pmd@cbscc.UUCP (Paul Dubuc) (03/07/84)
From Chuck Jones > I do agree with you that the ultimate > answer is to prevent rape. I do object, however, to your comment > that pro-choice people think that abortion is "part of the answer". > (Apparently part of the answer to the question of rape.) Let's not > put words in the pro-choicer's mouths. Abortions after the fact > will obviously not do anything to prevent rape. I did not mean to say that abortion was supposed to be a part of the solution to the problem of rape itself, but that it is taken as part of the solution to the damage done to a woman as the result of rape. > However, to condemn a woman to carry the fetus of a rapist??! > To make carry a constant reminder of the assault she suffered? To > make her have the baby of a man who committed the ultimate violation > of her person and her spirit? A rape must be the hardest of traumas > to overcome, even if the woman was not seriously harmed. And you > really believe that it is better for her to have this baby, and ruin > here life, and the child's, than to have an abortion? (Yes I said > ruin the child's. I can't imagine that most woman could really ever > love this child, and I can't imagine that they would treat their > body properly during pregnancy (probably damaging the child), if > they could even withstand it mentally. And, yes I believe that this > kind of stress will damage the fetus.) I don't mean to think any less of the terrible harm done to a woman by rape. But, again, you are ignoring the fetus. If it is a human (and I believe it is) then it has human rights. I do not believe that it is necessary that a woman's life be ruined by rape, even if it results in pregnancy. You seem to take it for granted that it always will and that the child's life will also be ruined. But is killing the child any remedy? I don't deny that a woman, pregnant as the result of rape, will be very likely have the reaction toward the fetus that you describe. But does this attitude really make sense? Again, why is the child to be killed because of what a rapist has done. Do we impute the guilt for the rape to it? For example, suppose a woman with a 2 year old boy has a husband (the father) who has turned wife beater. He gets drunk, beats her terribly and regularly until he finally just walks out on her and their son. Suppose then that the woman's reaction is to take her hatred for the man out on the boy. The boy is a constant reminder of the man who has beat her. Why should she be "forced" to raise the child of a wife beater? She thinks that the man hs ruined her life by beating her and leaving her with the burden of raising his child, who she finds very hard to love. Now, I admit that his analogy is not perfect. The fetus is more easily associated with the rape than the child with the beatings. But I think that in both cases the association is completely unjustified. We would say that the woman is wrong to take punish the child for her beatings (no matter how severe). Why, then is she justified in killing her unborn child because of rape. Is the child evil because it's father is a rapist? I agree that a woman in this situation needs plenty of understanding and help to recover from the horrible experience of rape. But I think this help should include helping the woman realize that the child in her womb is in no way responsible for the crime of its father, just as we would do in the case of the woman who was beaten by her husband. It entails a greater commitment on the part of those who would help the woman. But that is what is required if we really love and care for both the woman and the child. Punish the rapist for his crime, not the child. Respectfully, Paul Dubuc
ajs@hpfcla.UUCP (03/11/84)
Sheesh. Fetuses have umbilical cords; children do not. Fetuses do not breath; children do. As long as you (plural) insist on calling fetuses "unborn children", you will be blind to both the facts of the situation and the feelings of others. If you consider yourself open-minded and respectful of others (as one author signed himself, "respectfully yours"), please desist from using presumptive, prejudicial, and, yes, even irritating phrases like that. Thanks, Alan Silverstein PS: No one is perfect; correct me if I do the same in reverse.