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You are here: Experts > Health/Fitness > Women's Health > Abortion - Pro Choice Views > This isn't right
Expert: Danielle - 10/21/2008
Question
Hello there. This isn't a question about abortion from a medical standpoint. I guess I am just interested in getting your opinion as something. During the course of writing a paper for school on violence against women, I stumbled across a couple of cases where the fact that the female victim had once made the decision to terminate a pregnancy was brought up. In once case, the defence attorney actually implied that we should feel sympathy for the defendant(who brutally stabbed his girlfriend to death in front of her horrified colleagues!) who was "devestated" when he found out his girlfriend had aborted "his child". This man by the way had a history of abusing women. She left him because he beat her. In the second case, the defence attorney brought it up in order to make the woman appear "trashy" and "slutty". She apparently had multiple sex partners, and had had more than one abortion. So I guess that meant that it was OKAY for her husband to strangle her to death. This is unbelievable!
I couldn't help but be mad. I'm not big on abortion myself, I don't think I would have one. But it IS legal, and women DO have the right to decide for themselves. So if it is legal, why is it allowed to be used an excuse to murder a woman? They haven't done anything wrong legally, and the abortion issue is one that people disagree on. There is no right or wrong answer, it's a matter of opinion. IT's just sickening in general to hear these lawyers make excuses for why men abuse/murder women. Even if she had had TWENTY abortions, that doesn't give him the right to murder her. And he had a role to play in the unintended pregnancy too, which is something people seem to forget. Thanks.
Carmen
Answer
Hi Carmen :)
It's disgusting. No matter how horrifying the situation, people will find some way to blame it on the woman, when in reality it's NOT her fault. People always try and misconstrue it so the blame is taken off the abuser, and it really doesn't make any sense. The focus should be that the man is an abuser, not that the woman had an abortion, or how many people she had sex with, which should have no role whatsoever in court cases. I think they're trying to appeal to misogynistic feelings. If they can somehow take people's fear of women's sexuality (hence bringing up sex partners) and control (abortions), we can convince people it's really HER fault! You're absolutely right, it shouldn't be an "excuse". It's outright hateful, and should be called out for what it is, especially since it's so disturbingly common. It's really depressing, but hopefully the more people call out lawyers for pulling crap like that, the more it will be known.
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