertising–how many dumb ads these days feature a small, white housewife bossing some large, hulking, often black athlete or monster or monster truck driver around?
It’s like a lesson in middle class white privilege. They make me cringe.
Another Halocene Human
@mistermix: Well if you’re trying to argue, essentially, that fucking doesn’t lead to babies, you’re pretty close to arguing that the more sex you have the better your chances of not having a baby
Case in point: Madonna.
//I think I’m kidding?
Another Halocene Human
@Cassidy: How long before T&H comes to tell us tha tthe dude was just moving his hips back and forth and that it’s the woman’s fault for being in the way?
I thought spatula was only into raped white boys. Raped women put his boner to sleep.
MikeJ
@Randy P:
I would suggest dropping the word “doctor”and adding the word “nazi”. There are plenty of stupid people out there who don’t know who Mengele was and using the term doctor may confer an undeserved aura of respectability.
Another Halocene Human
@beltane: It’s worse than that. The hard right wing Dominionists don’t consider rape to be wrong because the woman’s bodily integrity is violated. She’s just chattel. Rape is a sort of property crime. That’s why they don’t recognize marital rape as a thing. They also blame the woman for her rape because on her side they consider it a sexual impurity thing like adultery or fornication. So they blame her, and their only interest in punishing him is the man who owns the woman’s rights being infringed upon.
They are sick, sick, sick.
Shakezula
@rk: True, but saying stress affects ovulation is an incredibly vague statement. It could put you off by a couple of hours or cause you to miss entirely. It really does depend on the individual and after having a period while recovering from major surgery, I have to say I hate you bitches who stop for things like final exams. Seriously, shut up.
Another Halocene Human
@Kay: Why would there be? They’re always going to trip over it, because they aren’t telling the truth.
Imma leave this right here.
And yes, they are stuck in the 17th century, pre-Enlightenment. They’ll even tell you they reject the Enlightenment.
Villago Delenda Est
@Frankensteinbeck:
Funny how actual immoral behavior, like encouraging little old ladies on Social Security to send their checks to a televangelist doesn’t cross their event horizon, while anything having to do with sexual pleasure is just terrible!
Cripes, these people are scum.
Villago Delenda Est
@Another Halocene Human:
Hell, the Bachmann bint said that the Renaissance was a mistake.
These people want to go back to the dark ages.
Forum Transmitted Disease
@Another Halocene Human: Fixed that for you.
Freak on a very thin leash, Special Timmy is. Hope Cole is prepared for the inevitable subpoena of his server files and logs when the, well, inevitable happens.
Frankensteinbeck
@Villago Delenda Est:
No argument there.
Another Halocene Human
@BGinCHI: How the fucking hell did 27% of the population get this fucking stupid?
Cocaineracism is a hell of a drug?Another Halocene Human
@MattF: They can’t make up their minds if they want to forcibly sterilize poor women or force them to carry babies to term. Decisions, decisions.
But the important thing is that she suffers.
Ken T
@Villago Delenda Est: If you think about it, this is really just a continuation and expansion of the medieval belief that it was a woman’s duty to give her husband a male heir. In other words, that she was in fact entirely in control of the process. So if she failed to get pregnant, or if she bore only girls, it was because she willfully chose not to do her duty. Which was therefore grounds for divorce (or worse). Today’s Republicans are quite literally living in the Dark Ages.
Another Halocene Human
@Soonergrunt: Sooner, don’t forget what’s not on this page–their rampant lying about the dangers of birth and the risks of a high-risk pregnancy, or the fact that late term abortion procedures are needed to save the life of a mother during a late term miscarriage. Like what happened to that poor woman in Ireland. Or “Beatriz” in El Salvador. One was a miscarriage, the other a non-viable fetus. The “Pro-life”* crowd lies about this stuff all fucking day long. They stick their fingers in their ears and scream “Best of all Best of all Possible Worlds!”
*-and never going to take credit for all the women they kill, just like antivaxxers won’t own all those deaths due to whooping coff, autism moms won’t own the young children beaten and harmed by DAN! practitioners, etc, etc, my delusion is more important than any harm done to any of youuuuuuu
Another Halocene Human
@Randy P: Rachel should do a bit.
El Caganer
@Omnes Omnibus: Uh, what exactly are you referring to?
Emma
Ok, I know this is completely OT, but did anyone read the story? The Supreme Court, unanimously, found that human genes cannot be patented.
does little happy Snoopy dance
Another Halocene Human
@Villago Delenda Est: Here’s some mainstream info:
Low sperm count caused by environmental factors, not “jacking off too much”.
What the research says about men with low sperm counts and sperm quality.
Or you* could just ask your mates at the pub what they think. I’m sure they’re certified in something. //
*I don’t really mean YOU villago, just stating it more generally
David Hunt
@balconesfault: I wish I could be sure that that argument will never be mainstreamed.
Forum Transmitted Disease
@Emma: Missed that. Thank the God I don’t believe in, and I mean that in the most heartfelt way. Ruling any other way would have been an utter disaster in so many ways it does not bear contemplating.
Another Halocene Human
@beltane: In Nazi Germany, there were Jews hidden in attics. In Reich Wing America, it’s the women and children.
Another Halocene Human
@Villago Delenda Est: They’re always going to trip over it because it has NEVER been about “saving babies”. It’s always been about punishing and controlling the sluts. ALWAYS.
Why do women fall for this shit? About 15 years ago I read some “Westoxification” essays. Some middle aged Muslim woman blathering about how the West sucked and burkas were awesome because women weren’t judged on their appearance argle barge. Like, basically she was stuck in a world where she was denied a career so dependent on her husband for support. And in her country he could marry another, younger woman without her permission. (Well, sometimes Muslim marriage contracts forbid this–really depends on the country.) More importantly, he could unilaterally divorce her (this is any country with Sharia law–btw, Jewish religious law is the same). Leaving her without support and possibly forced to prostitute herself under temporary marriage contracts or forced into a line of work that is looked down upon as if it is prostitution. Or throw herself on an established adult son’s mercy. All humiliating prospects.
And so she seizes on covering the young women up. COVER THEM UP! Then her man will not see them and not think about all the hot sex he could be having with a hot, young (&naive) chick–legally, and with full social approval!
So. Stupid.
It’s like those Christian parents who think if they shield their kids from any mention of sex then they won’t do it. At least the Ger (kooky Jewish cult) community pretty much just comes out and is like they are straight up controlling people so they withhold info on contraception so the young people in forced marriages quickly become parents of multiple children and completely inmeshed in the life of the cult economically, physically, emotionally, and can’t escape. Whereas these dipshit Christian parents think they’ll somehow “save our kids from the culture” when that sex drive is innate, you fucking weirdo delusional fucks. Damn.
Villago Delenda Est
@Another Halocene Human:
I still think these dumbshits are taking surface appearance of ejaculate to indicate how energized (and capable of fertilizing ova) the sperm is. After all, they’re plain and simple folk.
VERY simple.
For an example, I have read that the clear lubricating fluid that precedes ejaculation can have sperm in it. So, full scale ejaculate may not be necessary to induce a pregnancy, which means that those who use coitus interruptus as a birth control method are called “parents”.
Mike in NC
@Villago Delenda Est:
At least 27% of the US adult population will agree with such a rigorous scientific analysis!
Cacti
Since the Open Thread is dead as a door nail, thought I’d post this OT here:
Chief Justice Roberts has called for an extremely rare formal review of 5th circuit Judge Edith Jones for her alleged racist remarks during a Federalist Society speech.
Shakezula
@Villago Delenda Est:
What do you mean, sexual pleasure is terrible? Every time I turn around some right wing SOB has been found covered in lube and sex workers.
Now, if you don’t pretend sexual pleasure is terrible, that is very bad. If you’re a woman who doesn’t pretend sexual pleasure is bad, prepare ye for a stoning. But at the same time, women should be prepared to service any right wing SOB who comes along, because the right wing penis must be obeyed.
Yatsuno
@Emma: Wait wait wait…Scalito & Co just made a jerb creator cry? Is is snowing by my condo in Hades?
rk
@Shakezula:
Actually I had a period after a surgery as well and again the explanation was stress (as told by a nurse who called it breakthrough bleeding). They don’t call it “the curse” for nothing.
I think a lot of times the word stress is substitute for we don’t know jack. I had an aunt who died at a very young age and was always told that she had “hysteria”. It’s only later that I realized that “hysteria” was not really a medical condition but a name given to any set of symptoms related to the female (because it was thought to originate in the uterus) . So it was an all purpose diagnosis. Made life so much easier for Doctors when they dealt with women. At least we have progressed to a point where the Drs don’t tell women “it’s all in your womb”.
SatanicPanic
@Another Halocene Human: But women being judged on their looks is mens’ fault. I guess that’s not a popular thing to say in Muslim countries. Or really in the USA.
Soonergrunt
@ricky: I should have said “Logic would dictate…” and then pointed out that logic isn’t part of it any more than saving babies is part of it. Slut shaming and denying women agency is what it’s all about.
Villago Delenda Est
@Ken T:
Good points, all.
Emma
@Yatsuno: Hold on to your hat. Thomas delivered the opinion and Scalia filed an opinion concurring in part and concurring in the judgment.
JR in WV
@Another Halocene Human:
There you go, completely not enlightened! Your
RepublicanNazi party. Self identified as such by their every utterance.When a white woman is the Democrat candidate, and the Republican Nazi candidate has to fumble around other republican statements and laws about republican rape laws, how many women will vote for the republican nut, er, candidate? I’m thjinkin’ damm few. Hoping anyhoo.
scav
@Another Halocene Human: Still, don’t confuse the burka with the full cultural deal (in its most extreme forms, no less). And there is something to be said about how much of western feminine dress and body image blah blah blah is also a culturally enforced reaction to masculine expectations, desires and demands. It’s messier, like most of reality — including the bit on both sides where woman are active and willing supporters of the status quo. It’s not like this culture has got it all sunshine and right, especially given the topic of the thread.
Emma
And another: Brewer got Obamacare approved in Arizona. Are we living an backwards and upside down day?
Patricia Kayden
I don’t understand all these “raped women can’t get pregnant” claims. There have been documented cases of women being impregnated by rapes and if these women don’t want to be forced to give birth, that is their own private decision.
If even one woman gets pregnant by rape, her reproductive rights, including the right to terminate the pregnancy, should be protected.
Are there no Republican women who can tell their male counterparts to shut up about this issue?
muddy
@Patricia Kayden: No, that would be disrespectful.
piratedan
@Patricia Kayden: apparently they believe that those dirty sluts had it coming as well. As much respect as I have for the fairer gender, not all of your sisters share your empathic tendencies. Look at that group of harridans running Komen for example.
Central Planning
@Matt McIrvin:
I was going to go with 4 hours, but 2 days is ok too.
Shakezula
@rk: Ah yes, hysteria. Because medical theory based on the idea that a baby-free womb will roam around the body causing trouble based on what organ it is bumping against must be a sound medical theory. Better hang on to that one, eh?
As for “You’re just under stress, dear,” it is impossible to say how many women have died because of this attitude in the medical community. Until fairly recently, a woman who had a heart attack was at serious risk of being misdiagnosed. Our symptoms tend to be different from a man’s and well, who gives a fuck? Give her a script for Valium and send her home. The women in my family have a history of cardiovascular problems and you can probably guess how hard it was to get the correct diagnoses when, for example my grandmother’s kept fainting because her bp would plummet for no reason.
My advice to any woman who seeks medical care is to follow my mom’s example: Don’t answer any questions about stress in your life unless that’s your complaint. If you’re having periods of dizziness, just talk about your dizziness and when it starts and when it stops. It is up to your doctor to rule out all other possible causes and determine it is just stress.
Another Halocene Human
@scav: Never said it was, just think that Muslim critiques of Western capitalism fall apart because of their utter delusion about the power dynamics in the Muslim world.
The West has a maelstrom of issues having to do with rampant, unchecked capitalism, the lure of mass commercial media, right wing religious conservatism, patriarchy, and fucknuts who can’t deal with change. Fashion, for example, is all kinds of crazy. Massive economic inequality+commercial needs (churn) –> loss of vernacular dress, loss of local culture, loss of aesthetic value, discontent b/c of the inequality, economic dislocations and costs.
Capitalism makes people unhappy and proposes to fill that void with stuff. Okay.
Sharia law blames women for male desire, makes the dependents of men as if they are children and does not hear them when they are harmed or wronged.
One of these things is not equal to the other. And Muslim patriarchy finds its opposite number in Christian patriarchy, not on Madison Avenue.
shortstop
@Redshirt: I wonder how much of that can be ascribed to general tribal ties, and how much specifically to the Democratic candidate being a kneegrow. It will be illuminating to see how many white Republican women cross the barbed-wire fence to vote for Hillary, especially when the GOP can’t stop pissing off the ladies daily. Might be a significant number. Might not.
Another Halocene Human
@Emma: Not really… it’s all about the Almighty Dollar. Also, I guess some Tea Partiers found out and they’re only allowed the illusion of manning the rudder. Boo hoo hoo.
Another Halocene Human
@Patricia Kayden: Don’t forget the Founding Myth of Rome. (warning: the summary is Bowdlerized)
Why does the GOP hate traditional (Western) culture and values?
Yatsuno
@Another Halocene Human:
Those exist? LOL! Muhammad was a huge capitalist! Before he was a prophet he was a (rather successful) merchant. The interest restrictions were adopted from the Jewish scholars he studied with.
Redshirt
@shortstop: I’m sure it’s mostly about Tribal allegiances. That said, there’s always a percentage of Tribalists who are least open to the suggestion of something different. If the Republicans continue their Rapechat through 2016, and Hillary is the Dem nominee, it seems reasonable to assume she’ll get a greater percentage of the white woman vote than Obama did. Also, relatedly, she’ll do much better in Appalachia which should put Pennsylvania well out of R reach, and maybe even swings W. Virginia.
scav
@Another Halocene Human: Oddly enough, this bit rather came across as not blaming existing “Muslim” (as though all Muslim cultures and societies believed, spoke and acted with a single voice) cultural structures and critiques of the west but dumb women and specifically one.
I mean, how dare that woman have a different take on dress and cultural values?
Whether or not you meant it.
maurinsky
Ovulation should occur a day or three before ejaculation if you want to get pregnant; although rape is stressful, if a woman is raped shortly after she’s ovulated, the stress of the rape won’t enable her to go back in time and un-ovulate.
Emma
@Another Halocene Human: Honestly, I don’t care why. Thousands of low-income people in Arizona are getting some form of health insurance. That’s the main thing.
piratedan
@Emma: yup, it saves them money and AZ got nailed hard by the recession and the financial boondoggle that was SB1040.
Xenos
@rk: For ovulation to be suppressed by stress it has to be chronic. Rape victims are not stressed until they are raped, and if they had just ovulated a couple days beforehand, then they are pretty likely to get pregnant.
And would sudden trauma cause a follicle that was near rupture to reverse the process? What sort of biological system in the ovary would do that?
Why even ask these questions – the people proposing this theory don’t even believe in evolution. There is nothing to talk about with people like that.
rk
@Xenos:
My point was actually to say that these pols take something which may have a grain of truth (ie stress can effect ovulation), twist it, add their own BS (stress caused by rape prevents pregnancy) and use it to formulate policy. I know these people don’t believe in evolution. Heck, they don’t even know basic biology.
R-Jud
@Shakezula:
Yep. Made the mistake of answering the “stress” question in March when I turned up with fatigue, depression, loss of appetite, and consistent pain and bloating in my abdomen, and got told I had “IBS” and that I should take up yoga or maybe cut out wheat and dairy.
Fast-forward to June, and it turns out there’s a really rather large cyst or tumor that has taken over my left ovary. Given my age and family history it is extremely unlikely it’s cancer, but still– it ain’t stress.
DavidTC
Okay, every time this comes up there are always people showing up confused, because doctors actually _do_ say that reducing stress increases the odds of pregnancy, so increasing stress must decrease it, so this idiotic Republican are _a little_ right?
No, they aren’t. Because being raped is not ‘stress’.
Stress is a specific _long-term_ psychological condition caused by anxiety. Now, being raped could lead to anxiety. Any sort of trauma, or, hell, almost anything can lead to stress. In fact, trauma of any sort can lead to something call ‘Post-traumatic stress disorder’.
This would be over a period of weeks, though. It doesn’t happen _during_ anything.
No one suffers from stress _during_ a rape. That is not what stress is. And even if that was ‘stress’, ‘stress’ doesn’t magically stop ovulation anyway. Stress is merely something that doctors think _might_ possibly effect pregnancy, this has not actually been proven. (Nazi stupid-science aside.) And when they talk about ‘stress’, they aren’t even talking about the psychological part, they are talking about the effect stress has _on your body_, with high blood pressure, lack of sleep, etc…none of which can magically appear during rape.
Now, there is something call _shock_, which I think is what is being confused with this.
People can go into shock due to trauma. And your body does actually ‘shut down’ during this. It’s a form of emergency management that doesn’t work very well. It _is_ likely that ovulation won’t happen during this. Hell, fricking _heat regulation_ doesn’t happen during this. (We manage to stop being ‘warm blooded’, our body just gives up on that whole 98.6 degrees thing. Room temperature is fine, why not. All it will do is kill us.)
This condition, in addition to not _actually_ being useful at all (Seriously, it’s a completely nonsensical response. It’s the appendix of mammalian reflexes. It makes things worse!), is _lethal_ if it last more than a few minutes.
And not only do most rape victims _not_ suffer from shock in the first place (Shock is usually trigger by blood loss, which is not an incredibly common thing during rape.), but the average amount of time between sex and actually being pregnant from it is, uh, more than a few minutes, as evidenced by the entire _premise_ of Plan B.
So this shock can not conceivable effect pregnancy rates. I guess in crazy hypothetical world that if a women was five minutes away from ovulation, and was raped and went into shock, it could delay ovulation an hour…and then she’d ovulate and have just as much chance of becoming pregnant as before. D’oh.
However, there is something that _does_ happen during any sort of assault: Extra adrenaline.
Do you know what helps _cause_ ovulation? That has been proven to trigger ovulation in various animals, and blocking in other animals can stop ovulation?
Adrenaline.
Now, obviously consensual sex involves adrenaline also, and no one knows if it involves more or less. (It would be fairly hard to monitor those levels during sex, and impossible during rape.)
But rape should, _in theory_, involve more adrenaline than normal sex, so there is actually a process by which rape victim could be _more_ likely to ovulate soon after. (And no process by which they’d be _less_ likely.)
The Other Chuck
@DavidTC: I’ve heard of studies that in fact claim that the pregnancy rate from rape tends to actually be higher. Then again, it could also be because it’s unplanned, to say the least, and typically unsafe.
While it’s great to educate anyone who may be happening to hear these right wing nazi jagoffs talk, don’t assume for a moment that they respond to anything like logic, reason, compassion. Shit, it’s a dark road to go down, but I really see them as less human. They certainly make a very big point of seeing me that way, to say nothing of half the population.
Redshirt
@R-Jud: That sucks. Best of luck and my thoughts are with you.
DavidTC
I’ve heard of studies that in fact claim that the pregnancy rate from rape tends to actually be higher. Then again, it could also be because it’s unplanned, to say the least, and typically unsafe.
I actually read a statistic the other day that said with regard to sex without any protection, consensual sex’s pregnancy rate is 3%, and rape is way up at 8%. So, yes, rape is about 250% more likely to produce pregnancy.
I think it’s worth repeating: 1 out of 12 unprotected rape victims will become pregnant.
I was just pointing out that there is literally no mechanism that could even _hypothetically_ reduce the odds of pregnancy during rape. It’s not some debatable thing. Morons decided to string together some _assumptions_ that fertility doctors make (It’s not their fault, their job is fairly random) into proof that stress actually _does_ cause less pregnancies, and then, apparently deliberately, decided to completely misunderstand what the fuck ‘stress’ was. And then, on top of that, decided that this hypothetical ‘reduced chance’ actually meant 0%.
It’s deliberate misunderstanding on top of deliberate misunderstand on top of an _assumption_.
Incidentally, the idea that oral contraceptives sometimes keep a fertilized egg from implanting is _exactly_ the same bullshit. That idea that came from a _hypothetical_ concept in a damn ad campaign advertising the contraceptives. There literally has never been a shred of evidence for it, and nor the slightly way it _could_ happen.
This is because oral contraceptives stop _ovulation_ by _mimicking pregnancy_, and, uh, pregnant women women certainly can have eggs implant, as evidenced by, duh, twins conceived on different days, which is fairly well documented. Hell, there have been women who get pregnant months into a pregnancy, which is not good, but demonstrates rather well implantation is possible.
But we have to treat these fucking _lies_ as some sort of debatable science.