If there were a reliable, effective contraceptive for men would.....

Because this isn't the Iron Age where a woman is property of her father who's sole role is to be married and produce heirs (without her say in the matter, or her lover's).

Most women who have recreational sex wouldn't want to get married to someone they don't have a close relationship with anyway (unless perhaps they're in a fundamentalist cult and thinks that God will damn them to hell for whoredom if they don't, lol). Even in the 1950s no one thought this way outside of some fundamental Baptist or Mormon church (other than the extremely young or naive).

That's not to say they thought people should sleep around wantonly with no desire to ever have a relationship, but I can guarantee you that even back in the 1950s, the majority of girls who became pregnant unexpectedly did not think they should marry the man (nor want to) if they knew there was no real love there. And such a relationship would not be good for the children.

 

Both parties are equally "to blame," but nobody's really doing anything wrong unless they don't take responsibility for it. I'm pro-choice, so there is that. Beyond that, it's much like drinking. You can do it responsibly and it's fine, or be irresponsible. If reliable birth control is used, it can still happen, but not very often. If it does happen, both parties need to be prepared to face consequences. But it's much the same with anything you do. I enjoy jumping off of rocks in the river too. If I'm not careful, I might hurt myself. There is the matter of an innocent 3rd party here, but I don't consider that person to exist until >20 weeks gestation.

 

Where, where, where did you live in the 1950s? I can tell you that the majority of girls who became pregnant unplanned did not know they were having "recreational sex", they thought their sex was a deep expression of love. The idea that it was recreational sex was strictly male. And they did think they should marry the man, and even men thought they should marry the woman. A man who skipped out was looked down upon. And whether such a relationship was good for children is debatable, but surely it was better than having a child reared as a bastard. At least at that time, considering the shame that was heaped upon an unmarried mother and spilled over onto the child.

 

That's still true today with many young people, nevertheless it is still recreational sex since it was not intended for procreation whether or not she thought she was in love.

That's not true, it was just less socially acceptable for a woman to say she enjoyed recreational sex than it would've been for a man to. And of course what people did and do in practice isn't the same as what it is politically or religiously correct to talk about.

Plus some women might feel pressured to "marry" if they had an unplanned pregnancy, but they did not always marry the young man who made the kid.

I'm sure the attitude existed culturally, especially in more "redneck" parts of the states, but in practice I can guarantee you that many people did not think that young people marrying simply because they had a kid was a "good idea" if they weren't old enough or compatible enough to have a relationship.

Even Bertrand Russell back in 1936 was smarter than that:

http://www.utilitarian.org/texts/oursexethics.html

This attitude comes from very primitive cultures and times (ex. Iron Age israel) in which a woman's status was more like "property" and family had more say in marriage than she did, and in which she was almost totally financially dependent on the man for financial support.

Many women (esp today) would not want to marry the person who get them pregnant if they realized it was a mistake of their youth, the "man should marry her" crowd apparently forgets that today women are individuals, not property and actually have something known as.... a say in the matter

Better for keeping up appearances? Sure.

Better in practice, no.

I think that most people today would agree that a man who gets a woman pregnant should step up and help raise and support the child he created, but they would not agree that he and a woman should marry or enter a monogamous relationship on that reason alone if they're not compatible (unless they're still stuck in the 1950s and before), since that would be bad for all parties involved, child included. I'd think most people would agree that the two should keep their relationship strictly about raising the kid, and each find another partner who they're actually compatible with for marriage.

 

It was not socially acceptable for a woman to talk about having sex for recreation, enjoyable or not. The 1950s was well before reliable birth control (the pill or any other hormonal BC) was available, so sex was more commonly thought of in connection with procreation, whereas today, people think about "recreational" sex.

Those who thought a pregnancy shouldn't result in marriage would have been a minority at that time. Though abortion was available it was dangerous and therefore frowned upon. And illegitimate children were definitely frowned upon.

Nevertheless that attitude was prevalent in the 1950s. You may call it primitive if you wish, but that is the way people thought at that time. And that attitude is still held by some. If the anti-choicers should prevail, and abortion in criminalized again, don't you think that shaming of unmarried pregnant women will happen once more?

Sure a lot of forced marriages ended in divorce, but a lot of them appear to have succeeded in happy marriages.

Today is quite different from the 1950s. That is why the right-wingers keep lobbying government to force a return to that time.

 

In the media? Definitely not, that doesn't mean that no one ever did outside of the public eye. Apparently you missed the Roaring 20s? There was quite an industry built on sex appeal even during that age; it just may have been missed by people living in rural areas.

In practice I guarantee you that people were smarter than to really believe that young people marrying just because of pregnancy was a good idea. What was acceptable to say, and what the common man actually did and thought were 2 different things.

Even Shakespeare in Romeo and Juliet understood the concept of young people foolishly marrying just because they had sex/or so they could have sex (and this was in the Renaissance era).

You're over-exaggerating - the attitudes and practices fluctuated quite a bit - these attitudes were more prominent in rural, religious areas than they were in large cities for example.

Happily ever after indeed:

The actual attitudes and practices of the 1950s are quite exaggerated - even in old sitcoms like Father Knows Best and Leave it to Beaver for example, the marriages were shown as fairly egalitarian (you never seen Ward Cleaver telling June to get back in the kitchen, or caning her), so even during that day and age, the Iron Age, religious fundamentalist attitude toward women and marriage was still an extreme, not the norm.

 

LOL, I definitely missed the roaring 20s, and I believe you did too, so be careful of describing how things were "back then."

Perhaps Shakespeare understood quite well the perils of forced marriage since Anne Hathaway was pregnant when they wed and Shakespeare was only 18 at the time. You don't seem to grasp how shameful an unwed pregnancy was for a woman. And an illegitimate child even more shameful. A woman would endure an unhappy marriage to avoid that shame and stigma. The 50s was just the beginning of the idea of romantic love being essential to marriage. Marriage was seen as just the way the world worked, that is, men had jobs or businesses to make money which they used to support wives and families. Women needed marriage to earn their way in the world (paying jobs for women were few and frowned upon for married women), and to avoid being a financial drain on their birth families. Many a marriage was a result of pragmatism rather than "finding your soul mate."

True.

I hope you aren't suggesting that anything in those sitcoms portrayed reality. Just because most men didn't beat their wives (but if they did, there was little consequence to them), doesn't mean they didn't have control over their wives, the financial power pretty assured them control. It was the 60s when it began to be acceptable for married women to hold jobs, it was the 60s when reliable birth control became available, and women began to exert power of their own. The combination of financial freedom and the ability to control reproduction gave women power they had never had before. And we're hanging onto that power, we're never going back.

 

I would think that such a contraceptive for men would help to reduce abortions.

 

Good lord. So, the success of this depends on men volunteering to have a needle jammed into their scrotum. And since no one is saying how long this form of contraception lasts, it may have to be done more than once. I don't see many 18-35 year old American males lining up for this. I could be wrong, but I just don't see it taking off.

 

Yep! Nothing like it. Had one right after my daughter was born in '98. Since divorced, I'm secure in knowing that the two I have are all that I ever have, or ever will produce. We made our replacements, one son, one daughter, and the Circle of Life is balanced. One is 20 and a Junior in college, the other is 17 and graduates in June. My ex-wife, OTOH, now has a four year old at age 46. She'll be 60 when this one graduates, while I'll be 48 with two adult offspring. I guess she should've had the tubal, lol...

 

The more contraceptives we have the more abortions and unwanted children we have...
So I would say no.

 

What?! Do you know what contraceptives are??????

 

I think the difficulty might be with the world "effective"

 

How is it much different than a vasectomy in terms of needles etc? In vasectomy, your scrotum is cut open, this seems considerably less invasive.

 

When sharp pointy objects are applied to one's scrotum, invasive is a very relative term...

 

Compare it to pregnancy and child birth.........the most invasive things of all...

 

No argument there. I was in the room for the births of both of my children (#1 involved a level 4 episiotomy) and I'd rather stick my *@@* in a meat slicer than go through that.

Still, the idea of sharp objects around "the boys" creates an involuntary pucker factor for most rational males...

 

And I don't think women get a thrill from vaginal exams and mammograms ...they have to tough it out because ya gotta do what ya gotta do....men should try to be as tough as women .....

 

Oh we try. But from what I've observed, unless a man has survived combat level physical trauma and been ready to sign up for it again six weeks later (the traditional post partum waiting period) he hasn't even come close.

 

Betty White !!!!!!!!!!!!


Thanks for the quote, it's one I hadn't heard and it's terrific!!!