Rep. Todd Akin, the newly-christened GOP Senate nominee in Missouri, believes that “legitimate rape” rarely causes pregnancy. He said that he understood from doctors that pregnancy from rape is really rare. He further noted that if it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.
Given that the phrase “legitimate rape” is confusing many, thegarlic has decided to define it as well as the phrase “illegitimate rape” using the Oxford English Dictionary. First we focus on legitimate rape. The meanings of legitimate according to the dictionary given in quotes below are used to combine it with the word rape.
- A legitimate rape is “in accordance with established or accepted patterns and standards”.
- A legitimate rape is “given a lawful or legal character or authorized by legal enactment”.
- A legitimate rape is given “the legitimacy by an authoritative declaration or decree”.
- A legitimate rape is “authorized or justified by word or example”.
It is not clear which meaning Rep. Todd Aiken was using in his remarks on abortion.
It is now possible to define illegitimate rape in a similar way.
- An illegitimate rape is “not legitimate, not in accordance with or authorized by law; unauthorized, unwarranted; spurious; irregular, improper”.
- An illegitimate rape is “not in accordance with rule or reason; not correctly deduced or inferred”.
- An illegitimate rape is “naturally or physiologically abnormal”.
The aim of these definitions was to clarify what Rep. Aiken meant but it appears that the aim may not have been been met!!
