Letters to the Editor

In the debate over the new abortion bill, a senator found fault with the people who don't want to fund abortions for victims of rape and incest. I believe his exact words were, "How can we force these victims to bear the children of the monsters who attacked them?"

First of all, it isn't as if we're talking about inseminating rape and incest victims. It is their attackers who forced them to bear children. We're just saying we shouldn't pay to kill the children in question.

Second, and more important, is the sexism of the senator's attitude. Are women just the soil in which a man may plant his seed? Isn't it her baby too? Just because a woman has been raped doesn't mean she isn't a mother. For this senator to refer to the baby as "the rapist's child" dismisses the woman as an object. But it was seeing the woman as just an object that allowed the attack in the first place. Perhaps that is where the good senator found common ground with the rapist.

Funding abortion for rape and incest victims is condescending. It says that women are weak, timid, fragile items that must be washed out if touched by unclean hands. Doesn't the woman's courage, integrity, and worth offset the one evil act by a man? We need to stand beside these women, not belittle them. And whether the child brings joy to her or to the lives of an adoptive family, she will always know that she was better, stronger, and more just than her attacker. We owe these women nothing less.

To support their position, abortion advocates tell the story of a 13-year-old, pregnant through incest, whose father shot her dead in her bed when he learned of her abortion plans.

Abortion advocates use this sad incident to argue in favor of doing on-the-spot abortions for incest victims.

They ignore the fact that it was the 13-year-old's ability to arrange an abortion that led to her death.

If abortion clinics were required to report child abuse, the way real doctors are, the girl would have been immediately removed from her abusive family. Her father would have been put in jail. She would still be alive today.

Instead, the abuse was ignored. The girl's abortion was scheduled and she was returned to her abusive father. He committed the ultimate child abuse.

This girl's death is not an argument against parental notification for abortion--it is an argument in favor of requiring abortion clinics to behave like legitimate medical providers. She is not the only incest victim that abortion clinics have returned to their abusers. How many more girls like her have to suffer and perhaps die at the hands of their abusers before this country wakes up and realizes that abortionists are not compassionate health-care providers; they are vultures preying on weak and miserable victims like this one. They're still using her, even in her death. They ought to be ashamed.

There has been a lot of hysteria over a proposed requirement that rape be reported within seven days to get a state-funded abortion. Teary-eyed abortion profiteers have told stories of women they would be "utterly unable to help, since so many women are afraid to report a rape."

They may be afraid to report real rapes, but we know that pro-choice women have no qualms about reporting fake rapes if it will facilitate an abortion. When states fund abortions for rape, abortion facilities report a surge in the number of rape pregnancies they abort. Obviously, this isn't due to some twisted compassion on the part of rapists--

that they are less likely to rape if they fear their victims can't get free abortions. It is because abortion mills are creative about getting as much tax money as possible into their cash registers. The largest abortionists' guild, the National Abortion Federation, requires little of its members beyond a pledge to secure every possible tax dollar.

One pro-abortion handbook recounts stories of pre-Roe abortions secured by faking rape to get around the laws. It also coaches the post-Roe woman on how to report fake rapes. Roe v. Wade itself was based on the lie that Norma McCorvey (aka Roe) was pregnant by rape when in fact she later admitted that she wasn't.

Some people think I am calling women liars. I'm not. I'm calling rabid abortion supporters liars. Their movement was founded on and is perpetuated by lies. We have no reason to trust them now.

Pro-choicers have gone ballistic over the proposed requirement that rape be reported within seven days to get a state-funded abortion. Teary-eyed abortion profiteers have told stories of women they would be "utterly unable to help, since so many women are afraid to report a rape."

If they are so gung-ho about inflicting the trauma of an abortion on a woman who is already traumatized by rape, let them set up a Rape Fund. Their real motive for opposing the rape reporting requirement is financial.

When abortions are funded for non-reported rapes, suddenly the mills report a surge in the number of rape pregnancies they abort.

Let's assume that abortionists are honest. That would mean that the number of women pregnant through rape is directly related to how easily rape victims can get free abortions. Perhaps rapists have some twisted sense of compassion. They are, according to abortionists, less likely to rape a woman if they fear she will be unable to get a free abortion.

Wouldn't this be an argument against paying for abortions for rape victims? These numbers certainly indicate that restricting funding for abortion prevents rape.

Of course, the numbers don't reflect the number of rapes. They reflect how easy it is for the abortionist to lie to get your tax money.

Let the pro-choicers be fleeced if they want to be. Women who want to lie to get free abortions can lie to pro-choicers, not to the taxpayers. Women pregnant through rape deserve better than abortion anyway.

A pro-abortion man demanded, "Why should a woman who's been the victim of rape or incest have to bear her assailant's child?"

What a patriarchal, sexist thing to say! Is the woman just the ground into which the man places his seed?

It is bad enough that a rapist can invade a woman's body. It is adding insult to injury for people to claim that this somehow makes her unfit to be a mother to her own child. And the child is hers, just as much as if she had consented to the act that led to conception.

Women are not just receptacles for whatever men put into them. We need to get rid of that archaic notion. And a good place to start is to get rid of this idea that the woman pregnant through rape or incest has been contaminated and needs to be purified by abortion. The child is still her child.

The debate over the proposed abortion bill is leading down the same old rabbit trail--abortions for rape or incest.

A common response from pro-lifers is to say how few abortions are due to rape or incest. This is a point that needs to be made. However, the rape question also feeds a fear that people already have in their minds: "What if our daughter is raped? What if my sister is raped? What if I'm raped?"

We need to do all we can to help the woman who is pregnant through rape. What does she need? Before we can answer that, we need to examine what her specific problems are.

Researchers say that women feel dirty, helpless, and insecure after having been raped. They experience shame or guilt, as if they were somehow responsible. They feel violated, and may feel anger and rage toward men. And perhaps most important, they suffer from very low self-esteem. But almost never will you hear it said that pregnancy is the primary problem. There are many, many examples of women who say that they have at least learned to accept and live with the fact that they have been raped. However, many who had abortions say they will never be able to accept the fact that they killed their own baby. Through abortion she becomes not only a victim of someone else's actions, but of her own as well.

Let's not victimize the rape victim twice. She needs love, not abortion.

The debate over the proposed abortion bill is leading down the same old rabbit trail--abortions for rape or incest.

Once the rape victim is able to deal with the feelings of shame and guilt, of feeling dirty, the anger, the rage, the feeling of helplessness, of low self-esteem, she seldom views the child as another bad thing that happened because of the rape. She often comes to see the child as the only good thing that came out of an otherwise horrible experience. If she decides to keep the child, that will certainly be the case for her, and if she decides to place it for adoption, it will be the case for someone who might not be able to have children otherwise.

Now, there is no way to deny that there will be some women who see the child as a curse. That attitude almost always changes during the pregnancy, but it might not. And while that's certainly understandable, they need to realize that placing the baby for adoption will mean the "curse" will last for a few months, whereas aborting it will be something that could haunt them forever. They need to understand that abortion, regardless of the circumstances, never results in fewer victims, but more. I personally think it degrades women, and trivializes their problems, when we say that one of the most horrifying experiences she may ever suffer can even be partially addressed with a "quick-fix" trip to the abortionist.

The debate over the proposed abortion bill is leading down the same old rabbit trail--abortions for rape or incest.

I believe most people who want to allow abortion in these cases are motivated by compassion. Their hearts go out to the victim, and they want to help in any way possible. Most of them agree that when an unwanted pregnancy occurs because of freely chosen sexual activity, abortion should not be allowed. Having free will about having sex eliminates abortion as a morally acceptable option. They also understand that rape means a man has unilaterally made that decision, carrying it out violently upon an unwilling participant. This lack of free will on the woman's part causes some people to feel that rape can justify abortion. They believe allowing abortion somehow returns decision-making ability to the woman. However, while their motives are admirable, their reasoning is flawed.

Unfortunately, when a rapist deprives someone of her right to decide whether or not to have sex, he takes from her something neither the law, nor society, nor any individual has the power to give back.

We can enact laws that punish those who commit such hideous acts. But we can't pass laws that will return to the rape victim what the rapist stole. There is simply no basis for the contention that allowing a woman to inflict violence upon her child can erase the violence that was done to her.

It's true that two wrongs can't make a right.

The debate over the abortion bill is leading down the same old rabbit trail--abortions for rape or incest.

Volumes have been written about the impact of abortion on the rape victim. As for incest, I can understand those who feel this is such a nightmare for a young girl to endure that abortion should be allowed. But we must be realistic.

What the criminal has taken, we are powerless to restore. This is tragic but true. An abortion won't restore her virginity. It won't erase the memories and the enduring humiliation and shame. We can never put things back the way they were before the crime.

But although she has lost her innocence, she has not become guilty. She has been the victim, not the perpetrator. Abortion will change that. Her child's blood will be on her heart for the rest of her life. Though her assailant took her innocence, she took her child's life. And in her heart, she knows that no matter how tragic her circumstances, this is still the greater crime.

You can't wipe out the irrational guilt and shame of being an incest victim by overshadowing it with the real guilt and shame of being a child-killer.

The incest victim needs help to rise above the abuse, to prove to herself that she is a better person than her attacker. Giving her child life, giving a child to a loving adoptive family, can be the help she needs.

Are we brave enough to offer it?

The debate over the abortion bill is leading down the same old rabbit trail--abortions for rape or incest.

Although everyone's heart goes out to the women and girls victimized by rape or incest, there is someone who almost always gets forgotten--the child.

An unborn child is no less a child if she came into being through deplorable circumstances. It is indefensible to say that unborn children deserve the death penalty for the crimes of their fathers.

If we ever establish that the legal protection afforded unborn children can differ based on the circumstances of their conception, there is no reason this discrimination should end at birth. If we can say that an unborn child conceived through rape is less valuable than one conceived in love, we can say that same thing about a five-year-old.

If a drunk driver runs over a child, are we going to give him a lesser sentence if we find out the child was conceived through rape? If a mother kills her two-year-old, who would buy the defense that the child was conceived through rape, and therefore not entitled to legal protection?

To argue that children, born or unborn, find their right to life in who their fathers are points out exactly how evil and morally bankrupt the whole idea of legalized abortion is. There is no way any society can claim it has respect for life while saying it's permissible to execute someone whose only "crime" is that their fathers were criminals.

I am surprised at our senator for supporting the new bill allowing state funding of abortion for victims of rape or incest.

Since when do we kill family members of criminals? That sounds like the Mafia, not American justice!

It is no more fair to kill a child because his father is a rapist than it would be to execute the rapists' parents, brothers, and sisters. In fact, it would almost make sense to execute the rapists' parents, since they raised him, if you're going to go that route.

The truth is, we don't punish people for crimes their relatives commit. I see no reason to make an exception for the children of rapists.

I am surprised at our senator for supporting the new bill allowing state funding of abortion for victims of rape or incest.

The child didn't commit the crime. To kill him for the crime his father committed is giving a stiffer sentence to an innocent bystander than to the perpetrator. Is that what America stands for?

The debate over the abortion bill is leading down the same old rabbit trail--abortions for rape or incest.

Volumes have been written about the impact of abortion on the rape victim. As for incest, I can understand those who feel this is such a nightmare for a young girl to endure that abortion should be allowed. But we must be realistic.

Allowing an incest victim to obtain an abortion is like a physician treating a patient's symptoms, while ignoring the disease.

When a young girl is pregnant by her father, the disease is not the pregnancy, it is that her father is forcing himself upon her. The pregnancy is one of the many symptoms, and treating it simply ensures that the disease will continue.

When we allow abortions on girls pregnant by their fathers, we are protecting the father, not the daughter. The most effective protection for anyone who commits a crime is secrecy. You can be sure that when a man commits a crime as despicable as incest, he wants as few people to know about it as possible. His daughter's abortion not only destroys a human life, it also eliminates the primary physical evidence of his crime. It makes it easier for him to continue doing what he's doing. It seems to me that we should be protecting the victims of crime, not the perpetrators of them.

The debate over the abortion bill is leading down the same old rabbit trail--abortions for rape or incest.

It's interesting how abortion proponents deal with this topic. Whenever a legislature considers limits on abortion, these people trot out stories of rape and incest victims. But when pro-lifers offer to compromise and allow abortion for these cases, suddenly the issue is no longer abortion for rape and incest victims, it's unfettered abortion for all. In other words, they never cared about rape or incest victims in the first place, they just wanted to exploit their misery to protect abortion-industry profits!

If you don't believe me, ask them. Ask them why they constantly talk about rape and incest, but then oppose legislation that would prohibit abortion except in those cases. Ask why they began their campaign for legalized abortion with the lie that it would only be used for the so-called "hard cases."

Of course, they will say some proposed bills would punish women for lying about being raped, and that this was unnecessary because women don't lie about being raped. What about Norma McCorvey, the Roe of Roe v. Wade? McCorvey claimed she was gang-raped by some carnival workers and became pregnant. The one thing about this case which these people never want to discuss is the fact that McCorvey has since admitted she lied. She was not raped! In other words, legalized abortion started with a lie, and it continues today with the aid of lies.

The proposed abortion legislation says, in part, that if a woman wants an abortion because she was raped, she has to report the attack to the police within seven days. Abortionists argue that this is "too restrictive." However, rape counselors and other experts say the best thing women can do to reduce the incidence of rape is to immediately report all such attacks. Police departments say one of their biggest problems in combatting rape is that most go unreported, or they're reported too long after they occur. With each day a victim delays reporting the assault, the rapist's chances of being caught are less, and the chances of conviction even smaller. In short, waiting to report rapes only serves one person--the rapist.

So we have legislation containing a component which is the best thing women can do to combat rape, being rejected by people who claim to be looking out for the welfare of women! Obviously these abortion fanatics couldn't care less about women. Their interest is in abortion-industry profits.

If you think about it for a minute, we really need some sort of "quick-reporting" legislation, regardless of the legal status of abortion. In fact, I suspect some of these abortion advocates might even support a stand-alone bill to encourage women to report rapes promptly, but since it's part of an abortion bill, they won't. In other words, they might support legislation to protect women--as long as it doesn't hurt the abortion industry.

Abortion proponents have accused pro-lifers of not believing our own rhetoric because pro-lifers sometimes agree to legislation that would allow abortions for rape and incest victims.

These abortion enthusiasts are obviously trying to make us appear hypocritical by forcing us to defend legislation that would allow some babies to be killed, when we've been saying all along that all human life deserves protection.

I make no secret of the fact that I would love to protect every child in the country from abortionists. But I also know that politics is the art of the possible. Today, the political reality is that it's not always possible to keep people from killing all the babies, so we'll try to keep them from killing as many of them as we can. Now, if abortion advocates think that's inconsistent, or unfair--or whatever else they might think--then they should introduce legislation that protects all the babies, and we'll support it all the way!

In the meantime, I'm not going to let them get away with criticizing any pro-lifers for trying to stop whatever part of the bloodshed we can. It is the ultimate hypocrisy to suggest that we are compromising our position because we can't stop all the killing, when abortion advocates' accomplices are the ones doing the killing! The unmitigated gall of even bringing the subject up says more about the pro-abortion mentality than anything I could possibly say.

To hear abortion advocates speak, every pregnant woman is poised on death's threshold, with only legal abortion to stave off the Grim Reaper.

That's odd. As far back as 1967, Planned Parenthood's Alan Guttmacher said, "Today it is possible for almost any patient to be brought through pregnancy alive, unless she suffers from a fatal illness such as cancer or leukemia, and if so, abortion would be unlikely to prolong, much less save life." So in 1967, even the sickly woman could be expected to survive pregnancy and childbirth. But today's abortion supporters make it sound as if Death lurks in the labor room, ready to claim even the most robustly healthy woman if her doctor diverts his attention for even a nanosecond.

I'd like to know when pregnancy suddenly became so dangerous. Was it when legal abortion became so profitable?

Abortion fanatics sometimes accuse pro-lifers of being heartless in "denying an abortion to a girl who has been a victim of incest."

These fanatics seem to be assuming that abortion is something good, something the incest victim desperately wants. To the contrary. By allowing abortions for incest pregnancies, we are telling the girl that the real crime isn't that her father is raping her, but that he got her pregnant. We are telling her that she should hide the evidence of the crime and not bother us with her problems.

Is this helping her? I don't think so.

Abortion supporters usually try to defend legalized abortion by painting a picture of women pregnant through rape, women with life-threatening health problems, and women faced with the birth of a handicapped child.

Why is it that these abortion enthusiasts use these "hard cases" to justify the 93 percent of abortions that are done just for birth control?

If their concern really was for women in dire circumstances, they'd be willing to limit abortion to those dire circumstances. But they aren't willing to limit abortion in this way, so clearly they are using our sympathy for these women to cover up the behavior of women who have abortions for the most common reason: they don't want to be pregnant.

Be honest, abortion supporters.