While Republicans have backed off their wildly offensive & dangerous plan to redefine rape as “forcible rape”, two recent bills make it clear their frightening disregard for the safety of and respect for women continues.
Here’s Violet, the Reclusive Leftist, discussing the first:
These are the people who want you to die
If you’re a pregnant woman, that is. You’ve probably read about the “Let Women Die” Act currently in the House; the bill would allow hospitals to simply refuse to provide emergency life-saving medical care to a pregnant woman if such care involves aborting the fetus. I was fascinated to see that the bill, which was introduced by Rep. Joe Pitts (R-Andromeda Galaxy), has 100 co-sponsors. One hundred! That’s almost one-fourth of the entire House of Representatives. Here they are:
100 co-sponsors! All but one of the Kansas Representatives (and one a woman!) signed on. I wonder if there’s a corresponding bill planned that they MUST save the woman if letting her die would kill the fetus? Probably not.
And today, there is this cheerful piece of news:
Georgia Republican’s bill would reclassify rape victims as ‘accusers’
When is a rape victim legally a victim of rape?
According to a Georgia state representative, the term “victim” should be applied only after the accused has been convicted.
State Rep. Bobby Franklin (R-Marietta) recently introduced a bill mandating that not only victims of rape be re-classified as “accusers,” but victims of stalking, harassment, and family violence should as well.
If passed, the legislation [PDF] would amend state criminal law “in the context of a number of statutes making reference to circumstances where there has not yet been a criminal conviction; to provide for related matters; to repeal conflicting laws; and for other purposes.”
Critics said that they feared Franklin’s bill would decrease reports of rape, which is itself already an underreported crime [PDF], according to the California Coalition Against Sexual Assault.
I don’t know what’s behind this apparently sudden volley of aggressively anti-woman legislation. But, it seems to me that we’d better be watching our legislators very closely. These bills might be shot down in the next week or two. But, these guys have an agenda and something tells me we’re just beginning to see it.
As bad as they are, the thing that worries me isn’t so much out-in-the-open bills like these. What worries me is that the stuff in these bills could be slipped into other — bigger — critically “important” bills. And actually get passed.
That’s what I’m worried about. How about you?
Filed under: General | Tagged: "Let Women Die" Act, anti-woman legislation, Bobby Franklin, rape, Reclusive leftist |
The Confluence 
katiebird, the second bill would apply to Georgia only. Of course, if it worked there, Kansas and the rest of the states that are hostile to reproductive choice would surely follow.
As for the first bill, my Republican representative is not a co-sponsor but he’s going to hear about it from me anyway in case he’s inclined to vote for it.
I know that — but, the point isn’t which legislative body is playing these games…. it’s that there’s a trend developing that doesn’t look good.
We’ve always said that we need something more powerful than Roe v Wade. And these bills are pretty good examples of what we fear.
Sorry, I misunderstood.
I agree that we need a better way than Roe v.Wade to protect a woman’s right to choose.
“That’s what I’m worried about.”
I’m with you!
Unbelievable. Thanks, Katie. I went to Violet’s to see.
For reasons that escape me, some of my fellow male talking apes really believe that social and political equality and/or erotic liberty for female talking apes will end civilization. I do not understand their fear. 😕
very disturbing
I have my YT favorite list open in another window, and I happened across this tangentially related song, which might be NSFW.
Pitts is a member of The Family, the extremist cult that is also backing the kill-the-gays legislation in Uganda.
I don’t know what Franklin’s affiliations are–is there a union for Stupid?–but I suspect that his proposed statute would go down in flames on the first appeal unless the change in nomenclature is broadened to include victims of all crimes. It’s a blatant violation of the 14th Amendment on its face, since it singles out crimes in which the victims are overwhelmingly women. If they want to do this, then they need to refer to “accusers” in robbery, burglary, fraud, assault & battery (separately and together), homicide. . .. Ooops, there’s a problem.
In cases such as burglary or assualt and battery, it’s clear that a crime has happened and who is the victim. But in some cases of alleged rape, it’s not clear that any crime has happened; there’s just the word of one person claiming that something happened and that it was not consensual.
Speaking of right-wing nuts, and not to ecroach on the mods’ judgement and discretion, why is Free Us Now still on the blogroll? It’s gone full-bore radical right, pushing Islamophobia of the most bigoted kind, embracing Pamela Geller and Gert Wilder, and publishing consistently anti-left screeds. There’s currently a piece up about how possible CIA asset Stanley Ann Dunham and her family were all–wait for it–dirty commie-commies and Frank Marshall Davis was likely BO’s father.
Ptui. Gotta go wash my brain after a couple paragraphs of that last one.
They undoubtedly will slip those measures into other bills, and the Dems will undoubtedly allow them to, and then to pass them. The vigorous stream of woman-hating legislation has become a torrent, and there’s no reason to think that courageous action on the part of a majority of Democrats will stop it.
This is so big there are no words for it.
All men go up in status as all women go down.
One definition of insanity is repeating the same action and expecting a different outcome.
You keep voting for the current crop of (Obama)Dems expecting them to act like FDR Dems is a good example. How can you be so Stupak?
I won’t get into the degree of rape argument because it distracts from the fact that a woman should have the right to make unhindered decisions when it comes to her body.
I make the same argument for same gender marriage. Whether the attraction between consenting adults is Nature or Nurture is nobody’s business when it come to the rights and privileges of marriage.