For a long time, we’ve been warned by reproductive justice folks that it’s not “just” abortion that right wing politicians are coming for, that the end of Roe is only a fraction of their mission to control the bodies of people who can give birth. We’ve seen the criminalization of pregnancy, the arrests (primarily of women of color), personhood, the forced c-sections. But there’s more lurking, or rather, not lurking, because it’s actually been very present this whole time. More below this picture of spring on the Upper West Side.
Let’s start here: There’s a lot on social media about hormonal birth control, and much of it isn’t based on actual medical information. Anti-birth control propaganda is everywhere on Tiktok (and other platforms as well); women who have used hormonal birth control - which we commonly think of as birth control pills, but actually includes IUDs (the kind that contain progestin), Nexplanon, and anything that utilizes hormones to do its jobs - are taking to their accounts to tell their horror stories about it, and to warn others against using it, for the sake of their health and future fertility.
Finding birth control that works for you is an extremely personal decision, and hormonal birth control isn’t for everyone. Side effects are a real thing, and for some, they’re not worth it. More than one thing can be true at the same time, though - you can decide not to use hormonal birth control because it wasn’t right for you, and it can be a life-saver for others, and reproductive health hasn’t been researched thoroughly enough for there to be more (better) options for birth control for people who can give birth. We’ve seen this happen in anti-abortion rhetoric as well, the idea that if someone has a bad abortion experience or regrets their abortion, it means no one should be allowed access to safe abortion.
Anti-birth control propaganda is conservative propaganda, tied not only to anti-choice messaging and efforts, but also to anti-vax and pronatalist propaganda. Many who love to talk about the evils of hormonal birth control are urging folks to use natural family planning, or fertility awareness, instead. (Of note: If you do a Google search for ‘natural family planning,’ the first result is from the American Pregnancy Association, which isn’t an actual medical organization, but a group with the mission of deterring people from choosing abortion.) Natural family planning as birth control requires keeping track of your cervical mucus, your basal body temperature, and other aspects of your cycle. It’s a lot of work. It entails attention. And it also can easily fail if you’re not on top of it, and even if you are, because bodies are unpredictable.
Look, use natural family planning if you want, use nine forms of hormonal birth control if you want (don’t, that’s probably way unsafe), but make your decisions based on medical information and not an anti-choice person on Tiktok who traffics in fear and stigma.
Action item: Have you seen anti-birth control propaganda on social media? Elsewhere? If and when you do, make note of it. Consider your own birth control experience - how have you spoken about it? How do others speak about theirs?
Next time: More of this.