"Planning Ahead" for Rape

[zeitgeistic.livejournal.com]

TRIGGER WARNING for rape and incest.

Kansas State Rep. Pete DeGraaf likens rape to a getting a flat tire.

I recently came across a CNN article noting that earlier this month, DeGraaf suggested women prepare for rape the same way he prepares for a flat tire by carrying a spare. This is in response to a question on abortions for pregnancies resulting from rape or incest. I'll quote below because LZ Granderson says it better than I can at 11:50 at night.

Earlier this month, Kansas State Rep. Pete DeGraaf made some rather outlandish comments during a debate centered on banning insurance companies in Kansas from offering abortion coverage as part of their general health plans unless a woman's life were at risk. The bill, which the governor signed into law last week, would require a woman to carry a separate policy for abortions. When Rep. Barbara Bollier voiced concern for women who may become pregnant as a result of rape or incest, this exchange followed:

DeGraaf: "We do need to plan ahead, don't we, in life?"

Bollier: "And so women need to plan ahead for issues that they have no control over with pregnancy?"

DeGraaf: "I have a spare tire on my car."

"I also have life insurance," he added. "I have a lot of things that I plan ahead for."

I don't know about you guys, but I don't change my tire if it isn't flat, so this metaphor, which seems to be in favor of reactive actions, not proactive "rape protection" (whatever that is), falls flat. Maybe his idea of "changing the tire" is hoping real hard? How do you plan ahead for rape?

_{(First time posting)}


SOURCE: full text here

ETA: I realized that I linked the wrong article to this post. The article I cited from is THIS ONE. The other link is just a different article on the same comment.

Comments

[paedraggaidin.livejournal.com]

Even in my former home, not known for the tact of its state politicians, the reaction has been universal horror at his remarks. Plus he's from Mulvane, arguably Wichita's most white-bread, ultra-conservative suburb where people go because they don't like to risk having brown skinned/Catholic/immigrant/poor neighbors. (I'm not exaggerating...I have relatives there and I know the place too well.)

Between this idiot, Fred Phelps, and Scott Roeder, it's a no wonder we've become an international joke. *sigh*

[blue-mangos.livejournal.com]

That's the only redeeming part of this story, that he has gotten such overwhelming criticism for his remarks.

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

Sadly you've now initiated the Abortion Drinking Game. Every time you comment on one of these posts you have to take a drink. Every time you post on your journal 'OMG, not another LJ abortion post!' you have to take a drink.

And you don't drink alcohol, tragic.

[mrbogey.livejournal.com]

Why are you so sexist?

Not one man in this community has made a comment about women being stubborn or dumb because they're women yet you have stated thus several times.

[bex.livejournal.com]

I think there are lots of men in this comm who are totally sympathetic to this kind of issue. I think there are probably equal numbers of men and women who might agree with this guy.

Gender is not a unifying mind-meld that makes all members of that gender feel similarly about certain issues.

[sealwhiskers.livejournal.com]

Again with this? Surely there must be a better way to discuss this topic.

[harry-beast.livejournal.com]

Your attempt to stir up sh*t serves only to distract attention from the point under discussion. It is unfortunate that you don't take this issue more seriously.

[policraticus.livejournal.com]

Why aren't you making me a sandwich?

[nano-muse.livejournal.com]

The upcoming shitfest which you started.

I know that a lot of men are horrifically unsympathetic and downright hostile about rape, both in general (insert joke about these types of guys all being rampant rapists themselves*) and those hostile to rape as an actual discussion topic (take it from a girl with a relatively feminist father who doesn't seem to think rape exists until I want to go to a party hosted by people with lower GPA's than mine).

That said, it's bullshit to call or even imply all men are sexist and/or unsympathetic to rape, and then whine about the shitfest that comes after it.

* = I'm too tired to come up with a snarky joke here so just go with it

[zeitgeistic.livejournal.com]

I like to be optimistic. :)

I may not have done a good job with this post, however. I should have clarified that I was more concerned over the notion that rape is apparently so expected that I need insurance for its consequences, but the comment count is so high now that I don't think it makes a difference now.

[hikarugenji.livejournal.com]

You have encountered *women* who have these sorts of views too, haven't you? I've definitely seen conservative and/or fundamentalist women take the same pro-life, "if you're not a slut it's not an issue" standpoint. Of course you can argue that they're socialized products of a male-dominated system, but that's true to a certain extent of the men as well.

Abortion is an issue that I've never seen as dividing neatly on gender lines.

[bex.livejournal.com]

It's disgusting, as are so many statements made lately. I'm sure there will be people in this thread saying women should take martial arts, carry a weapon, wear conservative clothing and, I don't know, wear a plate-armor chastity belt or something just to prove they're really, really not asking for it, cross my heart!

One thing that really pisses me off, though, is the bluster over this "What about rape and incest?!" argument. I wish people would stop using it. Either abortion is a legitimate medical option that is available to all women, or it's not and shouldn't be available to anyone. Using rape and incest victims as sympathy-getting objects to win the abortion debate is just... so very wrong. Rape and incest victims account for a tiny fraction of the number of abortions performed every year, anyway, so legalizing abortion for these cases only really won't be of much benefit.

We need to break away from this "rape and incest" argument. Pro-lifers shouldn't use it because if it's about saving the baby's life, it shouldn't matter how the baby was conceived. Pro-choicers shouldn't use it because if it's about women's rights, it shouldn't matter if she's a victim of rape/incest or not. It makes no damn sense for either side to be fussing over this issue - it's just a ploy to make people look alternately more or less compassionate on the political stage.

/rant

[mrbogey.livejournal.com]

Some people refuse to take a life. Others will take a life at a lower threshold. Some people don't see it as a life. We're not talking about a binary morality here.

'Pro-lifers shouldn't use it because if it's about saving the baby's life, it shouldn't matter how the baby was conceived. '

Some argue exactly that.

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

Sadly this is the sort of distorted logic that comes from having to support no-abortion policies. Instead of dealing with the real problems caused by rape or incest, stupid, knee-jerk comments like this get made.

The problem is trying to legislate Bronze Age morality into the modern world. It only flies if one accepts certain premises like women are inferior beings. If men were the ones to get pregnant, abortion would not only be legal everywhere but would be convenient and fully covered by insurance plans.

[zeitgeistic.livejournal.com]

I try to be optimistic about women's rights, but sometimes I wonder if what you said (If men were the ones to get pregnant, abortion would not only be legal everywhere but would be convenient and fully covered by insurance plans) isn't true after all.

I don't really understand why anyone would think women should need to carry rape insurance. It shouldn't be so expected in society that we will get raped that we need to carry insurance for the repercussions.

*stabstabstabstab*

[squidb0i.livejournal.com]

One guess as to his party affiliation.

Re: *stabstabstabstab*

[telemann.livejournal.com]

R. (http://www.kslegislature.org/li/b2011_12/year1/members/rep_degraaf_peter_1/)

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

It seems to me that the fundamental miscommunication going on here is what insurance is for. If you go to the original news article that is cited in your linked article (http://www.kwch.com/news/kwch-dmh-news-lawmakers-comments-about-rape-insurance-anger-womens-rights-groups-20110525,0,3331742.story), at the very end is a quote by Ms. Rinker that is very telling. She thinks that she's making a profound counter-argument, but is actually missing that people do get murder insurance every day. It's called life insurance. The whole point of insurance is to get some compensation in the event of an unlikely and/or catastrophic happenstance.

The main problem going on here is that our health care system is so tied up with medical insurance that it's turned it into merely a payment plan and not actually insurance while still calling it insurance and so people don't seem to understand what insurance is any more. And thus we get the silliness that started this whole thing, namely, the gov't trying to decide what should be covered by the payment plan system.

[new-wave-witch.livejournal.com]

I don't think life insurance is analogous with "murder insurance". Life insurance helps your family in the event of your death, it doesn't help YOU deal with the after effects of your murder. I read the statement you take exception with as to say that most people do not feel they need to be prepared for violent crimes such as rape or murder. I mean, how many people have life insurance? What age groups? What healthy 20 something, who may or may not be able to afford it, would think that life insurance is something they need at that point in their lives?

Medical insurance is not parenthood insurance. DeGraaf is trying to diminish the after effects of a pregnancy-causing rape into terms he can compare with himself, when that is ~impossible~.

[kylinrouge.livejournal.com]

Didn't we have this topic already? Also, the article is from a month ago.

[zeitgeistic.livejournal.com]

We might have. I scrolled back through the posts to the date this article was published, and didn't see anything resembling it, however, I've only been lurking in this community for a week, so if it was posted and deleted, I wouldn't know.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

Eh, it's typical of the party that votes against puppies and apple pie. The GOP's turning into Saturday Morning cartoon villains of the Ineffectual Unsympathetic sort these days.

psst

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

FYI your voting against puppies and apple pie thing is starting to lose it's punch. Perhaps start rationing it, it's too good to die a death of overuse :)

[reflaxion.livejournal.com]

To be fair, carrying a tire iron around with you is a good way to prepare for both flat tires and attempted rape.

Seriously though, I think a comment like this can only be met with universal shock and horror. I'm personally horrified that a guy like this somehow got ELECTED, by OTHER PEOPLE.

[zeitgeistic.livejournal.com]

I believe it was met with shock and horror by local people; what was mentioned in the article, and what shocked me, was how long ago it was said, and that I hadn't read anything about it any of my usual news haunts. It's pretty easy for people like that to get elected when people ignore/don't hear about the ignorant and insensitive things they do.

[auntiesiannan.livejournal.com]

Maybe we can send him some anal dilators so he, too, can be prepared for rape.

[zeitgeistic.livejournal.com]

The 'prepare for rape' notion was what concerned me most, too. Unfortunately, I didn't clarify that in my original post.

[eracerhead.livejournal.com]

This is the quandry the alleged pro-life people find themselves in. If every life is sacred, then to be true to one's beliefs, the conditions under which any particular life is created do not matter. That life must be protected. This means of course, that a woman must carry to term her rapist's baby or her step-father's baby just as much as those she was willing to conceive.

This doesn't play well with the general public, so in order to salvage what they can out of their base beliefs they add the qualifier "except in cases of rape or incest." But what does that say? It says that all life is not sacred. Some lives are more valuable than others, the progeny of the rapist can be killed.

Unfortunately (for them) that still doesn't work, because now they are making the implicit statement that the intention of the mother is a factor in whether or not she can terminate her pregnancy. The argument is now abortion is OK as long as the woman did not willingly have sex, which has nothing to do with the value of life, and everything to do with behavior modification.

Once you go down the path of making exceptions to the sanctity of life, you end up in a situation where intention is a factor. If intention is a factor then why isn't it OK to terminate the pregnancy because you did not intend to get pregnant? Is it because you're a slut and so therefore you deserved it?

I actually have to admire Pete DeGraaf for recognizing this and sticking to his base principles. If you are "pro-life" you are stuck with having a distasteful opinion either way.

[zeitgeistic.livejournal.com]

Thank you. :)

I prepare for rape...

[sophia-sadek.livejournal.com]

In order to avoid rape, I carry a tire iron with me. It seems to keep the wolves at bay. It is also less expensive than insurance. Sure, it is a tad heavy, but it helps to exercise my arms.

On a more serious note, I forgive the guy because he is a clueless moron with no sympathy for women.

[the-rukh.livejournal.com]

He said that in 2008, kind of weird to bring it up out of the blue.

What is weirder- on the phone he says "People wouldn't need this kind of coverage if people weren't predisposed to killing their own children"

I have to think that is way worse than what he said here.

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

What the WHAT?