Feministing has a poll up about birth control methods that got a lot of interesting comments, especially about some that are more innovative or long-term like the implant, sterilization, etc.
H/t to another of my A-list blogs, Pandagon, for directing me to The Pill Kills. It’s an online campaign to make birth control illegal because it’s dangerous for women’s health and it hinders the implantation of a fertilized egg in the uterus (i.e. kills babies). The best estimate I can find for the numbers on breakthrough ovulation and rates of fertilization says that this occurs maybe 1% of the time. A lot of feminists, like in Amanda Marcotte’s post, believe that the real motivation behind things like this is to keep women from controlling their fertility. I think it’s true that in a lot of cases, a scary video and a dramatic list of side effects are a cover for a thoughtless, across-the-board opposition to birth control. I also don’t think the pill is quite so liberating as some feminist writers believe. The control that it gives a woman over her fertility also comes with the burden of birth control being placed entirely on her–remembering to take it every day, paying for it, dealing with the side effects, etc.
I’m not meaning to say that I think the pill is bad or that it’s a tool of oppression or anything like that, and I obviously don’t think it should be illegal, but reading about this campaign just led my thoughts this way. This is just to say that it’s hard to liberate women from every kind of oppression when it comes to birth control, and even though I and most women don’t feel particularly burdened by taking the pill, there is some unfairness to it. Male birth control, anyone?
What if the male birth control’s testosterone overload makes me more aggressive and hairy, and makes my breasts tender?
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[...] the pro-choice bloggers that wrote about the American Life League’s The Pill Kills campaign, including this one, and I thought I’d link to all those fine blogs myself. Below the fold you’ll find a [...]