Why are male condoms and female birth control pills more popular than female condoms and male birth control pills?
Female condoms were one of the
interesting things I learned about through a public health campaign at Ohio
University. However, the female condoms are not popular as much as the male
condoms. Why is that? In addition, this question raised many other inquiries for me
as to why there are female birth control pills, but I have never heard about
male birth control pills. After further research, I found out that there are,
indeed, male birth control pills. More importantly, researchers who have developed the male birth
control pill say that is effective and has few side effects. However, men have
been reluctant to embrace contraceptives.
Most men studied at the research and development of male birth control shared
that they would not take a male version
of the birth control pill, but there are many indications
that social morals are changing towards sharing responsibilities of family
planning.
Men demonstrated higher level of knowledge and
awareness about condom usage, yet it was women who demonstrated more positive
attitudes than men towards condom usage. However, women do not insist on
condom use for many reasons, including: trusting her partner, fear of
abandonment, and coerced consent caused by strong persuasion (Andrade et al.,
2015). We realize a power difference in the relation among couples and in the decision
making that tends to be dominated by males. Furthermore, there is a positive
correlation between women who gain knowledge about the importance of condoms
and their respective use of condoms. In other words, empowering women through
knowledge and providing them with tools to enhance their reproductive health is
an important part of empowering women.
The benefit of the female condom is
that it allows women to have more control over their safe sex practices. Above
other things, the female condom was introduced as a way of empowering women to
be in control of their sexual relationships, encouraging full participation in
family planning, and actively preventing HIV and sexually transmitted infections/diseases.
On the other side, male condoms give the power for the man in the relation and
limits the women`s power.
Still, there are some disadvantages to
the female condom. The main disadvantages include: a lack of spontaneity, a
decrease in sensation, discomfort, a lack of knowledge, technical difficulties,
and inconvenience. The disadvantages of the female condom compared to the male
condom are the exact same. However, male condoms are more popular and more
readily available. There is only one company in the US who produce female
condoms and it does not even exist in other countries around the world. Unlike
male condoms, which are produced in a by variety of manufacturers and in different
colors and types. Additionally, male condoms can be accessed easily from
regular stores, however, female condoms require a prescription for purchase
even in the US.
Empowering women is to provide women with choices and tools that
they can use to protect themselves. There has been lack of investment by the
companies to develop female condoms and male birth control pills as we live in
patriarchal communities. Access to female condoms would empower women. Access
to male birth control pills would allow an equal share in the responsibility of
family planning instead of only burdening women with it.
Hey Dareen,
ReplyDeleteThank you for your post, I found this an interesting topic.
Before taking this class I actually never reflected or considered the role of women in regulating their own reproductive cycle. Why are women required to take control of this? Why are women responsible for taking birth control and making sure an unexpected pregnancy doesn’t occur? It is always a woman’s job to remember to take her birth control and if she doesn’t…. well that’s her fault! I don’t know about you, but I am so forgetful… I can’t even remember to set my alarm before bed let alone take a pill everyday!
I agree with you Dareen when you say that women should be able to take control of their own sexual relationships and be able to actively participate in HIV and STD prevention but is the female condom a realistic way to achieve this? Why can’t women carry male condoms with them as a form of empowerment? I do agree with what you said about how male condoms give men power because they are the one who will use it. You also mention that although men demonstrated higher knowledge about condom usage it was women who held more positive attitudes about using condoms. It seems that women will be likely to use a condom while men may shy away from using it unless the women insists (This is of course just my personal opinion and not based on statistics!). I posted a video where Jimmy Kimmel asks people if they are carrying a condom. Although silly, only one out of the four men had a condom with them. Although only one girl was asked, she did in fact have a condom. As a woman, I believe carrying a male condom (or having a supply) has the potential to be empowering and give women control over their reproductive and sexual health, especially since female condoms are not yet widely available as are male condoms.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zmZim8y4WUk
About male birth control... The idea is great and overall has potential, but as it stands and the current views about reproductive healthcare, this idea is far from materializing. I think the idea of men taking a pill that would block their immediate ability to reproduce would be perceived as challenging their masculinity and dominance. This relates to the idea that many scholars have described: men as ‘gendered beings’. Similar to women’s roles, society has constructed a set of imaginary (yet very real) set of guidelines about how men should act, the role he should play in society and what type of emotions he is allowed to express. Men are expected to be dominate, competitive, have a high sexual drive and be devoid of feelings. The use of male birth control goes against everything we think of and regard as ‘manly’! Although this mindset is changing, this view of manliness and masculinity is still regarded as dominate. Maybe male birth control will have the hey-day it deserves, but before this is ever to happen, men (and women) need to challenge preconceived notions of gender roles and facilitate education geared towards men about the potential benefits of male birth control!
Maybe one day soon we will live a world where female condoms and male birth control pills are more popular than male condoms and female birth control…. Who knows!
Thanks for your reply Janee :)
DeleteI totally agree, also, I believe of the importance of women knowing that they have options. Knowledge is power and knowing that there are varies tools including female condoms that they can you use is empowering for them even in small things like this that are taken for granted.
Interestingly, I just came across with male contraceptives a few days ago through magazine. I remember leaning about reproductive health from an elementary school to a high school, but I cannot recall myself leaning about male birth control choice other than male/female condom, female birth control, and other choices I do not remember how they are called. So it was very interesting to lean about pills for men.
ReplyDeleteWhen it comes to reproductive health, some think that it is women’s responsibility to not get pregnant. Since men will not experience pregnancy, thus no fear for carrying a baby for nine months, some men do not even consider wearing condoms. This makes their partners in danger of getting Sexually Transmitted Diseases or HIV as well as pregnancy if female do not use other way of prevention. Therefore, on the magazine, Friedman (2018) wrote about a girl who felt powerlessness about preventing pregnancy. Women are more at risk than men, and sometimes I fell that seriousness about pregnancy is different between men and women.
While reading your blog, I realized that I have never looked for female condom at a drugstore (though you mentioned it requires prescription). Compared to male condom, female condom is not widely commercialized in reproductive health. I have seen male condom at some hospitals but have never seen female one. According to your blog, there is only one company so far in the U.S., and without competition with other companies, I do not expect the quality of product to be great. Added to that, if getting a condom requires prescription, it would be difficult to spread the usage of female condom. Not only female condom, but accessibility to tools for preventing pregnancy other than condom or female pills makes it hard to overcome current situation.
One thing that I remember leaning from health class in high school is that multiple use of tools to prevent pregnancy is important. Condom itself is not perfect, and contraceptive either. I strongly agree with you that women should be provided with choices and tools that they can use to protect themselves.
Thank you Dareen for the post. I remember I asked during my presentation how many pregnancies can be prevented if one man uses a condom compared to the number of pregnancies a woman can save herself if she uses a contraceptive measure! I believe all questions raised about the issue you are addressing in your post can be related to, inter alia, gender relations and patriarchal domination. However, there is one important thing that could be a big reason behind women using bills and men using condoms. It is all about the woman’s body in which a fetus grows up. If a man to know that he would get pregnant and carry a baby in his belly for 9 months, especially if he does not want it, he would have used all the different forms of contraception.
ReplyDeleteA man is fully aware of the fact that a condom is cheap to buy and easy to use, while bills require a lot of attention, planning and responsibility in order to have effective results. For this reason, men do not prefer bills and leave them to women. Moreover, if an unwanted pregnancy happens, a man will never suffer the consequences because again it is not happening inside his body. Therefore, for women to save themselves this headache, they use bills as they are more effective, and do not need to use condoms for the disadvantages you already mentioned. Another point that could explain this complex situation is that a man generally believes that a woman is only a recipient within the sexual relationship. This puts him in a “privileged” position, where he should not care about the consequences of that affair, and where a woman fully accepts to receive sex, she should be responsible for all what does/does not happen next.
That is why male condoms and female birth control bills are more popular, I think
Thank you for sharing this post and personally, I found it very interesting as it was the first time I came across the concept of female condoms and men’s birth control pills. Such information is very eye-opening for the people and societies especially when the women’s sexual and reproductive rights are challenged in different parts of the world one way or the other. This reminded me the discussion about empowerment from Kabeer & Parpart (2010) highlighting the fact that empowerment is not easy to be defined as one size won’t fit all, but for me giving the choice and agency can be the start for empowering women. They should be the ones to make the decision when it comes to their bodies and their lives, but promoting and implementing such concepts proved to be more challenging than it looks like. This post also clearly highlights the challenges that such concept and initiatives may/can face as there are different factors blocking them from moving forward. As discussed here in the post the male’s birth control is less harmful compared to the female’s birth control pills, but the idea doesn’t get promoted and people hardly knows about it. At the time that there are tons of advertisements for birth controls pills for women and condoms for men, there is none for male’s birth control and female’s condom; also accessing female’s condom is difficult and there is a need for doctor prescription for accessing it.
ReplyDeleteThis article also reminded of me the influence of cultural norms on reproductive justice and rights which blocks such information from reaching to the targeted audience. In some culture, it is shameful to discuss such information or there are people who don’t want the information to be out. Discussing this in the Asian context or specifically my country, in the traditional and conservative families, it is considered a shame for women to discuss the body parts or even people to see the women's growing belly while they are pregnant or ask for information related sexual practices and reproductive justice and rights. This culture is isolating women and their decision-making abilities and let the social norms to make those decisions for them. It is not only disempowering, but also oppressing women and prompting patriarchy. There is a need for the strategies in the state level to normalize these concepts and allow women to be more independent and take their way toward empowerment.
Your discussion about birth control pills for men caught my attention because, honestly, it has not crossed my mind significantly in the past. Nonetheless, this discussion made me recall my past experience. Some time ago, I went to Planned Parent with a partner who took the initiative to pursue some form of birth control besides a condom. First, it’s been a while, but I remember feeling out of place. Maybe I was nervous, but that aside, I wish I would have been approached by staff about birth control advice. In fact, I went there a second time with a relative because she needed birth control. And I felt the same as the first time. I’m trying to rationalize the situations. Okay, I could have asked questions myself and engaged. But if I’ve learned anything in this class, my guess is that this particular Planned Parenthood, and perhaps other organizations, focus their efforts and funding on women.
ReplyDeleteNow back to male birth control. Would I take such a pill? Yes, but how would more men respond? You mentioned that it is an option now, which caught me off guard because last I heard it was not. I need to look this up! Anyway would organizations like Planned Parenthood target men if this were an option? Your post and these questions lead me to Planned Parenthood’s website and to my delight, there was a doctor with a male patient! This is the first image on the site! Good start! Then, I went to the birth control tab. Here is the link: https://www.plannedparenthood.org/learn/birth-control. It presents various birth control options, their effectiveness, cost, how long the option will last, and more. After a review of some of the options, it looks like implants, shots, and pills are for women. Besides the usual condom, it seems like one of the other options for men is a vasectomy. Anyway, your topic turned into a valuable content analysis! Thanks!