Sweeping Rape Under the Rug of Convenience

This has to be one of the most myopic letters I've read in the Rapid City Journal in a long time.

Better ways to use resources than Initiated Measure 11

I received my absentee ballot in the mail yesterday, and Measure 11 goes farther than I thought. In addition to forcing women to carry unviable fetuses to term (those with fatal defects or even those with a defect that results in the absence of a brain), it reads: When an abortion is performed as a result of rape or incest, the woman must consent to biological sampling from herself and the embryo or fetus for DNA testing by law enforcement. Thus, in addition to the physical and psychological trauma of rape or incest, paternity testing would be performed on the products of conception by law enforcement. What is this expensive testing going to tell us? Women may be having sex with their partners or husbands at the time of rape. Women may be raped by their partners/husbands. Is our state so financially set that we can spend our taxpayer’s dollars on paternity testing of aborted fetuses? This doesn’t even take into consideration the millions of dollars that we, as South Dakotans will pay as this law goes to the Supreme Court. Let’s put that money into our schools, our roads, low cost birth control and sex education.

JESSICA PETTIGREW
Rapid City

"Thus, in addition to the physical and psychological trauma of rape or incest, paternity testing would be performed on the products of conception by law enforcement." Evidence gathering is standard procedure in the crime of rape. It's how perpetrators are prosecuted, justice is obtained for the victim, and the public is protected from future rapes.

"What is this expensive testing going to tell us?" Oh, silly little things like who is the perpetrator of this crime of rape. And it will tie the perpetrator to the victim with physical evidence. Just goofy stuff like that.

"Women may be having sex with their partners or husbands at the time of rape." So? That "expensive testing" using DNA evidence will reveal who is the father of the child--and theoretically the perpetrator. DNA evidence can tell the difference whether the woman was impregnated by her husband or the rapist (not that this changes the humanity of the child). After all, the issue with the rape exception is theoretically that the woman was raped and the child to be aborted is a subsequent outcome of that rape.

"Women may be raped by their partners/husbands." Yes, and if they did, they can be prosecuted for it...and again, this "expensive testing" will provide the evidence necessary to proceed with prosecution.

"Is our state so financially set that we can spend our taxpayer’s dollars on paternity testing of aborted fetuses?" I don't know; is our state "so financially set" that we can spend our taxpayer's dollars to gather and test evidence in other crimes?

"This doesn’t even take into consideration the millions of dollars that we, as South Dakotans will pay as this law goes to the Supreme Court." If it does go to the Supreme Court, you can thank the pro-abortionists for suing to stop a reasonable law from being enforced. It will be them you can thank for the expense, not the folks trying to end abortion on demand and save lives.

I think rather than "Better ways to use resources than Initiated Measure 11" for the title of this letter, it should have been, "Sweep the crime of rape under the rug."

Do we really have to explain basic things like this to pro-abortion liberals? Or are they simply so blinded by their zeal to keep abortion legal for retroactive birth control that they overlook the obvious?