Forcing 10-year-old rape victims to give birth isn�t moral, just or �pro-
life�

Now that Roe is dead, have Republicans become more compassionate? No, and
they�re even more emboldened.

For the first decades after Roe v. Wade was decided, anti-abortion forces
made the case that they were the real pro-women movement.

They claimed to love the sinner (the fallen woman) but hated the sin of
abortion. They just wanted to save female babies. And some promised to be
there with the first box of diapers (the roughly 250 subsequent boxes
were always going to be your responsibility).

It was a myth perpetuated in gullible reporting that often swept the
movement�s long record of intimidation, violence, arson and murder under
the rug. (�Every movement has its extremists,� pundits would tsk, while
conveniently ignoring that abortion rights advocates didn�t resort to
terrorist tactics to get their point across.)

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And so, anti-abortion activists had a lot of people fooled when they
promised that if the Supreme Court ever overturned abortion, they would
never hunt women down and prosecute them for terminating a pregnancy.

But the movement became more emboldened over the years as a powerful
force in the Republican Party, proposing a slew of creatively cruel
restrictions, like forcing Michigan women to purchase �rape insurance�
since standard health policies couldn�t cover abortion, even in the case
of sexual assault.

After religious right darling Sarah Palin landed on the 2008 GOP ticket,
more Republicans started dispensing with the fiction that they supported
exceptions for health, rape, incest and the mother�s life. And we began
hearing more and more that throwing doctors in jail was a just outcome
(Michigan�s poorly written, 91-year-old abortion ban allows this).

Why don�t pro-lifers care about the trauma inflicted on a child who was
already sexually violated and then forced to give birth? How do we think
she will ever have a normal, happy, healthy life? Why should her life be
sacrificed?

Then Donald Trump came on the scene. There�s no evidence that he was ever
pro-life, but he gleefully jumped on the bandwagon while running for
president in 2016 to prove he really was a Republican. Only Trump was
never a quick study � he reportedly didn�t read intelligence briefings in
office, but would look at pretty graphs � so he would say the quiet part
out loud, like that �there has to be some form of punishment� for women
who have abortions.

Naturally, Republicans and their anti-abortion benefactors quickly denied
that would happen and Trump�s favorite daughter, Ivanka, was dispatched
to reassure suburban women and insider journalists that her dad didn�t
mean any of that.

But that, of course, has become the official policy of today�s GOP now
that the far-right court couldn�t wait to overturn Roe to signal that the
era of universal human rights (however imperfect in practice) is over.

One of the first victims of this misogynistic fiat was a 10-year-old rape
victim in Ohio who was forced to travel to Indiana to terminate her
pregnancy.

It�s clear that a lot of Republicans skipped health class, but pregnancy
and childbirth can be dangerous even for healthy, adult women (far more
so than abortion).

My first pregnancy was considered normal. I never had severe
complications, but I was still hospitalized twice for severe dehydration
because I had violent morning sickness up until the day I gave birth �
and that�s pretty minor compared to diabetes, high blood pressure or
being on bed rest for months. I also had a Cesarean section, which is
major surgery (my then-husband watched doctors juggle my organs while
trying to get our child out). Oh, and I was expected to be back to work
six weeks after that and had to negotiate for more time off (none of
which was paid).

Even under the best of circumstances, we face a world that�s hostile to
the well-being of mothers and children, despite the flowery pro-life
rhetoric.

I can�t believe I have to explain this, but a fifth-grader does not have
a body suited to carrying or delivering a baby. (The World Health
Organization found that the leading killer of girls 15 to 19 � who are
years older � is pregnancy and childbirth complications.) Expecting young
girls to fully understand what�s happening is sadistic. Journalist Jill
Filopovic recalls interviewing a 12-year-old rape victim who responded to
being told she was going to have a baby by hearbreakingly asking if she
could have a doll instead.
Demonstrators outside the U.S. Supreme Court on Dec. 1, 2021. Justices
are hearing arguments in a Mississippi case that seeks to overturn Roe v.
Wade. (Jane Norman/States Newsroom)

Why don�t pro-lifers care about the trauma inflicted on a child who was
already sexually violated and then forced to give birth? How do we think
she will ever have a normal, happy, healthy life? Why should her life be
sacrificed?

But GOP Ohio Senate nominee J.D. Vance flippantly dismissed such
circumstances as �inconvenient,� adding, �The question to me is really
about the baby.�

Michigan GOP gubernatorial hopeful Garrett Soldano is on the same page,
announcing that rape victims who become pregnant must �protect that DNA
and allow it to happen.�

You also have Republicans trying to pass laws charging doctors with
�abortion murder� if they don�t �reimplant an ectopic pregnancy� in the
uterus � which is medically impossible � so it�s abundantly clear that
anti-abortion activists don�t care about facts or pregnant people�s
health.

So now that Roe is dead and reality has set in, have Republicans become
more compassionate? In a word, no. They�re even more emboldened, cooking
up laws barring people from crossing state lines for abortions, putting
bounties on their heads and making every miscarriage a potential crime.

Take Kristi Noem, a red-state governor and likely 2024 contender, who was
asked about the case of the 10-year-old. After giving the perfunctory
answer that this was �horrific� she declared, �But, in South Dakota, the
law today is that the abortions are illegal, except to save the life of
the mother.�

Pro-lifers have proved that they�re not just into punishing women � they
also delight in punishing child victims of horrific crimes.

Far-right justices and overzealous GOP leaders have fundamentally changed
the issue. Abortion is no longer a personal decision for you and your
family. You now have the state deciding what you can and cannot do with
your body � and Republicans are willing to imprison women, ban them from
freely traveling, force children to endure risky childbirth and more.

A lot of my colleagues seem surprised at the swift and vehement backlash
to the Supreme Court�s massive overreach. �But people are divided on
abortion,� they protest as they keep writing stories about polls on
people�s personal beliefs.

What they�re missing is that these far-right justices and overzealous GOP
leaders have fundamentally changed the issue. Abortion is no longer a
personal decision for you and your family. You now have the state
deciding what you can and cannot do with your body � and Republicans are
willing to imprison women, ban them from freely traveling, force children
to endure risky childbirth and more.

We�re a country that doesn�t like people telling us what to do. Now we
have more than half the population that can�t make basic decisions
because the state has the ultimate power. And you have a political party
dedicated to making the process as cruel and dangerous as possible.

That�s a whole new ballgame. And that�s why the SCOTUS decision is deeply
unpopular with the vast majority of the country. Far-right justices think
they can issue edicts swiftly snatching away other basic rights of
privacy, contraception, same-sex marriage and non-discrimination and the
majority will simply acquiesce.

Our nation just turned 246 years old. Nobody signed up to live in a land
where freedom and democracy are concepts in name only. We�re citizens,
not subjects. And you can count on the fact that the majority will not
consent to be ruled by an authoritarian, out-of-control court.