‘God’s Little Shield’: A Short History Of The False No-Pregnancy-From-Rape Theory

Rep. Todd Akin is far from the only conservative to suggest women rarely get pregnant from rape. He’s not even the first lawmaker to make the assertion (which flies in the face of medical evidence).

A search of news archives by TPM shows a short history of Republican politicians espousing the idea of a biological defense against pregnancy in cases of rape, though there’s little consistency in their explanations of how such a mechanism works.

In 1988, Stephen Freind, a state representative in Delaware, defended his no-exceptions anti-abortion stance — as Akin was doing Sunday — by claiming that it was virtually impossible for a woman who is raped to become pregnant.

“The odds are one in millions and millions and millions,” Freind said in a debate in March of that year. “And there is a physical reason for that.”

Freind said that women possess a “certain secretion” that kills sperm.

“Rape, obviously, is a traumatic experience. When that traumatic experience is undergone, a woman secretes a certain secretion, which has a tendency to kill sperm.”

Freind promised to provide scientific documentation of his theory and told a cheering crowd later that month, “If you’re expecting me to back off, the answer is no.”

Read more from TPM’s Pema Levy at TalkingPointsMemo.com…