'Legitimate rape' – a medieval medical concept (The Guardian)

[Lone_Star_Dem]

The idea that rape victims cannot get pregnant is a very old medical theory

The idea that rape victims cannot get pregnant has long roots. The legal position that pregnancy disproved a claim of rape appears to have been instituted in the UK sometime in the 13th century. One of the earliest British legal texts, Fleta, has a clause in the first book of the second volume stating that:

"If, however, the woman should have conceived at the time alleged in the appeal, it abates, for without a woman's consent she could not conceive."

This was a long-lived legal argument. Samuel Farr's Elements of Medical Jurisprudence contained the same idea as late as 1814:

"For without an excitation of lust, or the enjoyment of pleasure in the venereal act, no conception can probably take place. So that if an absolute rape were to be perpetrated, it is not likely she would become pregnant."

This "absolute rape" is not quite the same as Akin's "legitimate rape". Akin seems to be suggesting that the body suppresses conception or causes a miscarriage, while the earlier idea of Farr relates specifically to the importance of orgasm. Through the medieval and early modern period it was widely thought, by lay people as well as doctors, that women could only conceive if they had an orgasm.

<snip>

Thinking of the sexual organs as mirrors of each other obviously led to questions about the existence of a female "seed" or ejaculate. There was a disagreement about the roles of male and female seed – did they mingle to create the offspring, or did they contribute different things? Whatever the female seed contributed to conception, it was thought necessary, and so in theory a female orgasm was as important as a male orgasm.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/the-h-word/2012/aug/20/legitimate-rape-medieval-medical-concept

This belief from the Middle Ages is basically where modern day conservatives understanding of the female body, and how it functions, stems from.

They honestly have so little respect for women, they've openly embraced a concept from an era when women could not work, do their own banking, and were basically chattel to be bartered and traded.

This is what they want us to be reduced to again.

[seabeyond]

1. the women "worked" in medieval times, i assure you, lol. but ya, i get what you are saying. nt

[Lone_Star_Dem]

2. The only careers they were permitted were subservient/service ones.

It hardly qualifies under today's standards.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

3. The GOPers are stuck in the middle ages on pretty much everything.

[sinkingfeeling]

4. Great bumper sticker: GOP, going back to the 13th. Century.

Also, if a woman can't conceive except when she's 'enjoying' the act, how does artificial insemination happen?

[Lone_Star_Dem]

5. Yeah, and this one too, "Republicans want to take women's rights back to the Middle Ages."

[enlightenment]

6. And those medieval thinkers got the idea

from the ancient Greeks. The belief that women can choose to accept or reject semen/fertilization has been around a very long time.

The Greeks had an excuse - even the medieval thinkers had an excuse. Ignorance about basic biological function was rife, but it isn't anymore. The current batch of nutjobs have no excuse for hauling out this nonsense.

http://books.google.com/books?id=Tfa5TZR8oOQC&lpg=PA230&ots=WHaXEoQ1ed&dq=hippocratic%20corpus%20pregnancy&pg=PA231#v=onepage&q=hippocratic%20corpus%20pregnancy&f=false

Start reading on page 231 . . .

[Lone_Star_Dem]

7. I didn't know the ancient Greeks believed it first.

I can excuse them, and those during the middle ages who believed this, though. They had no way of knowing better yet at that time.

What amazes me is that anyone in modern times could still cling to such an ancient, misinformed belief.

[enlightenment]

8. A convenient misinformed belief, though.

A convenient way of suggesting that some women deserve to be raped - since even they, in their idiocy, know that just saying "some women deserve to be raped" isn't going to play well in Poughkeepsie . . . or anywhere else. Not even in places where the Puritan right is on the ascendent.