Saturday, September 1, 2012

Illegitimate Comments on ‘Legitimate Rape’


More on “legitimate rape” and the Akin campaign.

In commenting on this, John Stonestreet over at Breakpoint said:

Look, I quickly join my voice with the legions of others that despite our intentions, we should never use this phrase “legitimate rape” again. No rape is legitimate; all rape is devastating, evil, and dehumanizing. I also join with others in condemning the profoundly unscientific idea that a woman’s body prevents pregnancy in cases of rape.

Since Breakpoint is a Christian-oriented group, it seems fair enough to remind them that the Bible makes a distinction between legitimate rape, and other kinds of sexual encounters.  Deut. 22:23-27 seems to be making the very point that there are encounters that are legitimate rape, and others that are not.  So Akin’s distinction between real (legitimate) rape and other sexual encounters is not just common sense, it is Biblical.

Again, while Akin was factually mistaken about the results of rape, that doesn’t change the fact that the stupid media frenzy over the phrase “legitimate rape” was the kind of idiocy that we have come to expect from many media outlets.  It is also the kind of idiocy that writers at Breakpoint should be condemning, not repeating with approval.

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