Contraception: Why Not?

[Kfisher]

http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/sexuality/se0002.html

The article is way too long, so for convenience I will just quote the important parts and leave out the theological parts that the predominantly Atheist population of the op9 forums would prolly disregard anyway...

In the 1960's, the pill became available and that's really when the revolution in contraceptives began. The pill was considered to be a great salvation of mankind for several reasons. It was at that time that people began to think we were headed for disaster as far as population was concerned. In fact, when I was in high school, we had posters of globes with human beings falling off the globe, it was projected to be so crowded. But there actually have been no two people who have been more wrong than Malthus and Paul Ehrlich, who both predicted huge famines and wars because of population.

I don't have time to go into the “myths” of overpopulation, but I can recommend a few books: one by a man named Julian Simon and another man, Ben Wattenburg, who are demographers. And there's many others — Jacqueline Kasun — who have critiqued the work of Malthus and Ehrlich.

Malthus said that the population would increase geometrically and the food supplies would only, at best, increase arithmetically. It is true that population has increased enormously. That's not necessarily bad news. That's just a fact. It has increased enormously. The good news is that the food supply is wildly better off than Malthus ever dreamed. The United States could quite easily feed the rest of the globe. It's not a problem. Modern agricultural techniques have exponentially increased our food supply. And they say we haven't even begun to mine the ocean for food. And as for limited mineral resources, Malthus thought we would certainly run out of coal and copper and precious metals, but we actually have more coal and more copper now per person on the globe than Malthus thought we had at his time. We've discovered more resources and we need them less, because we have discovered such sources of energy as atomic energy.

Again, I'm not here to argue against the population scare. I'm just here to tell you that there is good reason to doubt it. Yet, you might wonder why we see these emaciated children on TV starving. It is easy to think we must be overpopulated — look at all these starving children. Yet, the starvation of children has little to do with population, really. It has a great deal to do with one tribal or ethnic group hating and starving out another tribal or ethnic group. It has a great deal to do with corrupt governments and the failure to distribute food. It has a great deal to do with natural disasters that we have little control over. But still, concern about overpopulation has been one of the reasons for thinking the pill to be a great advance for mankind.

Feminism has also contributed to the enthusiasm for contraceptives. Feminists believed we had to have contraceptives because women couldn't get in the work place and find their fulfillment unless they were having fewer babies and the only way they could have fewer babies is if they had good contraceptives.

It was also believed that a contraceptive, especially the pill, would make for much better marriages. Much better marriages. Because, clearly, people could now use contraceptives within marriage and get rid of the fear of pregnancy that was dampening the spontaneous and blissful sex lives that spouses hoped that they could have. It would take the tension out of the sex life that was there because of the fear of pregnancy. And it didn't take people long to catch on. Well, gee, if you could take fear of pregnancy out of sex within marriage, you could wipe out the fear of pregnancy out of sex before marriage, and surely it would make sense to have sex before marriage.

-Snip-

What about the predictions of the secular world who thought contraception would be so great? What about the prediction that marriages would be better? I think, in some respects, marriages are better, but the divorce rate shows us that there are a lot of very bad marriages, or at least marriages that end because people think they are very bad. In fact, the divorce rate doubled between 1965 and 1975. The divorce rate had been sort-of sneaking up all century long until in the mid 1960's it was at 25%, and then in 1975 it had got up to 50%. In a short ten year period, the divorce rate doubled. There's a social scientist at the University of Stanford named Robert Michael who was intrigued by this and he wondered why it was that the divorce rate doubled in a ten year period. He actually discovered that as the contraceptive pill became more and more available, divorce became more and more popular. In about 1975-1976 when about every woman who wanted access to the pill had it, that's when the divorce rate leveled off.

In this statistical scientific investigation, he's discovered three reasons why he thinks the use of contraceptives have contributed to this massive increase of the divorce rate. He says he can attribute 45% of this increase to increased use of contraceptives. These are his reasons. There are three. I think there are others, as well.

Michael's first observation is that the statistical data show that those who use contraceptives have fewer children and have them later in marriage. His statistical data show that those who have the first baby in the first two years of marriage and another baby in the next couple years of marriage, have a much longer lasting marriage than those who don't. Now I'm sure everybody here in this room can tell me of someone they know who's been married for twenty-five years with eight or ten kids who's gotten divorced and it's all very sad but that's the rarity. It's the rarity. His data shows that those who have babies sooner in marriage have a longer lasting marriage than those who do not.

I'll give you about three seconds to figure out why. He gives no explanation. I think there are several. One is that, again, some of you look like you've been around for a while, some of you are actually pretty newly married, and it might become clear to you for as blissful and as happy as those early years of marriage can be, they can also be very difficult. You've got two people with different habits and different expectations and different modes of communication trying to build a life together. I've noticed with my friends who are newly married, at some point in that first year or two, it seems that one or the other gets in a car and goes for a drive around the block and around the highways and you don't really know if you are going to come back. You're pretty damn mad about something. But if Junior's in the house, there are somebody's smiles you don't want to miss in the morning. So, you go back and you work it out with the person you're mad at. There are two people in the house you love — one you're mad at and the other whose smiles you can't think of missing. If you have another child, there are two people whose smiles you really want and one you're mad at. You're mad, but you go back and you work it out. And that's very important in marriage — to work those things out early in the marriage.

I think it's also the fact that people who have children, become better people, I want to say, almost instantaneously. Almost instantaneously they become better. It's been my good fortune to have met several of my male friends as they've exited from the delivery room. And some of you may have experienced this or seen others. Such individuals are generally delirious and they babble and they say things like, “It's incredible. It's the most miraculous, marvelous, mysterious thing I have ever been a part of in my whole life. It's the best day of my whole life. I can't believe it.” And somewhere along the line they say, “Everything's different now. Everything's different now.” And that's absolutely true because yesterday they could care less who the mayor was or who was chief of the police force or who was president of the school board and whether the playgrounds were safe or how they spent their money or how many movies were rated PG and what was on TV. But today they care. And today everything's different and now they're going to be careful about all these things. When you're single, who cares about all these things. It doesn't affect you. When you don't have any children it doesn't affect you. When you have a child you're sending out to the world, all of a sudden you become protective of this child and you know that all these influences need to be attended to. You also become more patient and generous and kind and hardworking because this baby is very demanding. It takes a lot of your time and a lot of your effort. And so you become a better person and you're married to a better person and that makes for a better marriage.

So that's Michael's first reason. People who contracept have fewer babies later in marriage and their marriages are weaker and it seems clear to me why that's the case.

Secondly, he says since contraceptives have arrived on the scene, there is much more adultery than there was before. I'll give you two seconds to figure that one out. People have been tempted, for the history of mankind. It's easy enough to think about wanting to have an affair but wanting a child out of wedlock is another story. But if most every woman is contracepting, then most every woman is available in a certain sense and there is no real reason to say no. Adultery is absolutely devastating to marriages.

The third explanation is that women are financially more independent. They do have fewer children. They do go into the work place. And, again, when they have difficulties in the marriage, it's much easier to say, “Take a walk,” than it is to work it out because they need their husband for one fewer reasons than they did before.

Yeah, it's still a bit too long, but for lazy readers, it's better than going through the whole article. And personally, I'm pro-choice, which means I have nothing at all against those who choose to use contraceptives. However, this article does contain interesting information that can't simply be ignored. Now, I need opinions, y'all...

[h2orowe]

Cue Roxie in:
3...
2...
1...

[Jetsetlemming]

tl;dr.
Pro-choice isn't a contraceptive term, btw. Killing sperm ahead of time, despite what Monty Python may have you believe, isn't a big enough issue for most religious people to get up enough anger to fight over (here in the glorious confines of western civilization, anyway. I make no claims for the behaviors and issues of anywhere else in the world).
I hear it's very wearying work being a prudish uptight blowhard about what other people who don't give a fuck about your opinion do in their bedrooms these days.

[Kfisher]

Pro-choice isn't a contraceptive term, btw.

But Wikipedia will tell you otherwise. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pro-Choice)

Also, even though this debate is old, the main reason I brought up this article is because of the fact that unlike most religious texts, this one actually contains facts and statistics that contradict the whole "contraception is helpful to the world" theory.

[Exeter]

I'm glad you took out the religious bits because I probably would've stopped reading altogether.

I mean, wow. Contraceptives are responsible for ruining the sanctity of marriage? And here I thought it was the gays.

I admit that I know a few couples personally who more or less decided to stay together because they had a kid. Is theirs a happy marriage? No. Are divorces necessarily such a terrible thing? No.

Of course, the article was primarily concerned with the religious issues surrounding divorce, which I can't really comment on. But imagine if your parents had had a terrible relationship when you were younger (or maybe they did, or still do). Would you (and your eight siblings) really want to grow up in a hostile environment that only remained hostile because your folks both felt obligated to stick around?

People who have children together early are not going to forget all their issues with each other. They're just going to feel more pressure to force themselves to stay together.

I'll accept that there might be something to the argument about adultery. But come on, if contraceptives were the only thing stopping these guys and girls from cheating in the first place, their marriages were tainted from the start regardless of whether they've done the deed.

And statistics be damned. Again, who cares if we can sustain this population when it's the poorest members of our society having the most children? Quality over quantity, people.

Remember, kids. Don't be a fool, cover your tool.

[SlickWilly440]

Didn't read the article, but Contraceptives are a good thing because it helps control the people population, without having to be spade or neutered. Also keeps couples who cannot afford children, from being drawn into poverty and picking up welfare checks to feed their children.

Does anyone know why China's population is so big? My guess is there was this period in history called The Era of Good Feeling where towns/villages jumped into huge orgies and multiplied like rabbits.

[MNJetter]

without having to be spade or neutered.
Spayed, dear. Spayed. Nobody's turning into a garden tool on this forum. :)


I didn't read the article. Too tired for something that long. But I figured I'd put in my two yen. I don't see anything wrong with contraceptives, but I believe firmly that none of them are as effective as abstinance. I'm not going to go preaching it to other people, but I'm not going to risk pregnancy until I can afford the consequences.

One of my ex-roommate's childhood friends has three children. All of them were conceived despite the best efforts of the contraceptive she was currently on. And she most certainly cannot afford three. She can't even afford one. So she relies on mooching off both the fathers and borrowing money from family members. I refuse to end up like that.

....and that probably had nothing to do with the article itself. But whatever. It's time for bed.

[Knife-Fingered Sue Sanderson]

I'm all for contraceptives, but the idea of "population" control is kind of weird. I like to think of it more as "life" control, as in it makes you more in charge of how you want to live your life (aka no babies out of wedlock at 15 thank you).


And people in poorer countries who live on farms have a lot of kids because they need them, and health care sucks so much that you could have 8 kids and all of them die, half of them die, or they all live. Also, India and China both put huge emphasis on the importance of having sons, and sometimes the only way women can gain power and respect in their village or husband's family is by having boys. So when the government tells you "only have 1 or 2 kids!" and you're only having girls, chances are you're going to feel the pressure to have more.

[Kwiz]

I don't have time to go into the “myths” of overpopulation, but I can recommend a few books: [...]

When an author "doesn't have time" to provide detail on a central part of his argument, you know something is wrong.

It is true that population has increased enormously. That's not necessarily bad news. That's just a fact. It has increased enormously.

Not necessarily bad news? Try telling that to officials in China or India.

The United States could quite easily feed the rest of the globe. It's not a problem. Modern agricultural techniques have exponentially increased our food supply. And they say we haven't even begun to mine the ocean for food.

The point about U.S. farmland is accurate, but... "mining the oceans for food"? Exactly what kind of nutjob proposed this concept? And how would it economically or physically work?

And as for limited mineral resources, Malthus thought we would certainly run out of coal and copper and precious metals, but we actually have more coal and more copper now per person on the globe than Malthus thought we had at his time. We've discovered more resources and we need them less, because we have discovered such sources of energy as atomic energy.

Someone needs to tell this idiot about global resource issues. Apparently he doesn't understand that all of those resources (with the possible exception of the still-born nuclear energy movement) are being constrained mainly because there are too many people using them.

It is easy to think we must be overpopulated — look at all these starving children. Yet, the starvation of children has little to do with population, really. It has a great deal to do with one tribal or ethnic group hating and starving out another tribal or ethnic group.

Oh? So farmers in Sudan who literally have to struggle for their lives every day actually have enough arable land to support them comfortably?

Feminism has also contributed to the enthusiasm for contraceptives. Feminists believed we had to have contraceptives because women couldn't get in the work place and find their fulfillment unless they were having fewer babies and the only way they could have fewer babies is if they had good contraceptives.

I'll let Roxie do the debunking on this one, but in the meantime I can definitely see a straw man argument here.

It was also believed that a contraceptive, especially the pill, would make for much better marriages. Much better marriages. Because, clearly, people could now use contraceptives within marriage and get rid of the fear of pregnancy that was dampening the spontaneous and blissful sex lives that spouses hoped that they could have.

Yes, and what exactly is wrong with this? Or do we actually want to stay in the Victorian sexual dark ages?

It would take the tension out of the sex life that was there because of the fear of pregnancy. And it didn't take people long to catch on. Well, gee, if you could take fear of pregnancy out of sex within marriage, you could wipe out the fear of pregnancy out of sex before marriage, and surely it would make sense to have sex before marriage.

Now we're just pandering to a conservative readership, aren't we? This inconclusive point begs the question: what exactly is wrong with sex being freed of fear and hangups?

I think, in some respects, marriages are better, but the divorce rate shows us that there are a lot of very bad marriages, or at least marriages that end because people think they are very bad. In fact, the divorce rate doubled between 1965 and 1975.

There are so many interpretations of divorce rate data - and so few of them which actually make conclusive sense - that using this as support is questionable at best, and outright dishonest at worst.

The divorce rate had been sort-of sneaking up all century long until in the mid 1960's it was at 25%, and then in 1975 it had got up to 50%.

Setting aside the very good possibility that these numbers came out of the author's ass, might we see an actual source?

Now I'm sure everybody here in this room can tell me of someone they know who's been married for twenty-five years with eight or ten kids who's gotten divorced and it's all very sad but that's the rarity. It's the rarity. His data shows that those who have babies sooner in marriage have a longer lasting marriage than those who do not.

And where the hell is the statistical evidence to back this up?

I've noticed with my friends who are newly married, at some point in that first year or two, it seems that one or the other gets in a car and goes for a drive around the block and around the highways and you don't really know if you are going to come back. You're pretty damn mad about something.

Anecdotal evidence proves nothing when you're trying to support an argument like this.

I think it's also the fact that people who have children, become better people, I want to say, almost instantaneously. Almost instantaneously they become better.

Yeah! Because nobody's ever heard of incompetent or abusive parents.

And somewhere along the line they say, “Everything's different now. Everything's different now.” And that's absolutely true because yesterday they could care less who the mayor was or who was chief of the police force or who was president of the school board and whether the playgrounds were safe or how they spent their money or how many movies were rated PG and what was on TV. But today they care.

How many new parents actually have the time to worry about so many fringe concerns when caring for an infant? Let's see some factual evidence of how, as the author claims, people automatically become better and more involved citizens after popping out a kid.

When you're single, who cares about all these things. It doesn't affect you. When you don't have any children it doesn't affect you.

Right, because only parents with children need to care about such unimportant matters as public services and the environment of their cities.

Secondly, he says since contraceptives have arrived on the scene, there is much more adultery than there was before. I'll give you two seconds to figure that one out. People have been tempted, for the history of mankind. It's easy enough to think about wanting to have an affair but wanting a child out of wedlock is another story. But if most every woman is contracepting, then most every woman is available in a certain sense and there is no real reason to say no. Adultery is absolutely devastating to marriages.

Hey, guess what? Good marriages are founded on mutual love and commitment, not some unspoken fear of being caught cheating. No amount of child rearing can reform a marriage based on fear or mistrust.

I'm sure the parents here on OP9 can attest to the fact that raising children often tests the strength of a relationship before reinforcing it. Entering parenthood with the expectation that your life and marriage will instantly be made more enjoyable seems rather foolish. That work, unless I'm gravely mistaken, ought to get taken care of beforehand.

[Hatsumomo]

^Good rebuttals.

I also want to add that the number one reason for marital discourse is finances. Children add to finance issues because now not only do you have to worry about the mortgage and paying off loans and the car, but you get the added costs of raising a child and figuring out how to pay for college.

That writer is just a fucktard who refuses to remove the rose-colored glasses.

[Plekto]

Why?

Because nothing is more expensive than a child.

"Honey - I want to burden both of us with an unwanted child that we have to spend $100K over then next twenty years raising... is that okay or should I use a condom?"

[Angelyne]

Malthus said that the population would increase geometrically and the food supplies would only, at best, increase arithmetically. It is true that population has increased enormously. That's not necessarily bad news. That's just a fact. It has increased enormously. The good news is that the food supply is wildly better off than Malthus ever dreamed. The United States could quite easily feed the rest of the globe. It's not a problem. Modern agricultural techniques have exponentially increased our food supply. And they say we haven't even begun to mine the ocean for food. And as for limited mineral resources, Malthus thought we would certainly run out of coal and copper and precious metals, but we actually have more coal and more copper now per person on the globe than Malthus thought we had at his time. We've discovered more resources and we need them less, because we have discovered such sources of energy as atomic energy.

This is wildly misrepresenting Malthus' argument, but then again, I don't expect a Catholic writer to have nice things to say about an Anglican priest. Just because we haven't run out resources yet doesn't mean it isn't possible or won't happen at all. Peak oil, anyone?


I had to do a lot of research about contraception in the early 20th century for a class last semester. The backlash against it in the 1920s, 1930s, and to an extent in the 1950s, was not because of religious reasons, but because of eugenics. If the middle and upper class white people stopped breeding, the country be overrun by poor black people. This is why the government and doctors had no problems sterilizing black women in those times, but refused to make contraception (diaphragms at the time) widely accessible to whites. And during the Depression, there were several churches that advocated the use of contraception to limit big families.

It's only within the last 30-40 years that religious/moral arguments against contraception have been taken seriously.

[manrush]

What irks me is that people equate contraception with abortion. Um, hello. Contraception usage will reduce unwanted pregnancies and thus reduce abortions. Not a difficult link to make.

[erbiumfiber]

One of my ex-roommate's childhood friends has three children. All of them were conceived despite the best efforts of the contraceptive she was currently on. And she most certainly cannot afford three. She can't even afford one. So she relies on mooching off both the fathers and borrowing money from family members. I refuse to end up like that.

Whoa! It takes two people to make a baby. The fathers had the option of using condoms. If you play, you pay. It's not mooching, it's child support.

My ex-husband (income, approximately $100k per year) sporadically paid $250.00 per month child support and nothing else. Last year's tuition at boarding school was $34,500. Guess who paid that? And he's contributing zippo to college, despite our settlement agreement. And he maintains no life or health insurance on his daughter, both called for in the settlement agreement. I'm lucky because I can easily afford all these things for my daughter. But if I couldn't? You bet he'd be paying A LOT more.

One of my big problems with the Catholic church (despite being a practicing Catholic when I lived in the U.S.) is the position on contraception. U.S. couples ignore the Church's teaching (well, many do) but in a lot of poor Catholic countries, access to birth control is pretty difficult. I can understand their position against abortion but birth control? So I have a hard time giving money to the Church, knowing it will be used to further their anti-contraception position...

Monty Python:

"Every sperm is sacred
Every sperm is great...
If a sperm is wasted
God gets quite irate

Let the heathens spill theirs
On the dusty ground,
God shall make them pay for
Each sperm that can't be found." :frypan:

[stsparky]

... My ex-husband (income, approximately $100k per year) sporadically paid $250.00 per month child support and nothing else. Last year's tuition at boarding school was $34,500. Guess who paid that? And he's contributing zippo to college, despite our settlement agreement. And he maintains no life or health insurance on his daughter, both called for in the settlement agreement. I'm lucky because I can easily afford all these things for my daughter. But if I couldn't? You bet he'd be paying A LOT more. ...
Have your lawyer send him the bill. Document this. See what happens.

[erbiumfiber]

It is one of my great joys in life that I do NOT have to wrangle with my ex-husband over every penny spent on our daughter. He has had no contact with either of us for over 6 years (his choice). I could get the money SO EASILY as he is a government employee (the Patent Office) and I could simply have his paycheck garnished.

Still not worth it. Probably drive him over the edge to violence (something I actually do consider).

[Plekto]

You definately need a better lawyer. Get in there with some teech and maul him good. Though, boarding school isn't considered "support". But the rest is - I think the average is 15% of their gross income per month.

If he's slacking off, garnish his wages and threaten him with prison time. No, I'm dead serious. I have a sister who also has a deadbeat father. He skipped back to Mexico and won't pay her a dime. His family is worth tens of millions - seriously filthy rich import/export, but since he's in Mexico, nothing can be done. I have no problems with nailing bastards like that to the wall.

Me? I'm separated. My son's tuition is paid by myself and my family entirely. his medical - I pay entirely. His clothes and such - I pay for 80% of that as well. I estimate that I pay about 25-30% of my income and my parents match about that same amount in tuition and fees and clubs/etc(Y membership, boys choir, summer camps...)

That's proper support. And it feels good that I do it and make her look like the slacker she is.(grin). He's 8 right now and I'm currently contemplating selling my car and taking the metro/subway to work in order to pay for his school. I'd do more, but I only make about $30K a year and live as cheaply as I can so my son has a good life(hence why my parents help so much until I can get my career doing better).

Child support is a bare minimum, like public schools, building codes, and safety standards. Any decent father should do easily twice that much.

But to just do nothing despite being able to financially... ream him good for me. Twice.

P.S. I see your reply above(you posted it while I was writing this)
This is the exactly problem most women fall into. They fear confrontation and would rather it all go away. That, and a fear that something bad might happen. But this is exactly the response a typical slacker father hopes you have. They get off free and you take all of the stress.

Don't fall for it. Don't be afraid. He has a legal and moral obligation to help your child. He has no right to spend another day avoiding it. And there's nothing he can do about garnishing his wages, either. He probably drives a fancy car, too, given that much money...

[Fred]

I liked Kwizard’s rebuttal of the article. There are a few other points I would like to make about the “statistical analysis”.

First of all, statistical analysis refers to the act of applying statistical algorithms to a set of data. The author states that he can attribute 45% of the increase in the divorce rate to the use of contraceptives. Where are the calculations that show how he reached this conclusion?

The next problem is that he is confusing correlation with causality. Causality tends to be much more difficult to prove. There may be a correlation between when couples have children and how long a marriage lasts, but where is the proof that there is a causal relation between the two factors?

It also bothered me when the author said; “I think it's also the fact that people who have children, become better people”. That statement is not a fact. It is a judgment.

Finally, there seems to be a few underlying implications that I disagree with.

One implication is that marriage is a good thing and divorce is a bad thing. Therefore, anything that increases the rate of divorce (i.e. contraceptives) is a bad thing. It is important to understand that whether or not something is good or bad in that sense is a judgment call. I certainly don’t think it is always true that marriage is a good thing and divorce is a bad thing.

Another implication seems to be that the purpose of marriage is to have children. My wife and I just had a child and we are delighted. However, I do not agree that the purpose of marriage is to have children.

[Y.T.]

Very funny article. Basically someone is against contraception, because ve had been told it's against God, from on high (God - > Pope - > Archbishop -> .. ), and then tries to rationalize it ..

Christians have been against the whole idea of sex for pleasure for the past 2000 years ...


One of my ex-roommate's childhood friends has three children. All of them were conceived despite the best efforts of the contraceptive she was currently on. And she most certainly cannot afford three. She can't even afford one. So she relies on mooching off both the fathers and borrowing money from family members. I refuse to end up like that.

Serves her right. She could have made the man use condoms, or had an abortion. Nothing wrong with terminating a fetus. Hell, even babies shouldn't count as people, they are not self aware .
..Or used effective contraception. Considering that rates of effectivnes are pretty high, three kids sounds suspicious.


Another implication seems to be that the purpose of marriage is to have children. My wife and I just had a child and we are delighted. However, I do not agree that the purpose of marriage is to have children.


Why bother then ? Last time I heard, getting married is quite expensive (especially if many people want to come).. if you don't want kids, why bother with that formality? I know I won't.

This one last ..

Malthus said that the population would increase geometrically and the food supplies would only, at best, increase arithmetically. It is true that population has increased enormously. That's not necessarily bad news. That's just a fact. It has increased enormously. The good news is that the food supply is wildly better off than Malthus ever dreamed. The United States could quite easily feed the rest of the globe. It's not a problem. Modern agricultural techniques have exponentially increased our food supply. And they say we haven't even begun to mine the ocean for food.


Now, If it were possible , this kind of people ought to be taken out, showed the error of their thinking (considering further population increase desirable / not harmful), and if they don't retract, shot to the base of the skull and carted off to a thermal depolymerization facility.

Ocean's are getting emptier by the day, oil is slowly but surely running out, upper atmosphere choking with dust, CO2 levels rising, topsoil washing away all over the world, forests diminishing, species dying out, and the selfish kooks want more people ..

Too bad the world's not an infinite plate. That's the only kind of place that would satisfy the urges of religious nutters, going forth and multiplying for all eternity. (discount Space .. it's not for men, and certainly not for catholics)



The divorce rate had been sort-of sneaking up all century long until in the mid 1960's it was at 25%, and then in 1975 it had got up to 50%.

Setting aside the very good possibility that these numbers came out of the author's ass, might we see an actual source?

Here's a graph .. numbers seem ok. I found it in 30 secs. Aren't you one of them 150 IQ fellas ? You could have found it in twice the time it took you to type that sentence ..

http://encarta.msn.com/media_461544040/u_s_marriage_and_divorce_rates.html

People, wake up. It's not about contraception. It's about people. Americans(and people elsewhere in the developed world*) nowadays, compared to the turn of the 19/20 th century, or thirties people, are
pussies. Go see depression rates, number of psychoanalysts .. etc.
IF they can't seem to manage their weight, or their own life, how can you expect them to keep their marriage ok ?
One bona fida curmudgeon put it concisely : overfed clowns. I apologise to
the exceptions to the rule..

[Pierrot le Fou]

When an author "doesn't have time" to provide detail on a central part of his argument, you know something is wrong.

Not necessarily bad news? Try telling that to officials in China or India.

The point about U.S. farmland is accurate, but... "mining the oceans for food"? Exactly what kind of nutjob proposed this concept? And how would it economically or physically work?

Someone needs to tell this idiot about global resource issues. Apparently he doesn't understand that all of those resources (with the possible exception of the still-born nuclear energy movement) are being constrained mainly because there are too many people using them.

Oh? So farmers in Sudan who literally have to struggle for their lives every day actually have enough arable land to support them comfortably?

I'll let Roxie do the debunking on this one, but in the meantime I can definitely see a straw man argument here.

Yes, and what exactly is wrong with this? Or do we actually want to stay in the Victorian sexual dark ages?

Now we're just pandering to a conservative readership, aren't we? This inconclusive point begs the question: what exactly is wrong with sex being freed of fear and hangups?

There are so many interpretations of divorce rate data - and so few of them which actually make conclusive sense - that using this as support is questionable at best, and outright dishonest at worst.

Setting aside the very good possibility that these numbers came out of the author's ass, might we see an actual source?

And where the hell is the statistical evidence to back this up?

Anecdotal evidence proves nothing when you're trying to support an argument like this.

Yeah! Because nobody's ever heard of incompetent or abusive parents.

How many new parents actually have the time to worry about so many fringe concerns when caring for an infant? Let's see some factual evidence of how, as the author claims, people automatically become better and more involved citizens after popping out a kid.

Right, because only parents with children need to care about such unimportant matters as public services and the environment of their cities.

Hey, guess what? Good marriages are founded on mutual love and commitment, not some unspoken fear of being caught cheating. No amount of child rearing can reform a marriage based on fear or mistrust.

I'm sure the parents here on OP9 can attest to the fact that raising children often tests the strength of a relationship before reinforcing it. Entering parenthood with the expectation that your life and marriage will instantly be made more enjoyable seems rather foolish. That work, unless I'm gravely mistaken, ought to get taken care of beforehand.
I'm not going to reply point by point because most of your comments are just quips with little substance to them.

First of all, you are committing a logical fallacy throughout. The lack of evidence for a claim is not proof that the claim is invalid. You claim that the lack of statistics/explanation of statistics/discussion of certain themes is indicative of 'problems' and rests a shadow over his argument. And do you do any better? No. If you can provide evidence that the author is wrong, do it, don't be condescending and roll your eyes as if it's a foregone conclusion that he's wrong.

Second of all, you act as if overpopulation in developing countries is indicative of a global overpopulation problem. Except that it isn't. Because developed countries all lower their birth rates. Those countries in the first world with healthy population increases are almost, without fail, countries that depend heavily on immigration.

The reason behind this is simple. In China, most labor is unskilled labor. Anyone can do unskilled labor. Therefore, more people means more hands means more work means more money. Education and high-level trained skills are unecessary to obtain employment, and therefore population growth is high to take advantage of that economy.

On the flipside, developed countries tend to have economies dominated mostly by high-skilled jobs, or jobs that require a lot of education. As the level of education and skills required to maintain a relative social standing to the parents increases, so does the cost, and therefore the amount of children a family can afford to have to maintain the same social standing is reduced.

In other words, as the Chinese and Indian economies develop, and the huge gap in labor pools in city vs. country is reduced, employees will require more skills and more education, and the population growth will reduce naturally (without the 1-child policies of China and the like).

Finally, you seem to have some bone to pick with the concept that contraception has a negative effect on divorce rates. You suggest somehow that contraception doesn't affect the adultery angle. Bullshit. Humans go through cost-benefit analysis of actions all the time, it comes naturally to us. The risk of cheating with protection is FAR less than the risk of cheating without it. When the benefit of getting your willy wet comes with the consequence of a child out of wedlock and a pissed off mistress, the concept suddenly becomes much less appealing.

While I'm sure people were fucking outside of wedlock before the pill and condoms, I'll make a healthy wager that a good portion of those extra-marital 'affairs' were actually paid transactions with a woman who would balance the risk of pregnancy, with the reward of payment for the sex.

I disagree with the article, but not because his points are invalid, but because contraceptives allow for more freedom of choice. And I believe that people should have that freedom, even if they use that freedom to make piss-poor choices.

It's really that simple.

Rolling your eyes and responding with fallacies won't dispel the argument posted in the OP, it will just make you look silly.

[MNJetter]

Serves her right. She could have made the man use condoms, or had an abortion. Nothing wrong with terminating a fetus. Hell, even babies shouldn't count as people, they are not self aware .
..Or used effective contraception. Considering that rates of effectivnes are pretty high, three kids sounds suspicious.
Apparently one of them was conceived on the pill, one on a condom, and one on injected contraceptives. I know, the chances are astronomical. But that's what I was told. So apparently she not only could have made the man use condoms, but she did, at least once. And your claim that there is "nothing wrong with terminating a fetus" might not be an opinion that she shares.

I brought up the situation, not because I was trying to make a judgment about what she did or how it turned out, but to offer a reason why I, personally, don't use contraceptives. Namely, I don't trust them enough to bet my livelihood on it.

Whoa! It takes two people to make a baby. The fathers had the option of using condoms. If you play, you pay. It's not mooching, it's child support.
I didn't mean to say mooching as if to say specifically she shouldn't be accepting child care. I meant it just in general derision of her situation. This isn't just an issue of some lady who forgot to take her pill one day and had a baby. She had such a lack of self-control that she had sex enough times to thwart the statistical safety margins of three different kinds of contraceptives. I can tolerate an accident, but I have no respect for people who are irresponsible enough to subject three children to a financial situation in which they can't even support one.

[Hatsumomo]

Honestly, I'm still suspicious of your friend. She has to be either lying or embellishing the truth. The correct use of contraceptives and using at least two methods each and every time makes the possibility of conceiving incredibly small. Hell, just taking the Pill properly (meaning every day, not missing a dose, and you're not on antibiotics which nullify the effects of the Pill) and using a condom correctly each time you have sex takes the risk of pregnancy down to about 1 in 1000. For it to happen three times means she's either a liar or one unlucky broad. Most likely it's the former.

[stsparky]

I vote liar. I use condoms, and they ALWAYS had the desired effect. The other possibility is that this friend's condom was compromised by one of the participants. Her story seems tailored to get sympathy. I have none.

[Trump]

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice shame on me. Fool me three times and ... I can't even state the level of stupidity.

[Hatsumomo]

Her story seems tailored to get sympathy. I have none.

Agreed. I've heard that "But I use birth control so I don't know why I keep getting pregnant excuse!" far too many times. Using it occasionally doesn't count. I'm just baffled by the stupidity.

There's no sympathy here either.

[SlickWilly440]

Why?

Because nothing is more expensive than a child.

"Honey - I want to burden both of us with an unwanted child that we have to spend $100K over then next twenty years raising... is that okay or should I use a condom?"

You could also add to that quote: "Even if you get pregnant you can get an abortion."

[Y.T.]

And your claim that there is "nothing wrong with terminating a fetus" might not be an opinion that she shares.


Like the kids, that's *her* problem. (insert maniacal laughter).
However,
having unwanted kids isn't good. I know a person who was born 12 years after his siblings, apparently due to a problem with contraception. People say that his mother did not want to have him, did not love him as much as her previous kids, and as a result, he's kind of weird, has serious personality issues.
Best to have kids when you want and can afford them.
Also, have you heard that legalizing abortions might have had an effect of lowering criminality ? ..


didn't read the article. Too tired for something that long. But I figured I'd put in my two yen. I don't see anything wrong with contraceptives, but I believe firmly that none of them are as effective as abstinance. I'm not going to go preaching it to other people, but I'm not going to risk pregnancy until I can afford the consequences.

It's abstinence, dear. If you want to mention it, learn to spell it first. However, not having any fun because of an irrational attitude towards contraception seems even more pathetic than not having any fun because of (being fuck ugly, very creepy, schizoid, ... etc)

Anyway, I assume abstinence means abstinence. Why be that extreme, from what I've read, anal sex can't get a woman pregnant...

[Kfisher]

Random point: To those who are referring to the author of the article as a "he", a thorough analysis of the entire article (yes, I read the whole thing from top to bottom) indicates that the author is female.

[seiji]

Anyway, I assume abstinence means abstinence. Why be that extreme, from what I've read, anal sex can't get a woman pregnant...
From what I've read, anal sex does not sound nearly as pleasant as oral, which also can't get a woman pregnant...
I assume abstinence refers to sexual practices likely to result in pregnancy because I share MNJ's opinion on such things.
As far as using contraceptives within marriage, I fully intend to do so. Personally, I think I'd like a year or two of uninterrupted sex before the kids start coming. Gives us a chance to bond with each other before complicating our relationship, right?

[Jetsetlemming]

I seriously doubt if you ask anyone who preaches abstinence that they'd say it's ok to just do it up the butt instead. O_o Abstinence is restraining from sex, not pregnancy.

[ミュー]

Religion is business. Business is about making money. Money comes from customers. Customers are easily attained through company loyalty, which is oftentimes commuted through families. Families who do not use contraception will create more children to follow their religion.

Personally, I would not like to be caught up in some religion's ploy to attain higher numbers. Especially at my own personal expense. I believe in the use of contraception, because I don't want to have dependants until I can afford them. I am, however, disappointed in the 'pill' and its lack of contraceptive steadfastness.

[MNJetter]

I seriously doubt if you ask anyone who preaches abstinence that they'd say it's ok to just do it up the butt instead. O_o Abstinence is restraining from sex, not pregnancy.
That depends on what you're abstaining from. Some people do it because they're afraid of STDs. Some people do it for religious reasons. And some people do it because they don't want to risk pregnancy. The specific things you abstain from will change depending on what you are trying to avoid.

Zak: Don't call me "dear" if you're not going to at least add some humor into your observation about my spelling.

Also, have you heard that legalizing abortions might have had an effect of lowering criminality ? ..
What does that have to do with this thread?

[manrush]

I'm still wondering why the fuck these holier-than-thou clergymen continue to equate contraception with abortion when the two could not be any more different from each other?

[ミュー]

I'm still wondering why the fuck these holier-than-thou clergymen continue to equate contraception with abortion when the two could not be any more different from each other?
They want to encourage other to explore the wonders of buttsex?
*waits for religious people to damnify my joke*

[manrush]

They want to encourage other to explore the wonders of buttsex?
*waits for religious people other than Catholic priests to damnify my joke*

fixed.

[Roxie]

However, this article does contain interesting information that can't simply be ignored.
The hell they can. Watch me.

[OliveButtercup]

It is one of my great joys in life that I do NOT have to wrangle with my ex-husband over every penny spent on our daughter. He has had no contact with either of us for over 6 years (his choice). I could get the money SO EASILY as he is a government employee (the Patent Office) and I could simply have his paycheck garnished.

Still not worth it. Probably drive him over the edge to violence (something I actually do consider).

You go girl. Not too many single mothers I know of who can easily afford to send their kids to 34,000$/year schools. I also think you're smart by not pushing your ex-husband to the edge if you know he'd react violently.