No, It’s Not Time To Forgive Todd Akin

11:45 am, August 21st | by Amy Tennery

Most people were horrified by Congressman and Republican Senate candidate Todd Akin’s comment that women rarely get pregnant from “legitimate rape.” Others, like actor and conservative activist Kirk Cameron, are kinda “meh” on the whole thing.

Cameron, who does not support abortion rights, told CNN that he respects Akin’s “pro-life” advocacy and thinks we should all cut him some slack:

“I’m the kind of person that believes that I would like to be evaluated by my entire career and my entire life, not two words that I would misspeak and then later apologize for. So he’s in a tough spot.”

When you’re running for senate and major news outlets are speculating whether your own party can and/or will force you off your ballot, yes, it’s fair to say you’re in a “tough spot.” And it’s clear that Cameron has plenty of reason to try and rehabilitate Akin’s image. The guy’s not exactly an attractive spokesperson for the pro-life set.

And yet, it’s awfully tough to take Akin’s extremist “misstatement” as an isolated incident of verbal buffoonery — particularly when there’s footage of him addressing the House of Representatives in 2008, in which he calls abortion providers “terrorists” and calls abortion more “un-American” than slavery:

All tin-eared, past invocations of slavery aside, what about Akin’s recent slip up? He’s released a highly apologetic campaign ad. Can we let this go? Should we? No. Particularly when you consider just how widespread Akin’s ass-backward sentiment on rape and pregnancy is.

In a fantastic Mother Jones piece, Kate Sheppard explained that the no-pregnancy-from rape idea is “held and repeated by individuals who oppose abortion in any circumstances.” A noted anti-abortion doctor she points to, John C. Willke, has promoted this myth repeatedly. And a Republican Senate candidate in Arkansas was slammed for mentioning the idea in 1998, Sheppard notes.

And if you’re looking for even more horrifyingly wrong-headed comments on rape and pregnancy, check out this rundown from BuzzFeed of crazy statements from high-profile people and institutions. (My favorite, from Federal Judge James Leon Holmes: “Concern for rape victims is a red herring because conceptions from rape occur with approximately the same frequency as snowfall in Miami.”)

We can’t forgive Akin because there are people (lots of them, in fact) who still don’t understand what he said is fundamentally wrong.

You can watch Cameron’s CNN appearance below, courtesy of Politico:

TAGS: kirk cameron | todd akin | todd akin apology

Anonymous

What Akin said was stupid and wrong. Having said that, I find all this outrage from the party that worships Bill Clinton, who has been accused of forcible rape, not to mention many other crimes against woman a little hard to swallow. Akin doesn’t believe in snuffing out the life of an innocent child even in instances of rape. I consider myself very pro-life, but disagree with him on that point. But I have way more respect for someone that advocates the sanctity of all life than for people who worship people that are serial abusers of woman. I find it very hard to understand how you libs reconcile your position.
Adam R. Charpentier

Chartlon Heston warned us years ago that if conservative heads prevail, apes will rule the Earth, so I’ll stick by my more liberal primate buddies, Dr. Zaius, and you can have Akin. Anyone that’s goddamn stupid enough to say, in front of cameras, that women have enough control of their physiology to auto-abort rape babies should not be allowed to lord over anything larger than a snail.
Anonymous

I don’t agree with him and most Republicans don’t either. Any person stupid and inhumane enough to vote for a bill that makes it illegal to help a baby that survives an abortion shouldn’t be the leader of the free world. I feel more comfortable surrounding myself with people who believe in the sanctity of life than with those who snuff it out without a second thought.
Anonymous

This guy is dumber than a bag of hair, and I find it telling that today’s Republican Party is trying to push him and shut him up because he’s bad for their image, NOT because he’s not representative of their own beliefs.
Anonymous

A woman is not simply a mechanical womb with ON and OFF push buttons. She has emotions and dreams and goals. She has been designed by a loving creator to love her own offspring. Should she deliver the same violence to the life inside her as her rapist committed violence to her. Is this the final solution. Becoming one with his HIS violence. He will someday have to come to terms with his violence but how will she come to terms with hers. She does it to her own. This should not be politicalized… only love and understanding can bring healing of the heart, mind and emotions.I don’t have to be religious to love children and not want them to be treated like garbage or a waste product. The dream of America can only be destroyed from within when we no longer believe in the sanctity of life. That we are just an industrially created life form who’s only purpose is to create profits for corporations and finally industrial refuse in a petri dish. When the majority of Americans hate the unborn and promote women to abandon and abort part of themselves it will mark the end of the U.S.A. as we know it. It will be a new age where we hate each other more than we love each other.
http://www.facebook.com/david.huston.790 David Huston

in front of cameras, that women have enough control of their physiology
to auto-abort rape babies should not be allowed to lord over anything
larger than a snail.

http://www.condominia.ca

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