Jaysus effin' Christ!! Santorum on abortion due to rape

[Shell B]

Deflection is cheap.

What does that even mean, alei? What am I deflecting? It helps your argument if I think women should be forced to carry a baby. Since that is never what I said, I could say strawmen are cheap.

Of course it is.

Yeah, it is irrelevant. You want to bring up the fact that I have never carried a baby as if it is some sort of defect in my personality. It just so happens that I have raised a child for most of his life instead of a woman who is perfectly capable of having children, just not capable of raising them. Guess what my ex-husband did? He raised his son without the help of his biological mother. He must of have had devious reasons, right? No father could just want to have their kid?

I consider myself an expert on the topic of women's reproductive rights.

The problem with this is that there are very few of what you would call "reproductive rights." There are plenty of parental rights, though.

There is a reason the father has no rights to an unborn, and isn't even given the luxury of any sort of discussion about the fate of a fetus.

By law. In a healthy relationship, he is given discussion. I never had a pregnancy scare where I didn't ask the potential father what he would want to do, should I be pregnant.

The main reason is there is no way to prove the paternity of the fetus before 10 weeks, and even that requires a pretty risky procedure called an amniocentesis.

Now you are venturing into the world of proving who the father is. When I say, "Regardless of whether the two parties know if the man is the father, they should talk about the fate of the fetus." this will be relevant.

There are risks to both mother and fetus with that, as well. I've had one of them done, for a different reason, and it was not pleasant.

This isn't a cornfield.

The father can have an opinion all he wants, but it doesn't matter because it's not his body.

Haha, so when a woman expects a man to work the rest of his life for a child he wanted aborted, that's okay. It's his body too. Do you realize that stress causes more disease than childbirth? The stress on his body from working harder to pay exorbitant child support is beyond consideration, but . . .

So because they're just potential side effects it's no big deal?

Yep. I said that. Listen, you can't throw out a fucking textbook full of "side effects" and present them as what happens to a woman when she has a baby when a number of those are as rare as having a baby with two heads.

No such thing as a woman who carries a baby to term and doesn't suffer permanent damage.

Sure . . .

I don't know what kind of dream world you're living in, but every woman has, at the very least her hips displaced from their natural position. They never go back.

That is natural! Women are made to do just that. Furthermore, that is not true. A woman's hips naturally open up with absolutely no harm done, assuming she has a good delivery.

I can also assure you that pushing out a baby you didn't want because the father wants it does , and will cause permanent damage.

This is where there is a disconnect, alei. A woman using sound logic will realize she is not keeping the baby. She can have the baby and go about her business. A number of women do this already. It is called adoption. They don't want to have abortions, so they have the baby and give it up. An abortion is traumatic too, so perhaps this is not the best argument.

It's a slippery slope from allowing fathers to be in on the "discussion", and forcing women to adhere to their stated wishes in those discussions.

No it isn't. There is a huge difference between a woman having to consider the feelings of the father and a woman being forced to have a baby.

Why are you being a bitch?

Alei, you are bombarding me with straw men and seriously fucked up biases on human males. I can't help if you do not like my opinion. However, I don't live in a world where all men are penis-slinging drunks who get women knocked up and bail.

I was trying to explain to you why men don't get a say on the matter. If you think the majority of those sperm donors aren't pieces of shit, you're jaded beyond belief.

I don't know where you live, but I have to assume it's the armpit of child-rearing at this point.

I know you're married to your poorly informed opinion, but I was trying to shed some light from an insider's point-of-view. Excuse the fucking hell outta me.

Again, strawmen don't help. You can relax. Just because my opinion doesn't suit the world of Christian babies being forced to abort by their parents and sperm donor boyfriends that you live in, does not mean my opinion is poorly formed. You ever stop to think about the fact that most of those "girls" (because they're all girls, right?) have boyfriends that do not want the child? Yeah, I'm talking about ones that do want the child. As rare as that might be, it bears consideration. Your experience is not in talking with fathers. My experience is raising a child with a damn good one, being raised by a damn good one, both of whom would have deserved a say.

And I told you why that was a load of stinking bullshit.

Yeah, but you backed it up with an army of strawmen and irrelevant arguments. We're talking about dads who want their kids.

If he's willing to be so wonderfully kind as to allow her to sign over her rights because he wants to keep the child??? Oh that makes it sooo much better!

Actually, that is wonderfully kind. Don't you think it is pretty great that someone else is raising your kid for you? You didn't have to have an abortion because someone else was nice enough to take up the slack that you couldn't handle. I have done that myself, so I know there is more sacrifice in giving your entire life to a child that is not yours than there is in having some hours of pain and stretch marks that might make you feel bad. Disclaimer: I think you did the right thing. That's not an insult, but merely a light being shown on the kind act that is raising a child someone else did not want.

If she is willing to do that, then it's all good, but you're still not getting the point, obviously.

It's not that I don't get the points you're making. It is that you are making points that have nothing to do with my argument. My initial statement was that I never heard Adrian be "pro-life." I have heard him be pro father's rights. I'm not pro-life, but you are coming at me like I am.

That statement is actually pretty gross. If I didn't know better, I would think you were a male chauvinist, like mehmet or something.

Oh, goody. More histrionics. You mean the statement that I didn't make? The one that you are playing out this argument pretending I had? That statement? Yeah, it tastes pretty gross when you put it in my mouth.

What part of she doesn't want to be pregnant and have the baby don't you get?

Wait, we're talking about a specific person? Yeah, alei, you can't speak for every pregnant woman and you can't pigeonhole my argument to suit one brand of pregnant woman. Again, some women do have babies and give them up for adoption. If she is aborting it because she cannot afford it, we have a different debate, don't we?

When men can get pregnant, they can make their own decisions about what happens to their body.

Until then, they shouldn't have to pay for children they don't want? It's their body that has to bust ass forever.

An extremist? I didn't say you said you want 12 year olds to carry their rapist's babies. I said it was a stupid fucking idea to allow the fathers of fetuses to make decisions about someone else's body. It is a stupid, stupid idea.

Then why have couples been doing just that for longer than either of us have been alive? He's not making a decision about what she does with her body. He is giving her another option. What about that is distasteful? You would prefer a woman to get an abortion than deliver a baby into a loving family?

He may be free to express his opinion, but he doesn't, and shouldn't have any right to enforce it. Whether it be that she wants to keep the baby, or abort it. He has no official say for reasons.

Yep, and when she decides to have the baby he doesn't want, he gets fucked for life. Sounds fair.

Nope. What I was saying is that men don't have to do a damn thing to become a father.

That's malarkey. It takes two to conceive. When my mother was pregnant, my father supported her, made sure she had insurance, got her to her appointments, etc. You can bet if he didn't, she wouldn't have had much to do with him.

I was saying that men don't have a say because it's the woman who has to endure the physical traumas associated with pregnancy.

Men do have a say in healthy scenarios. It happens all the time. A couple decides to have a baby. A fucking couple.

He can drink beer. Not that he would drink beer. She can't, but what if she did? What a horrible person that bitch would be.

Actually, yeah. Anyway, that is not what you said. You painted all men as beer-swilling, ball-scratching neanderthals and acted as if a uterus is the key to brains and goodness.

She's an alcoholic who doesn't want to stop drinking, so she wants to have an abortion, but the father wants the baby. Does he want a baby with fetal alcohol syndrome?

More nonsense.

He doesn't have to change his entire life when he doesn't want to, and neither should a woman, just because he's sentimental.

When a woman wants a baby, she's strong and independent. When a man wants one, he is sentimental. Alei, you have gotten a little lopsided here. I'm for equal rights. Equal. You have approached every scenario where a man would want his child with disdain.

That was ignorant.

Alei, cut the shit. I'm not ignorant. Just because I don't have a bunch of kids, work with strippers, work in an abortion clinic and whatever the hell else you do that makes you an expert on unwanted pregnancies, does not make me ignorant. I helped my 15-year-old sister take care of her son when I was 12/13 so she could go to school. There is another side to your coin. You know what happened? Someone adopted my nephew and married my sister. Even though they are now divorced, he still takes care of that child. You know what that sister went to school for? Delivering babies. You may know a lot about aborting them, but I know a hell of a lot about the risks of giving birth. I've been around for a few labors. Perhaps you need to spend some time on the other side of this discussion to see my point of view. There is no need for you call ignorance.

Even if she agrees to get pregnant, and then flakes, that is still her right. And no, that's never happened. Some of them are Muslim, some are hookers, some are rape victims, some are 30 year old women who just don't want to be a mother, and had an accident. I don't care if the father is a fucking saint, his opinion is irrelevant for the many, many reasons I stated above.

None of which actually show why he is not entitled to his opinion and a good acceptance of it. You have thrown out scenarios that fit a fraction of pregnancies and parenting situations. You have thrown out strawmen, but you have not once told me why a woman who does not fear pregnancy, but does not want a child, should not carry the child for a man who does want it. Since that is what I am arguing, I find it interesting that we have got this far without you managing to address that even once.

Some people like to be enlightened, some people value being right over accepting the truth.

I live in New England, alei. It's like another country. It might be the truth for you that most mothers are little Christian girls with tyrants for parents and baby daddies that scratch their nuts and drink beer all the time, but that is not the case here. Perhaps you need to realize that what is true in one pocket of east bumfuck is not the truth everywhere. I'm talking about a very specific scenario. It doesn't matter if you have never personally witnessed it. You have presumably never seen the Taj Mahal. Does that mean we should dismiss it and let it fall apart? Should we never consider such a thing existing and needing consideration? "Well, it ain't Christian and beer-swilling, hurf-durf, so it must ain't be real." It doesn't work that way. The funny thing is, I have strongly considered all of the scenarios you put forth long before you came around. I've held an opinion on abortion for a pretty long fucking time. I don't disagree with you on any of the things you set forth. I disagree with you on one that you have failed to consider. If you took a deep breath and realized what I actually said, we wouldn't have wasted all of this time with these "pregnancy scenario one-ups" and condescending questioning on the vacancy of my uterus.

Mothers do have the right to sign over parental rights to the father if they don't want the baby. And like I said, it's a slippery slope.

No, they don't. It is not that easy at all. It takes mountains of paperwork and at least three visits to court. Slippery slope, my ass.

A uterine supremacist? No, sweetheart, I'm not. I'm a compassionate person who talks to women in crisis for a living.

Partially compassionate, alei. You have shown not one ounce of compassion in this thread for men who want their children. It's not your fault. It is the way everyone is. Dads are "sperm donors" and moms are "victims."

You're really cold about this whole thing, and you don't know what it feels like to be 8 months pregnant when you don't want to be. I do. So if you think that I am standing up for women, you're damn right I am. You don't have my permission to make me feel like shit about that. You might have sisters who've gone through it, and a midwife whatever, but until you go through it, you can't really know.

Yeah, I didn't get knocked up with a baby I didn't want. I know how to use a condom. Sorry if I don't think managing to get pregnant when even a caveman could do it makes you fucking special. I've lived my life responsibly. Excuse the fuck out of me for not feeling pity for those who don't. I didn't try to make you feel like shit about anything. If you felt that way reading anything I said, that says more about you than me. I'll keep standing up for dads who give a shit and stop wasting my pity on women who can't figure out how to use birth control and men who don't want to use condoms. In my world, where my opinion comes from, the only people who fall into the category where such discussion would be relevant are responsible adults. You clearly don't have much experience in that department.

Some people don't even have to go through it because they have empathy. If you had empathy, none of this garbage could come out of your mouth.

Cry me a river, alei.

Asking me about my father? Fuck you. The only daddy I ever had tied me up to chairs and urinated on me. He was good to the kids that were made from his sperm.

That's hardly my fault, alei. It explains a hell of a lot about this conversation, though.

I'm so glad you have a swell father, but I don't know if you've noticed or not, from inside your bubble, but there is an epidemic in this country of absent/shitty fathers.

Haha, my bubble. Alei, you know fuck all about me. I mean, literally nothing. You also appear to know jack shit about what I am actually arguing. There could be a fucking epidemic of rape abortions and it would have absolutely jack shit to do with my argument. As long as there is one healthy woman who wouldn't mind carrying a baby to term if given the option that he be raised with a father and father who is willing to do so, my argument stands. It doesn't matter whats going on in Kentucky or wherever the fuck you're from.

To act like I could only understand a father's plight just because I don't have a father is pretty fucking rich coming from someone who has shown literally no empathy for what women have to go through during and after pregnancy.

I never said that, alei. You need to try arguing from a place of logic here. I had no clue you didn't have a dad, so how the fuck could I have insulted you for it. As for empathy for women who are pregnant, you are putting words in my mouth again. Not only is this a little alei dramafest, it is a ridiculous scapegoating. I have not fucking said any of the things you attribute to me. Yeah, fuck me. Fuck me until you can grow the fuck up and debate like a big girl.