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Republicans: New Mexico Bill Would Criminalize Abortions After Rape As 'Tampering With Evidence'
If you get an abortion from rape, you will be charged as a "third degree felon" and sentenced for up to 3 years in prison, for tampering with evidence.

Sourcing can be fun…

A Republican lawmaker in New Mexico introduced a bill on Wednesday that would legally require victims of rape to carry their pregnancies to term in order to use the fetus as evidence for a sexual assault trial.

House Bill 206, introduced by state Rep. Cathrynn Brown®, would charge a rape victim who ended her pregnancy with a third-degree felony for "tampering with evidence."

The update:

UPDATE: 12:25 p.m. -- Brown said in a statement Thursday that she introduced the bill with the goal of punishing the person who commits incest or rape and then procures or facilitates an abortion to destroy the evidence of the crime.

“New Mexico needs to strengthen its laws to deter sex offenders,” said Brown. “By adding this law in New Mexico, we can help to protect women across our state.”

I'm not sure if this helps to punish the alleged rapist more than it punishes the alleged rape victim.

Now I am no fan of abortion for reasons listed in another thread. On the whole, I believe they shouldn't be allowed. But I do think that rape is an exception.

An alleged rape victim shouldn't be forced to carry a baby to term. There's the chance that the victim "might be lying" or that the sex isn't deemed rape, but the alleged victims honestly believe that they were raped a massive majority of the time.

I don't feel comfortable with punishing that majority in order to "preserve evidence."
 
I'm not sure what's more demeaning to human life: "killing" an unborn child or forcing a mother to hang on to the kid because it's evidence.

If you need evidence, why not just go and find the records of the abortion? A woman isn't going to undergo a surgical procedure like that for kicks.

And this is why I'm glad I live in a country where politics aren't so draconian and out of tune with the nation. Not saying it's perfect – it still has a lot of work to do – but this kind of retardation is ridiculous.

If it were a legitimate rape, the woman would have ways of shutting the whole thing down.

Yeah I don't quite see the point of making the victim keep the child as "evidence" when records of an abortion can easily be found and analyzed.

I can at least appreciate that there are people out there willing to try to pass laws that will make it easier to convict a rapist, but I really, really doubt this is the right way to do it.

so basically the Republican lawmaker in New Mexico is a troll

ITT: 20% legit discussion 80% bashing Republicans

I can agree that this is a poor way to handle the situation. An fetus isn't a piece of evidence, it's a growing human, and putting that kind of responsibility on a rape victim for the sake of an efficient trial is a poor way of handling it.

"There are currently 38 Democrats, 32 Republicans in the House of Representatives."

"There are currently 25 Democrats, 17 Republicans in the Senate."

This is going to go over like a lead balloon. Even if it did, the Republican Governor wouldn't be braindead enough to sign it, in a state like New Mexico, it would kill your career.

Incorrect way to handle this. Just make it legally binding that IF the person gets an abortion and does not provide a blood sample from the fetus that was aborted, then it would be considered such, that or does not report getting an abortion and believes the baby to be the rapists. Maybe. That's the only way it could be okay, in my opinion.

UPDATE: 12:25 p.m. -- Brown said in a statement Thursday that she introduced the bill with the goal of punishing the person who commits incest or rape and then procures or facilitates an abortion to destroy the evidence of the crime.

Uh, since when has incest been a crime? I never knew.

It is illegal in a number of states, however proving it and such is difficult and usually not persuded unless the person claims it and doesn't want the child, etc. And that is a far better bill, however the wording was confusing, so it needs a revision.

It's illegal in all 50 states. Though, in some states you can marry cousins.

It's good to check your facts first. Bestiality is illegal in 37 states, and Washington is one of them, in fact the Washington ban is most well known, because of the 1guy1horse video. Wikipedia link

Zoosexual activity is a misdemeanor in the 20 states listed below:
Alaska
Arkansas
California
Colorado
Connecticut
Florida
Iowa
Kansas
Louisiana
Maryland
Maine
Minnesota
Missouri
Nebraska
New York
North Dakota
Oregon
Pennsylvania
Utah
Wisconsin

Zoosexual activity (bestiality) is a felony in the 17 states listed below:
Arizona
Delaware
Georgia
Idaho
Illinois
Indiana
Massachusetts
Michigan
Mississippi
North Carolina
Oklahoma
Rhode Island
South Carolina
South Dakota
Tennessee
Virginia
Washington

I find it amusing that the consensual sexual activity is banned in all 50 states, but basically raping animals is legal in 13. America, how you do?

I'm not sure what you mean by this, but if you're talking about homosexuality, that's not true. It's not illegal in any context to have gay sex in any state, because that's an invasion of privacy. It's gay marriage that is the current political issue. Federal government doesn't currently recognize homosexual marriages as legally binding, but has relocated that decision to the states. As of today (1/24/13), nine states legally recognize gay marriage:

•Connecticut
•Iowa
•Massachusetts
•New Hampshire
•New York
•Vermont
•Maine
•Maryland
•Washington

So technically, that's not true, either.

Also, it's zoophilia that's legal in 13 states, not beastiality. Beastiality implies rape or forced sex, whereas zoophilia is considered consensual.

I was referring to Beastiality, but the plot thickens. How can an animal consent? And I thought the suffix -Philia denoted a sexual attraction to, not an action.

>2013
>Still wikiphobic

Let's stay on topic, people. How this turned into a gay marriage vs. beastiality argument I will never know

… It hasn't. :|

How this turned into a gay marriage vs. beastiality argument I will never know

It all started right after Who Am I entered a thread that was specifically about: "banning rape victims from getting abortions in the interest of preserving criminal evidence" and then somehow decided that "Bronies, and how we [allegedly] desire to travel to Washington to have sexytimes with real animals" is a relevant and accurate contribution to the original topic. I can only think of one possible way that a human being could establish such a connection and that is by being devastatingly retarded. Under these circumstances I must assume that Who Am I is exactly that.

Keeping on topic, I have a paranoid suspicion that this is really just a shady way of making abortion illegal for more ulterior reasons. "Criminal evidence" sounds like some kind of an excuse when you consider how inefficient the baby would be in determining if a procreation was consensual or not

I suppose you could use the baby to do DNA testing and confirm the rapist as the father but I'm sure there is a faster way of doing that which doesn't involve waiting 9 months. Other than that, what else does it tell you?

Would a fully formed baby help in the prosecution of rapists any more than what we already have? (witness accounts, victim allegations, DNA tests, criminal confessions, abortion records etc). Maybe, but at a pretty big cost to the victim.

Furthermore, what information does an abortion destroy? Is confirmation of pregnancy and parenthood not obtainable afterwards?

Anyone else up for developing interstellar travel and just leaving the planet?

Becasue I doubt you want to live on this planet anymore.

I still agree it needs a revision. I'm pretty sure there is a procedure to get a blood or DNA sample from the fetus with minimal risk to the baby, and if it is aborted, the evidence is still there. It probably has ulterior motives on minimalising abortion, but every state has the right to limit it, they will do it if they want. They just can't make all abortion illegal due to federal laws. Similar to you being able to have assault style weapons in most states and can not in some states even after the ban was lifted. Ignoring bias either way to legality of abortion, it's a bit shady, I agree. But they have the right to do so. Kinda. I think it may be an invasion of privacy issue however, we'll have to wait and see how the law develops as well as wether or not it even goes to be passed, it was only proposed so far correct?

Incest is bad for the genome. But, bestiality has no effect on the genome, because no babies are made.

Incest causes the created child to have higher than average amount of homozygous genes.

Most genetic disorders only affect people if they carry two copies of the mutant gene.

BSoD wrote:

Keeping on topic, I have a paranoid suspicion that this is really just a shady way of making abortion illegal for more ulterior reasons. “Criminal evidence” sounds like some kind of an excuse when you consider how inefficient the baby would be in determining if a procreation was consensual or not

I considered this too. It does seem like a way to just ease into making abortions illegal. For now though I'm gonna give the benefit of the doubt and say that their only intention was to "preserve evidence".

I understand that, but why then would abortion after incest be considered a crime? Besides, two people with the same genetic disease can have children knowing that their child has a high chance of developing that same disease with no lawful repercussions, iirc. (Not that this is a good thing, might I add. It's essentially akin to torture in some cases.)

And besides, wouldn't incest with contraception still be prohibited? All the provision really refers to is flat incest.

Oh 'Murica you're so silly sometimes.

But seriously I do not agree with this.

Don't randomly bash bronies on KYM, you were practically asking for downvotes.

On topic though, I must say this is stupid, by forcing a woman to do that, otherwise it's illegal, is more wrong than it is right, this shouldn't have even been mentioned, it's just not good at all.

EDIT: Just read the thread… How this went from rape to incest to beastality I'll never know.

@Pseudogenesis

Socially and psychologically, incest is considered wrong anyway. Sure, genetically it's bad, due to two people who are closely related reproducing when they have similar genes and therefore less genetic variation (down the line) and offspring becoming more susceptible to mutations that are passed on easily, e.t.c.

But.

It's frowned upon anyway.

@Quantum I know, is anyone listening? o.0

If an abortion is performed, then the only conceivable moral infraction caused by incest is removed. Same with using contraception. Why then is there a blanket ban when two people with the same genetic disease are still allowed to have children, and people are allowed to force sex upon animals? It really makes no sense whatsoever to me.

@Pseudo.

Would you like to have sex with your sister then?

But of course you don't. You don't want to break the rules of society. It's called a taboo where something is terrible because we all unanimously agree it is terrible, even if the implications that make it terrible are not necessarily there. Incest is against the rules and the incestuous are bad for breaking the rules if not for causing a negative impact.

Incest became taboo because it caused deformations and birth defects ever since the beginning of time and that negative connotation remained prevalent in our culture for thousands upon thousands of years. A few decades of the existence of contraception wont undo thousand-year-old deeply ingrained cultural mentality

But that's an entirely different subject. Start another thread for it.

Taboos are one thing, flat out legislation against it is another. Interracial marriages were once considered taboo, right?

Besides, tobacco causes far more suffering and death than the deformations conceivably might. No legislation there. Sin taxes maybe, but no true legislation.

I dunno why I'm going on about this. I just think that human irrationality is interesting. Not interesting enough to make a thread about it, though. (Or to have to sift through all the inevitable "lol go fuck your mom faggot" responses.)

I was going to say what BSOD just said, relating down to it being taboo and that virtually all societies see it as wrong and awful for a number of reasons.

And yes psuedo, it is…strange. But the issue is animals really don't have many if any rights in virtually any countries. They aren't considered sentient or people as of yet. However there are talks about making chimps, whales, dolphins, porpoises and one or two other higher functioning animals who behave with a sense of society, able to recognize themselves, etc and giving them rights similar to humans as "non-human persons". Honestly, I have to agree with that, and I think all living things should have a general respect from humans. Why give rights to stuff you raise with intent to enslave and slaughter? Similar mindset.

To keep to the real topic, I'm wondering how they will handle this as a right of privacy issue.

Looks like the pot is calling the kettle black. The only sources worse than "a friend" are "they" or "experts".

Anyway, this place details the laws, if you really want the penal code.

http://www.animallaw.info/articles/ovuszoophilia.htm

Anyway, here's a Seattle Times article on the Enumclaw horse-sex case

This is exactly what I was trying to say, Pseudo.

Sorry, but I completely lost the right words for it.

Interracial marriages were also illegal. If you're wondering when society got behind it and repealed it, it didn't happen, at least not in America. It took a Supreme Court ruling…and a majority of people still disagreed with the ruling until the 90's, 30 years later.

Smoking causes you, yourself to become sick.

Incest causes your child to become deformed.

Compare kicking yourself in the head to kicking someone else in the head.

Eugenist, everything is interconnected, you can't say that to be true. Generally and for the most part, the impact is on the individual. However, second hand smoking can cause cancer in others. I won't go into the child part, it's too hard to explain and everything else, but it still has an impact.

Why are people using this thread to justify incest? What happened to the original topic?

Oh, for Optimus Primes sake…

@Pseudo

Look, I don't know why the rules exist. I just know that they are there and that's the way society is. Question it as you may: thousand-year-old cultural taboos will not die without a fight no matter how good your logic is. The rationality of society is indeed interesting

If you are going to compare incest to tobacco smoking, please note that incest became regarded throughout the centuries as a horrible crime looooooong before smoking tobacco was.

Maybe that's because the negative effects were that much more rapidly apparent. Nobody knew about lung cancer thousands of years ago and it wasn't obvious why smoking-related diseases happened at all. Meanwhile deformations were pretty easy to pin down.

We legislate incest because we tend to ban the things we regard as bad and incest has been bad for a pretty long time now. Smoking has only become mildly taboo just recently and only now are the legislations for it coming in

As for interracial marriages, yes it isn't taboo now once we realized that it caused no real harm. Maybe incest can be released from its taboo state as well if you prove it to be harmless (so long as contraception is used). If you wish to pioneer this, go right ahead and let me know how it goes

I don't even this thread.

Why on Earth did this turn into a discussion on morality.

My bad, guys; requesting lock.

OP didn't state what exactly to discuss

….what did you expect?

so back on topic here….obviously morality is brought into question because we're here to think….what the hell are the decision-maker's priorities? is it based on ethics? or morals? or is there some kind of hidden agenda as some of us are hinting at?

I think that if they do not allow the mother abort the child of rape, it would be bad for the genome.

It would cause the 'criminal' genes to be passed on.

So, back on topic.

As much as I like to bash Republicans, this title is about as bad as "Child kills mother after playing Call of Duty." It's sensationalist, and clearly meant to elicit a certain emotion from a target audience and propagate massive quantities of confirmation bias. That being said, how the Republican party manages to attract all these crazy people is a mystery to me. They're basically asking for it.

This is so blatantly self-serving and idiotic that it stands for itself without any refutation.

And lol isn't New Mexico Democratic?

New Mexico is Latinoworld, not 'Murica.

Guize. Abortion is up to the pregnant one. Not the government. Not your family. Not that waitress at Ruby Tuesday that spilled a soda on you. Nobody else. The end.

@Jimmy Lethal:
Last I checked, New Mexico is a 'Murican state

(although it's an honest mistake to make)

Not all American states are 'Murica. I think you want to focus on the former Confederacy, plus Oklahoma. (BTW, moving to South Carolina in June. Fuck New York.)

Peoples, it is not your vagina or belly the baby is in.
I don't understand how an abortion is murder, IF it is early on.
I'm not even the one who will ever have a baby, SO IT IS NOT MY ISSUE.