# The latest on Rick Santorum
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526
**Category:** The BBQ Pit
**Created:** [May 19, 2005, 2:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526 "2005-05-19T02:57:02Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 3
### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/41 "2005-05-19T12:39:45Z")
What’s with people talking about ‘decomposing’ bodies?; OK, I’m sure that’s _technically correct_, but under normal circumstances, a body doesn’t collapse into a festering puddle of corruption in a few hours. Get some perspective, fercryinoutloud.
I don’t like Santorum (from all the way across the Atlantic, I don’t like him); I find the idea of what he did _unusual_ (actually, not the _idea_, just the extreme he took it to\*), but it’s entirely understandable and not at all disgusting or immoral.
\*Before our two surviving children were born, we suffered two mid-term miscarriages; they didn’t have a chance of survival and in both cases, there wasn’t even a sign of life by the time they had been delivered. In both cases, the hospital staff (after asking a few questions to make sure it was OK) wrapped up the body in a blanket (they were perfectly formed, just very small); left us alone in the room and told us to take as much time as we wanted. We spent an hour or two cradling the lifeless form, holding each other, crying etc.
I don’t think either of us would personally have wanted to take it any further than that, but I don’t think what Santorum did is all that big of a deal - in reality, ‘sleeping with the child’s corpse’, probably actually means ‘lying on a bed, sobbing all night’ and letting the kids cuddle him is probably not that far removed from what the hospital allowed _us_ - I highly doubt the kids took the dead child to the fun park, or took turns dressing him up or anything.
It’s a human body; a few hours after life has ceased; there’s really no need for all this “Eeeeww, ewww, a corpse, a _horrible_ corpse!” nonsense.
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### Author:  [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 1:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/42 "2005-05-19T13:13:35Z")
> [@Mangetout](#):
>
> I highly doubt the kids took the dead child to the fun park, or took turns dressing him up or anything.
Is it bad that that made me laugh?
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### Author:  [@JeffB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JeffB)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/43 "2005-05-19T13:33:42Z")
From a [Washington Post](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A61804-2005Apr17.html) profile of Santorum:
> [@](#):
>
> Upon their son’s death, Rick and Karen Santorum opted not to bring his body to a funeral home. Instead, they bundled him in a blanket and drove him to Karen’s parents’ home in Pittsburgh. There, they spent several hours kissing and cuddling Gabriel with his three siblings, ages 6, 4 and 1 1/2. They took photos, sang lullabies in his ear and held a private Mass.
>
> …
>
> He and Karen brought Gabriel’s body home so their children could “absorb and understand that they had a brother,” Santorum says. “We wanted them to see that he was real,” not an abstraction, he says.
I have to agree that, while unusual, what the Santorums did was not “sick and wrong”.
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### Author:  [@GLWasteful](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GLWasteful)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/44 "2005-05-19T13:46:51Z")
Santorum is a reprehensible bastard who I wouldn’t piss on if he were on fire.
But what he and his wife did does not deserve the condemnation that it has drawn in this thread. They were grieving. And I believe that they are allowed to do so in their own way.
So long as they don’t perfume the corpse with lilacs. Because lilacs are wrong.
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### Author:  [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/45 "2005-05-19T13:58:41Z")
I find it weird, but I always give people dealing with tragedy a massive assload of slack. Even Rick Santorum.
Thankfully, I have not been a situation like that, so I wonder how common the desire to take home an infant that passed away. I bet it’s fairly common.
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### Author:  [@JerH](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JerH)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/46 "2005-05-19T14:10:23Z")
I’d read the _Washington Post_ profile when it came out, and saw that part. I kept thinking of their older children, 20 years later, telling their therapists how they were forced to cuddle a dead baby when they were little.
I’m putting my vote solidly in the “that’s creepy” camp - though I’ve thought Santorum was kind of creepy even without knowing that. It makes me sad that I left Pennsylvania before 2000, and thus only got to vote against him once.
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### Author:  [@fluiddruid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fluiddruid)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/47 "2005-05-19T14:26:08Z")
Ok, I too think it’s weird, but come on, guys. Criticizing a parent in a moment of grief is just beyond the pale. Wanting to touch and show affection to a corpse of a dearly loved one, even a baby, is a primal need. I disagree with his politics, but leave him alone, for Chrissakes.
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### Author:  [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/48 "2005-05-19T14:42:24Z")
> [@E-Sabbath](#):
>
> I just find it surprising they were able to take the body home.
I can only presume (if the story is true) that it’s pure RHIP, which is reprehensible in itself.
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### Author:  [@Spiff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiff)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/49 "2005-05-19T15:03:45Z")
Acronym check in Aisle 6.
RHIP?
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### Author:  [@Mr.Moto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Moto)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/50 "2005-05-19T15:10:02Z")
Rank has its privileges.
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### Author:  [@Spiff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiff)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/51 "2005-05-19T15:25:08Z")
Thanks.
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### Author:  [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/52 "2005-05-19T15:29:38Z")
> [@Mr. Moto](#):
>
> I don’t have the book, but I did a search on some reviews. Apparantly the Santorums just wrapped the baby up and walked out of the hospital.
I highly doubt that as well. Don’t you have to sign papers before you leave a hospital? And I’m assuming that since this was an infant death, it happened soon after birth, so wouldn’t Karen have to be escorted out in a wheelchair? I thought that was hospital policy.
Not to mention whoever was in charge probably got into some serious trouble for what they did. I don’t begrudge them their grief-but this story sounds fishy to me. I doubt its veracity. Not contacting a funeral home? I believe the hospital does that automatically.
Either way, whether it’s true or not, I think Santorum is using the story for political gain, and that pisses me off.
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### Author:  [@Scumpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scumpup)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/53 "2005-05-19T15:29:48Z")
Santorum and I share very little common ground. Hell, he makes Arlen Specter look good. With respect to the whole dead baby discussion, though, I can’t fault him. People deal with death in different ways. Over a seven year period during which I worked at a mortuary, I saw people do all sorts of “unusual” things while grief stricken. I’ll tell you this, too, there is nothing that left people as distraught as the death of a child.
I can’t think of any particular reason to like Rick Santorum. How he handled the death of his child isn’t another reason to dislike him, though.
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### Author:  [@GrizzRich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GrizzRich)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/54 "2005-05-19T16:03:31Z")
I despise Rick Santorum’s politics and position. Frankly, having someone that radically off-center in a position of political power is unsettling to me.
However, I’m a \*“loss-father” and I understand their actions.
I’ll not discuss in any forum if what the Santorums did was ‘right’ or ‘wrong’.
Grieving one’s infant child is an especially painful thing. Often, the pain subsides very slowly, if at all.
\*GrizzCub’s twin-sister died when she was three days old. I held her in my arms as she took her final breath. EVERY milestone the GrizzCub passes is a poingnant moment as his twin-sister is not here to pass it as well.
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### Author:  [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/55 "2005-05-19T16:07:53Z")
**Scumpup** , I’d like to hear more about your job in the mortuary. I’m thinking of getting into a related field myself. If you don’t mind telling me about it, please send me an e-mail!
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### Author:  [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/56 "2005-05-19T16:47:27Z")
Okay, I asked my father if this would be allowed. According to him, there’s no law about releasing dead bodies, and as long as Santorum signed the release form and the hospital allowed it, there’s no problem.
So, I stand corrected. Basically, it doesn’t sound that BAD, a little odd, but grief itself is weird. We all react differently. So, as long as they didn’t force their children to snuggle and play with the body, but simply said, “This is your brother-would you like to hold him before we say goodbye?” then that’s fine.
The part that really creeps me out though is that idea that Santorum’s Hispanic constituents consider him a “holy man.” What the fuck?
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### Author:  [@spectrum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/spectrum)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/57 "2005-05-19T17:07:08Z")
> [@Mr. Moto](#):
>
> She is in many ways a more impressive person than her husband is, a fact he freely admits.
You say that as though it’s an accomplishment to be more impressive than a backwards, gay-hating, freedom-loathing, mealy-mouthed bigot like Rick Santorum.
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### Author:  [@Mr.Moto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Moto)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/58 "2005-05-19T17:20:23Z")
From what I’ve seen, she’s a far more impressive person than you are, sir.
And again, that’s not hard to do.
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### Author:  [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/59 "2005-05-19T17:43:30Z")
I don’t want to interfere with your and **spectrum** ’s little love-fest, but I did think you were damning Mrs. Santorum with faint praise, myself.
Carry on.
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### Author:  [@twickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/twickster)
#### Post date: [May 19, 2005, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-latest-on-rick-santorum/304526/60 "2005-05-19T17:45:18Z")
And someone wanted to know why I started this in the Pit. :rolleyes:
Thanks to those who have pointed out that grief hits different people differently. I come from a tradition (Quaker) where we don’t even have the body (let alone in an open casket) at the funeral – which isn’t called a funeral, but a memorial service. For me, the point of someone who has died is to remember them as a person, not fetishize the physical remains. But, as a couple of people have pointed out, there are other traditions and other ways of doing things.
Can’t help it, though – my first reaction was definitely “ew,” and I still find the whole thing … well, “ew.”
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