Is there such a thing as "Birth Rape"?

[jedimaster91]

So this is what happens when EWs give birth? Just because things don't go according to YOUR plan doesn't mean doctors, nurses, etc.. are trying to take advantage of you. Things don't always go according to plan - especially with children.

One of my best friends just gave birth to her daughter. C wanted as natural a birth as possible. However, she has multiple major health issues and the doctors had to intervene. C is a reasonable person and when the docs told her things weren't going well, she let them do their thing. She is just greatful that her beautiful daughter was born healthy.

Ok, I looked into this in more detail than I would ever want to. There are people crying "Birth Rape" when in one circumstance the Doctor had to reach in and untangle the umbilical cord before it...you know...kinda strangled the kid to death.

Li'l Bro was born 6 weeks early with the cord wrapped around his neck. Had he been born term, he probably would have been stillborn or died during delivery. I'm glad for whatever the doctor did that saved Li'l Bro's life. I would think these women would be glad for an intervention that saves their kids. Geeze.

[Lachrymose]

Sorry, I was really responding to everything else but the birth rape part.
Eg.

Video Games: "Man, he raped you all game!"
Paychecks: "Man, the government raped my paycheck!"

They both COULD fit the non-sexual definitions of rape.

[Jester]

Um. You choose to have a child, you don't choose to be raped.

Not entirely true.

There are many women who have children who did not choose to. Beyond actual rape or incest, there are many, many unplanned pregnancies, and thus unplanned (and unchosen) births. My little sister is such an example. After having had a girl (my older sister) and a boy (me) four years apart, my parents were happy and content. My little sister is 16 months younger than me. She was a surprise. My parents did not "choose" to have her as they did with my older sister and myself. Another example: my best friend has two daughters. She had one at 19 and one at 31. Guess which one she "chose" to have? Right. The second one. The first one was quite an unplanned event.

But that being said, a child you did not necessarily choose to have is no more rape than any other thing that happens to you that you did not choose that is not rape. Some examples from my own life:

I did not choose to shatter my jaw at 16.
I did not choose to have my truck rear-ended in New Orleans in '98.
I did not choose to get dicked out of hundreds of dollars by a couple of former roommates.
I did not choose to experience any of the countless bicycle crashes I have been involved in.
I did not choose to be robbed at gunpoint in Los Angeles many years ago.
I did not choose to get sucker-punched any of the three times I have been sucker-punched.
I did not choose to have my heart broken when my ex-fiance dumped me years ago, or any other time I have had my heart broken.
I did not choose to have my father die and leave my life when I was but a boy of 10.
I did not choose to have any of my friends die who have.

These are several instances of traumatic events from my life that I did not choose to experience. And not one of them is an example of rape.

Not choosing something that happens to you is not rape.
And not all traumatic events are rape.

I don't care what the dictionary says. As our society defines it, rape is the unwanted sexual violation of one person by another by means of force, be it physical or chemically-induced. Rape is rape. One of the most horrible, terrifying, and traumatic things that can happen to a person, male or female. It is a terrible thing and should never be tolerated, period.

Equating an event that did not go as you planned or had some trauma to it to rape is simply disengenuous and takes away from the horror that is rape, and oftentimes also takes away from the other traumatic experience that is being equated to rape.

People need to stop being idiot, and stop saying they were "raped" when they were not, in fact, raped.

Period, end of story, good night, drive safely.

[anakhouri]

But even if your pregnancy is unplanned, you don't have to have the child. You can choose to terminate the pregnancy instead. If you give birth, it's because you made the choice to have the baby.

I'm sure some people have had bad experiences, particularly in the past. But I know that with all the complications of my delivery (and there were a lot), my midwife and the doctor told me exactly what they were going to do and why. I can't imagine being utterly traumatized and having PTSD just from having a baby.

[Kimmik]

Ok I am going to weigh in though my common sense is telling me not to.

As someone who has been raped and molested, and as someone that has had a horrific birth of a child.. I can say that while both are extremely horrific experiences I think that being raped was worse.

With my son, it was traumatic over a long period of time, but I could have chosen to end it the day everything went wrong. I chose to subject myself to trauma to try and give my son a fighting chance.

Being raped and molested... there was no choice for me to make. I didnt have any say in how I was violated.

I am sorry but when you do things that can bring about a pregnancy you pretty much give up privacy of your vagina. I had so many people poke and prod my vagina that any modesty that I had went right out the window but that was a price I knew that I was going to pay.

I am not over sensitive to the word rape as it has various meanings and is used in some old recipes. But this is one case that just pisses me off. Giving birth is no where near any of the definitions of rape. It may be as traumatic to some, especially in woman that are not prepared or have shitty doctors that do not inform them of what is going to happen, especially in the first birth.

[suchislife2]

IF the doc has to jam their entire arm up my womanhood in order to save my child...I don't give a flying rats ass! This "birth rape" is utter bull!

Can I claim "rape" every time I go to get a pap-smear? All maner of things can be stuck in there for that, depending on where you go and who you go with. HELL when you go for an ultrasound sometimes they do an internal one!

I'm sick of stuff like this...grrrr

p.s.

Appologies for not justifying my anger...in the low tollerence stage of pregnancy I'm here to blow off steam before I rip someone a new one for the sake of it!

[ExiledV20]

Over in LJ-land we have a name for moms like this.
They all live in the Booj.

[blas87]

Join me in on the whole thing being considered a very inapropriate term.

Most of the time I am against doctors and think most of them are high and mighty and full of shit, but at times, I also think people make poor decisions during their pregnancy or just with their overall health in general, and will blame doctors for the bad results that occur from those decisions.

One of my coworkers told me (and I don't even plan to have children) that if I ever planned to get pregnant, to NOT go to this doctor because she was "responsible" for a woman's baby dying just days before it was supposed to be born. I would imagine that that would have been malpractice if it were truly proven to be the doctor's fault, and she wouldn't be a doctor anymore. I didn't want to start an argument with her, I just told her that that was once my lady doctor when I was younger and still on my parents' insurance and I'd never had a problem with her.