A remedial exam for the woefully ill-informed—with answers provided by actual Republicans.
Jessica ValentiRepublicans: Do your friends make fun of you for your shameful lack of awareness on women’s issues? Have to vote on a bill that will legislate uteruses but not quite sure you know what that word means? Well, look no further—this quiz will help hone your lady-legislating skills with expert knowledge from your peers. Remember to use a number-two pencil, and no looking at your neighbor’s paper.
1. What is rape?
a. A “forcible” assault. Minors, incest victims and date-rape victims need not apply.
b. A figment of women’s imagination.
c. “The violation of a chaste woman, against her will, by some party not her spouse.”
d. Something that happens to drunk sluts.
2. What do we know about pregnancy that occurs after a rape?
a. It’s a God-given gift. Enjoy!
b. No such thing. The vagina employs bio-bouncers that will “shut that whole thing down.”
c. Impossible, because “the juices don’t flow.”
d. Trick question. There’s no such thing as rape. Duh.
3. How does emergency contraception work?
a. Melts snowflake babies.
b. Turns women into wanton harlots. Proceed with caution.
d. The cause of teen sex cults—distribute widely!
4. How does the birth control pill work?
a. You take one every time you have sex. The more pills you take, the sluttier you are.
c. Enacts a protective shield around the genital area that only holy water and/or Burt Reynolds can penetrate.
d. You put it between your knees when you run out of aspirin.
5. What words are appropriate to use when describing a woman’s “down there”?
a. Hoo-hah. (please pronounce as such)
b. “V.” (See: “trans-v,” Natalie Portman.)
c. *silence*
d. “Mine.”
For correct answers please stop talking to, sleeping with and voting for Republicans.
For more from The Nation on the latest iteration of Republican ignorance on women’s issues—that would be Missouri Senate candidate Todd Akin saying that pregnancies don’t result from "legitimate rape"—read Ilyse Hogue’s The Danger of Laughing at Todd Akin.
Jessica ValentiTwitterJessica Valenti is the author of Why Have Kids?: A New Mom Explores the Truth about Parenting and Happiness. She has also written three other books on feminism, including The Purity Myth: How America’s Obsession with Virginity is Hurting Young Women, which was recently made into a documentary. She is editor of the award-winning anthology Yes Means Yes: Visions of Female Sexual Power and a World Without Rape and the founder of Feministing.com, which Columbia Journalism Review calls “head and shoulders above almost any writing on women’s issues in mainstream media.” Jessica was the recipient of the 2011 Hillman Journalism Prize and was called one of the Top 100 Inspiring Women in the world by The Guardian.