Hack of the Day, Part Deux
By …meanwhile, I see Patterico is complaining because Amanda points out that criminalizing abortion is not about protecting fetal life but about regulating female sexuality (and still doesn’t seem to understand that using state coercion to force a woman to carry a pregnancy to term is punishment; the fact that women don’t get criminal sentences just makes the statutes irrational if protecting fetal life rather than regulating sexuality was the underlying motive.) But OK, let’s take him at his word: he doesn’t want to punish women, per se, he’s merely indifferent to the fact that abortion bans punish women while lacking any coherent conception of “fetal life.” Rather, he just has the same attitude about the agency of women as the 19th-century legislators that passed the abortion ban struck down in Roe: “Morally blameworthy or not, these women are often more pathetic and desperate than the doctors who kill dozens or hundreds of babies a year.” Ah, being “pathetic” or “desperate” exempts you from legal punishment for a violent crime–I’m sure Patterico applies this equally to male defendants! In related news, the L.A. District Attorney’s Office has been closed as all of California’s criminal statutes have been repealed for lack of enforceability.