Hadley Duvall and the problem with the Incest Exception
I recently heard a podcast from the Washington Post about Hadley Duvall and her story of sexual abuse and pregnancy. I encourage you to read the details of the story here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/12/04/kentucky-abortion-ad/
Hadley was sexually abused by her stepfather since the age of 5, and when she was 12, she got pregnant. He offered her a choice, “She could ‘sneak in’ a boy from the neighborhood and pretend the baby was his, she recalled him saying — or they could take a drive to a clinic in Louisville.” She miscarried instead.
But let’s imagine that instead, abortion was illegal except in cases of rape or incest. Would her stepfather have taken her to get an abortion, admitting to the rape and incest? At the time, she didn’t have the courage to tell her mother what was happening. When she did tell her mother, and then the police, she omitted the pregnancy because just discussing the abuse was difficult enough.
It’s better, if one is making abortion illegal, to have some exceptions. But to ask young girls who are victims of incest to admit the incest while pregnant seems too much. Let’s make their lives easier, not harder.
