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PA BILL GETS TOUGH ON RAPE VICTIMS


doggie

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I am just really starting to love republicans. the heartfelt love they have for woman is overwhelming.

A bill in the Pennsylvania House proposing the reduction of welfare benefits for low-income women contains a provision requiring a woman who became pregnant from rape to prove that she reported her assault. As ThinkProgress reported, the measure, proposed by five Republican state lawmakers, seeks to eliminate an increase in benefits if a child is conceived while a woman is covered under the Temporary Assistance To Needy Family program. A woman can seek an exception to this if the child is conceived as a result of rape. However, she must prove that she reported the incident to the authorities and gave the police her assaulter's identity. The bill reads:

Elimination of benefits under subsection (d) shall not apply to any child conceived as a result of rape or incest if the department: (1) receives a non-notarized, signed statement from the pregnant woman stating that she was a victim of rape or incest, as the case may be, and that she reported the crime, including the identity of the offender, if known, to a law enforcement agency having the requisite jurisdiction or, in the case of incest where a pregnant minor is the victim, to the county child protective service agency and stating the name of the law enforcement agency or child protective service agency to which the report was made and the date such report was made.

According to the Rape, Abuse, & Incest National Network, 54 percent of rapes and sexual assaults are not reported to the police. Last month, New Mexico's Children, Youth and Families Department considered a similar measure that would have only exempted victims of "forcible rape" from having to file child support claims against an absent parent. Gov. Susana Martinez ® quickly pulled the "forcible" language after the proposal sparked backlash. (H/T: ThinkProgress)

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As ThinkProgress reported, the measure, proposed by five Republican state lawmakers, seeks to eliminate an increase in benefits if a child is conceived while a woman is covered under the Temporary Assistance To Needy Family program.

WTF...why is this even a thing? Yeah, we don't want women to have abortions or get free birth control, so let's make it really hard for them to have their baby and raise it. That'll show 'em! Asshats.

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I was just reading something the other day about how many women who go to the ER to report rape and get an exam are turned away. What are those women supposed to do?

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"According to the Rape, Abuse, & Incest National Network, 54 percent of rapes and sexual assaults are not reported to the police."

With good reason. I speak from experience.

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WTF...why is this even a thing? Yeah, we don't want women to have abortions or get free birth control, so let's make it really hard for them to have their baby and raise it. That'll show 'em! Asshats.

Those evil harlots need to be punished for daring to have sex, or luring men to rape them!

:roll:

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WTF...why is this even a thing? Yeah, we don't want women to have abortions or get free birth control, so let's make it really hard for them to have their baby and raise it. That'll show 'em! Asshats.

Do these same lawmakers approve of free birth control for men and women? No? Then they should help themselves to an extra large cup of shut the fuck up.

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Do these same lawmakers approve of free birth control for men and women? No? Then they should help themselves to an extra large cup of shut the fuck up.

These are also the same lawmakers who (like Sarah Palin) think that rape victims should be forced to pay for their own rape kits and medical exams.

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A friend of mine was raped over the summer, she was attacked by two men while hiking on the Appalachian Trail. The men had a knife besides raping and beating her the also cut her with the knife she's fairly sure that they would have killed her if a family who was walking the trail hadn't scared them away. Since the rape my friend has found out just how effed up the system can be the hospital reported her rape without her consent, then they lost evidence. The detective handling her case has from the start did more investigating of her than the crime. Recently the detective asked to talk to me and basically told me that they knew she was lying about being raped, and that they believed that I knew she was lying. The detective tried to scare me into throwing my friend under the bus by making a statement saying I knew she was lying. The dectective went so far as to tell me I could be charged with her for filing a false report. If this is the type of justice rape victims can expect, why are they surprised when women don't want to report being raped?

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We hear how many stories of rape victims being accused of lying after their assaults? No wonder victims don't report the rapes!

Sometimes I swear our justice system is more interested in protecting the attackers than the victims. :evil:

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Obviously this law is aimed at "unwed harlots" who drop their knickers for the first man who buys them a drink.

But I wonder what do they expect a married couple to do? A married couple legitimately have sex, in fact many of the fundies do not think that a wife should ever turn her husband down for sex. Nor do they accept birth control as that would be interfering with what god wants. So you have a married couple with a few kids, the husband loses his job and they need TAFN for a while. Is the wife supposed to refuse her husband sex just in case they conceive?

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A friend of mine was raped over the summer, she was attacked by two men while hiking on the Appalachian Trail. The men had a knife besides raping and beating her the also cut her with the knife she's fairly sure that they would have killed her if a family who was walking the trail hadn't scared them away. Since the rape my friend has found out just how effed up the system can be the hospital reported her rape without her consent, then they lost evidence. The detective handling her case has from the start did more investigating of her than the crime. Recently the detective asked to talk to me and basically told me that they knew she was lying about being raped, and that they believed that I knew she was lying. The detective tried to scare me into throwing my friend under the bus by making a statement saying I knew she was lying. The dectective went so far as to tell me I could be charged with her for filing a false report. If this is the type of justice rape victims can expect, why are they surprised when women don't want to report being raped?

Wow. That's a horrible story. I'm sorry for what you and your friend went through. :(

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A friend of mine was raped over the summer, she was attacked by two men while hiking on the Appalachian Trail. The men had a knife besides raping and beating her the also cut her with the knife she's fairly sure that they would have killed her if a family who was walking the trail hadn't scared them away. Since the rape my friend has found out just how effed up the system can be the hospital reported her rape without her consent, then they lost evidence. The detective handling her case has from the start did more investigating of her than the crime. Recently the detective asked to talk to me and basically told me that they knew she was lying about being raped, and that they believed that I knew she was lying. The detective tried to scare me into throwing my friend under the bus by making a statement saying I knew she was lying. The dectective went so far as to tell me I could be charged with her for filing a false report. If this is the type of justice rape victims can expect, why are they surprised when women don't want to report being raped?

This is proving once again that rape is the only crime in which the victim becomes the accused. Sickening.

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This is proving once again that rape is the only crime in which the victim becomes the accused. Sickening.

Agree this is horrible. It is so ashame America is still backwards concerning rape and incest victims.

TANF only pays 83 dollars per additional child. So it not that making parents rich

And TANF benefits cap at five years.

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I was genuinely appealed at that particular police officers behavior, I grew up around cops and I knew he couldn't charge me with jack shit, because I hadn't made any statement prior to his contacting me. I didn't even find out about the rape until a day after it had happened. I'm not a witness to anything just the friend of a victim anything she might have told me would be considered hearsay by the court.The fact that he hadn't even considered I might know enough about the law to know he was bullshitting me and trying his damnedest to intimidate me into incriminating my friend really pissed me off. I really feel horrible for anyone young or naive enough to be bullied out of seeking justice for their rape by this asshole. There was a female detective that was so harsh on my friend she was in tears for hours after having to go over her story multiple times and being told repeatedly that she was lying and holding things back just because she forgot the exact details of an errand she had run earlier on the day of the rape. The whole situation pisses me off, because they aren't the one left to talk my friend out of suicide after they convinced her that maybe she was at least partially to blame.

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WTF...why is this even a thing? Yeah, we don't want women to have abortions or get free birth control, so let's make it really hard for them to have their baby and raise it. That'll show 'em! Asshats.

That's already the rule in NJ, since 1996 under PRWORA.

I work at the county welfare agency (ducking!) They call children born after 10 months of your case starting a "capped child." The kid gets added to your Medicaid and your food stamps go up, but not your cash. It's explained when you apply.

I kind of understand it. Working people's paychecks don't go up just because they have a child.

At least NJ Medicaid does cover birth control pills and abortions.

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These are also the same lawmakers who (like Sarah Palin) think that rape victims should be forced to pay for their own rape kits and medical exams.

I'm not American, so this may be a stupid question, but is the emergency room free if you go there to report a rape?

This story makes me SO angry!

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I'm not American, so this may be a stupid question, but is the emergency room free if you go there to report a rape?

This story makes me SO angry!

No. The emergency room is never free unless you literally have absolutely nothing with which to pay.

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No. The emergency room is never free unless you literally have absolutely nothing with which to pay.

One of my friends broke his arm, didn't have insurance (was between jobs, so no money either) and needed the arm set by a specialist. He remembered the hospital was a non-profit and told the person shaking him down that the hospital could write it off on their taxes as charitable care. He also hinted he might file a complaint with the IRS if they didn't start handing out charitable care, starting with him.

This was some years ago, and given the fact that so many people use the emergency room as their primary care physician, I suspect even non-profit hospitals are using their charitable care allocation to the limit.

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I'm not American, so this may be a stupid question, but is the emergency room free if you go there to report a rape?

This story makes me SO angry!

The ER doesn't charge you up front and it isn't supposed to refuse to give you care. However, they bill you and the cost is pretty high. You can make payments but if you don't have the money then the tax payers have to cover your bill. It is a screwed up system. People sometimes wait to seek help until their condition is more severe which means that the cost of treating them is even higher. Universal health care would probably save us money but people are too frightened of socialism to establish something so logical. I think that I read that something like 25,000 Americans die a year because they lack health care.

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One of my other forums lost a dear poster thanks to our fucked up health care system. She had Crohn's disease but couldn't afford treatment due to lack of insurance. She treated her symptoms with Imodium.

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