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this post was submitted on 17 Aug 2023
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Men's Liberation
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This community is first and foremost a feminist community for men and masc people, but it is also a place to talk about men’s issues with a particular focus on intersectionality.
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Recommended Reading
- The Will To Change: Men, Masculinity, And Love by bell hooks
- Politics of Masculinities: Men in Movements by Michael Messner
Related Communities
!feminism@beehaw.org
!askmen@lemmy.world
!mensmentalhealth@lemmy.world
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That's a valid choice to make. But I just want to highlight the misconception that female birth control is labeled as 'safe' in a vacuum. Relative to the risk of pregnancy, which can lead to death and other permanent conditions, anything but getting pregnant would be considered safe in this context. This is part of why male birth control hasn't been developed yet, because there is no counterpoint, from a medical perspective, to being an infertile man since biological men don't get pregnant.
Some severe side effects of oral birth control are the increased risk of blood clots (deep vein thrombosis), high blood pressure, heart attack and stroke, liver disorders. Women who take oral birth control are often not well informed about this. And among the 'less severe' side effects are migraines, headaches, nausea, bloating, mood swings, and breast pain. Just imagine yourself living with these 'acceptable side effects'. That is the state of modern medicine for women.
If your partner decides to take on the burden of birth control, just know that it's not a walk in the park. There are real life changing consequences to taking birth control for many women.
I feel that there is some degree of unnecessary gate keeping here. I think your pride in never engaging in conversation in female spaces is misplaced. To me, that speaks more to a lack of interest in opening up a dialogue about women's issues.
What's worrying about this community is how much self-blame is in some conversations. Some people have a tendency to conflate the patriarchy with men, systemic with individual issues, awareness with taking on fault, fault with responsibility, temperament with social conditioning, etc. I often see people fault 'men' and by extension, themselves, for something that is not any one man's fault.
For example, in the comment thread that you quoted, the general sentiment was that many women are choosing to remain single because it's men's fault for not being good enough. I don't entirely agree that the phenomenon of women becoming increasingly single is purely due to men's behavior, because I think that it is primarily the product of feminism attributing women with personhood and being happily single. Feminism has yet to do that for effectively for men. Hence what I meant by "Feminism has taught many women, but not enough men, how to live a fulfilling life beyond patriarchal norms."
In the comment above in this post men were said to have 'put the burden of contraceptives on women', but there is more nuance to that because of the nature of medication risk analysis makes it much harder to justify birth control side effects for men.
Sometimes, rebuttals like these are dismissed as 'anti-feminist' because it seems to be taboo around here for men to say 'it's not men's fault' to systemic inequalities. There is a lack of separation between fault and responsibility here that I'm hoping that I can sort out by saying 'it's not men's fault'.
Also, I want to clear misconceptions around topics like female birth control because I've had bad experiences with it and I'm pretty sensitive about it when it's deemed as something easy.
Above all, I want to understand men's issues because I find that to be lacking in many feminist spaces. My partner and several friends are all facing mental health issues, but don't often talk about it. I don't want to push them, so I'll try and learn what I can from this community and try to understand and empathize when they feel ready.