Think The Stupak Amendment Is Bad Now? It Could Have Been Worse

"Stupak amendment"--that would have limited the government's ability to include abortions in benefits plans to cases of incest, life of the mother, and forcible rape.

Forcible rape? All this time I thought it was redundant to call it that way. Deplorable.

As opposed to all those consensual rapes????

Was Stupak suggesting that date-rape, marital rape, impaired consent and coerced consent wouldn't be "forcible" enough for his standards?

I think the "forcible" distinction might relate to statutory rape and/or situations in which a woman is legally raped but not by force. That is, consent is either never given or withdrawn during the act, but the act continues. Even if no force was used, that's still rape. Moreover, instances in which the woman is unable to offer consent due to a state of impairment (intoxicated, voluntarily or otherwise) might be deemed rape but not forcible rape.

I might be way off with my interpretation here, but I think the distinction plays on both the she-asked-for-it school of thought and a backlash against a perceived expansion of the definition of rape that puts an undue burden on men.

Most Health Insurance policies will cover the cost of a vasectomy. Shouldn't this also be removed from all health insurance policies by federal law - the same way the Stupak amendment does for abortions? Why is a woman forced to have a baby, and yet men still aren't being forced to impregnate the women they have sex with? In the Roman Catholic Church, it is as sinful for a man to snuff out a potential life as it is for a woman to snuff it out. So why hasn't the Catholic Church pushed as hard for a vasectomy amendment? Is it because the church is run by men who often have illicit affairs with women (and little boys)?

“It's very telling that with all this talk about how pro-choice women can't be stubborn about their little needs, there is nobody out there complaining that Stupak and his crowd are making the Perfect the Enemy of the Good. He and the other "pro-life" Democrats are commonly and without criticism portrayed as voting for their principles, as if they have no choice in the matter. (Indeed, the whole argument over funding is defined by the fact that "pro-life" advocates apparently cannot be forced to pay taxes for something that goes against their principles.

Apparently some principles are just more important than others.” – Digby

Let's not forget that just a couple of months ago, the Catholic Church in Brazil tried - very loudly and publicly - to prevent an abortion from being performed on a 9-year-old girl who had become pregnant after being raped by her father since the age of six. Needless to say, had she actually given birth at that age, it would have certainly caused her serious injury and likely killed her as well. The church's response afterward was to excommunicate all the doctors involved, but NOT the father, because of course he had confessed and been forgiven.

That's the kind of mentality we're dealing with here.

Zack Space is from Ohio, not Indiana.