hat victims of rape and incest want to abort children con- ceived in these horrible circumstances is one of the most common myths in the abortion debate.
Not only is it untrue that most victims of sexual assault want to abort their babies, the small minority who do are nearly always regretful.1
Women who have been through these terrible situations are the only ones who know the truth, so let’s let the victims speak for themselves.
What do rape victims report?
• Two major studies of pregnant rape victims found that 3/4 of these women chose to give birth.2
• None of the women who gave birth said they did not want their children or wished they had aborted instead.3
• Of those who aborted, nearly half did so because of the demands of others.4
• 94% of women who gave birth said abortion would not be a good solution to a pregnancy resulting from rape.6
• 93% of those who had abortions said it “had not been a good solution to their problems” and they “would not recommend it to others in their situation”5 rejected abortion as a good option for incest related pregnancies.”9
Why don’t rape and incest victims choose abortion?10
Victims of rape and incest generally believe abortion would be another act of violence committed against their bodies. Abortion is a form of “medical rape”—an unwanted, violent intru- sion into their bodies. Victims gener- ally have a heightened awareness of the value of life and respect for others, so they respect the life they carry within them. Victims believe their child’s life may have meaning or purpose they don’t yet understand. They believe they were given this child for a reason.
Making it through the pregnancy is a way for a victim to overcome the abuse. The selfless act of giving birth is proof that she is better than her attacker. For the victim of incest, pregnancy is a way out—a way to expose the criminal who is abusing her and to allow her to begin to heal.11
Should a person’s worth be based on how he or she was conceived?
How we are conceived does not determine who we will be. One victim wrote, “I worried about the ‘genetic’ scares people tell you about: how this tiny number of cases, they