tbh as feminists we should be more concerned by the over-normalization of hormonal birth control
for the people wondering:
first of all because hormonal birth control is a medical intervention, for a medical purpose, but I know more and more girls who view it as a rite of passage for becoming a woman who may at one point become sexually active. It’s a serious medical intervention that comes with a host of risks and side effects and is not generalizeable to every condition or need. I know more women on hormonal birth control than I do off it, and many of them are not sexually active. saying that because so many women take it it’s “normal” or “not that big a deal” is wildly underestimating the potential for complications or problems, which can include anything from persistent acne to blood clots (one of which gave my mother a pulmonary embolism and put her in the hospital).
second of all, hormonal birth control is treated as a catch-all for a host of medical problems, and it’s not. things like genuine contraception (avoiding pregnancy from PIV sex) are completely different needs from PCOS, endometriosis, severe period cramps, irregular periods, and other reproductive problems, and the reason hormonal birth control is considered a catch-all for these many different conditions is because of a lack of research and funding into women’s health and developing alternatives. We need lesser alternatives for women who take hormonal birth control for things like period cramps, because this need is completely different from PCOS or from contraception. This lack of research and funding is the same reason that hormonal birth control can also be very dangerous for some women, or have unforseen and often irreversible side effects.
third of all, birth control in general has done very little to fundamentally change women’s sexual position in society for the better. like all medical or scientific advancements, what matters is what you do with it because objectively it’s neither good nor bad it just is. but birth control in general has just served to make women more sexually accessible to men now that pregnancy is less of a concern, and this has facilitated things like hookup culture and, to a certain extent, rape culture and sex trafficking. combined with the reasons previously listed, hormonal birth control should especially be a concern.
Not to mention that condoms are only used in 10% of all porn scenes because it is assumed that the woman is on birth control… So that means STDs are spreading across porn stars. It is estimated that more than half of all porn stars have herpes, which is uncurable
Also, note how birth control has backed up the claim that pregnancy is just the woman’s responsibility and not the man’s. It’s like, conservatives say ‘’She shouldn’t have had sex if she didn’t want to become pregnant’’ and liberals say ‘’She should be on birth control if she doesn’t want to get pregnant’’… It’s been years since birth control was put on the mass market and yet there is no demand for a male equivalent of the pill?
What bothers me most about birth control is it’s a bad answer to a real problem. If women want to not get pregnant, the best way is to not do PIV, but suggesting this sparks enormous outrage. Hetbi women acting like not having PIV is equivalent of asking them to pledge to life in a nunnery. As if lesbians just don’t have sex. As if PIV isn’t frequently the most painful, boring, and anxiety inducing part of het sex. The reality is women know they will be dumped instantly when she tells a prospective male partner she won’t do PIV, and they refuse to live without male partnership. So now instead of examining why women seek out sex which is unpleasurable, dangerous, and outright terrifying for them, we can keep on happily not having to answer any hard questions, because we’ve made PIV safer for women. Sort of. Except now we have depression, suicide, permanent dental damage, blood clots to deal with instead. Yay sex positivity.
And there’s this expectation that you’re just supposed to endure the crippling side-effects until you find The One. Deal with headaches, nausea, appetite changes, irregular spotting, cramping, and more for three months to see if it regulates. If not, switch to a new formulation. Repeat process. Spend literal years of your life and hundreds or thousands of dollars trying to find the right pill so you can have PIV, when a condom is reversible and does the same thing.
Don’t like daily pills? How about implanting a foreign device in your uterus, which involves piercing your cervix to place it? Or making an incision in your arm to implant a rod that slowly releases hormones? And if you have side-effects, you can’t just stop taking it. You have to make an appointment with your doctor to have them remove it, if you can convince them you don’t want to ~*wait a few months for everything to regulate*~
I’m grateful for contraception and family planning solutions, but we are being seriously sold short.
(via destroyyourbinder)
