"You and Mr. C. are going to drive each other crazy if you try to divide the cost of every single thing you share. Try to look at the whole forest of your relationship, not just the weeds, and decide if the financial burdens of your shared life are approximately equal. If they aren’t, then you have a legit complaint. But if they are, and you push him on this issue, what is he going to demand that you pay half of? The cost of the porn he watches to get himself in the mood? The health-club membership that keeps him in top physical condition for you?"

The cost of porn to get him in the mood ? Well there's a compliment! Pay for your own contraception makes sense if you view sex as something a bit like tennis, no-one would say a man owes a woman a racket! But I really don't believe that anyone should be having sex with anyone who is not willing to share the emotional and physical realities that it brings. I think that if someone is not able to commit themselves in that very small way it is a major sign that they are someone you should not be having sex with.

All of my personal beliefs about premarital sex aside, if a guy isn't willing to chip in for birth control then the cold hard truth is that he probably doesn't really care about you. Dump the loser and try abstinence until marriage!

Priya is 100% right. Hello, if a man needs porn to get excited to be with you, don't pay for his porn, run in the other direction and fast!!

What on earth...?

"Paying for the porn that gets him in the mood"?!

Okay, dump the guy and RUN!!! If he has to watch porn to get you in the mood, then he's not worth the trouble.

And I think guys should take some responsibility for the birth control. It takes two people to have sex and two people to make a baby.

The link you've used to our sexual readiness checklist is a spam site. Not only are they without permission to reprint the list -- nor do you likely want your readers to have to get spun to a spam site -- that is not an actual copy of the checklist, which lives here.

Too, Scarleteen is not intended only for young women, nor is that checklist addressed only to women, but to young men as well, and in context (which is extensive, and hardly limited to the ability to pay for BC), that is very easy to see.

We'd absolutely, and quite vehemently, agree that putting all the responsibility for cost and care per birth control in heterosexual couples on women is sexist and unbalanced. Why seek to create divisions when there is agreement?

If the two people are not exclusive, condoms should always be used. Guys tend to take it upon themselves to buy these and I have yet to hear of a guy asking a girl to pay him back half the cost, although I'm sure it's happened somewhere.

Otherwise, I am surprised you left this key part of the advice column out: "Try to look at the whole forest of your relationship, not just the weeds, and decide if the financial burdens of your shared life are approximately equal. If they aren’t, then you have a legit complaint."

If you are letting your boyfriend pay for most or all dates, dinners, cabs, event tickets, and everything else you do together, then whining about half the birth control money is absurd and unfair. That's a "what's mine is mine, what's yours is ours" attitude.

If you are not pressed for funds, then asking for $25/month is pretty tacky. It's like asking a friend to give you gas money for driving them to an airport 45 miles ($10-$20, since you have to make a round trip) away. If you're broke, it's OK, otherwise definitely not.

If you pay a roughly equal share of joint relationship expenses generally, AND you are on a tight budget, then I think you should expect him to pay his share for the birth control, and if he does not, then he is the one being unreasonable. Like most financial issues, this one is totally dependent on circumstance.

It's true that there is a sad misogyny about birth control today, even in the text books. 99% of birth control methods listed in Tortora's Principles of Anatomy and Physiology are female-use contraception. Male condoms were mentioned only briefly, and vasectomies were not mentioned at all. The sad fact of birth control today is that, generally, it is seen as being the "woman's responsibility." In fact, a lot of men today don't want to be bothered with safe sex at all, financially or otherwise. Most female methods of birth control come with some rather serious drawbacks. Those that are not abortive in nature or significantly less effective generally make use of synthesized hormones, which mess around quite seriously with a woman's natural body chemistry, not to mention increase the risk of dangerous conditions like deep vein thrombosis. And yet, a lot of men are reluctant or flat-out unwilling to use a condom.
I think we need to stand firm and demand our men take some responsibility.
Buddy, if you don't want to take some responsibility for contraception, then the birth control I'll be using is Aspirin. One pill placed firmly between my knees.

Hi Heather,

Thanks for writing in. I noticed the old link to your list didn't work anymore, so that's why I linked to the Google cached page of the list; but I'm certainly happy to link to your updated list and in fact, I have just done so.

Also happy to hear that we agree that women shouldn't bear the sole responsibility of contraception. However, when "readiness" is equated with a "sex budget" and the ability to pay for contraception--and since only women biologically can get pregnant--I think that unfortunately, the "readiness" philosophy can itself produce a gender imbalance.

If part of being a mature woman is paying for your own birth control, then why should a young woman ask her partner to pay if she is "independent" enough to pay for her own? Or, conversely, if she is not "independent" enough to pay, then why is she having sex in the first place because she is apparently not "ready"?

I'm not saying that you, personally, believe this Heather, but I think this is one unintended consequence of the mindset taken to its logical conclusion. And many young men do seem to have this belief as we have seen.

I think there are a few parts of the Checklist that are like this--obviously written with good intent, but nonetheless can have unintended consequences when read by teens. For example: "I can relax during sexual practices without fear, anxiety or shame." Many teens will read that and think that if they can't "relax during sexual practices," that means they are "ashamed."

Well, they might not be able to relax because a particular behavior is inappropriate for them or for their relationship. Perhaps they are with someone who is abusive or doesn't really care about them--in which case they are not shame-ridden in the least. They just need to say "no."

So I think we have to be attentive not just to intentions but also how these things may be interpreted or misinterpreted by young people. But I do appreciate hearing your perspective and I think it's positive that we're having this conversation.

Wendy, happy to chat with you about this.

I don't mean to nitpick semantics, but I think that saying having money to handle some of the costs of sex, as one of MANY aspects of readiness is "equating" readiness to having money. As well, I have said on that list from the start, right at the top of the page that sex does NOT equal maturity, and we've explained this daily to teens for all of the nearly ten years I've run Scarleteen. Too, again, that list is directed at BOTH partners (and Scarleteen also isn't just for heterosexuals, so).

Too, Scarleteen is a very interactive site: if teens reading are unclear, not only can they come to us and ask for clarification or further discussion, they often do. Our message boards have over 30,000 registered users, and there are constant discussions about all of this. But overall? From what I can gather, most of our readers really do seem to understand what's being said and what we intend with it.

But too, a lot of people CANNOT relax because they ARE ashamed. Perhaps of their bodies, perhaps because they're trying to have sex in a context or relationship they don't really feel is right, perhaps because they know they're having sex with someone who doesn't treat them with love and respect, and with anything like that, shame and/or lack of relaxation, I think we can agree it's likely NOT a great idea for someone to be having sex, in ANY context. (And we don't ever present not being ready as some kind of bad thing, or readiness as some sort of special status.) Again, I hear you saying the kinds of things we've always said and say daily. I get the impression from how you've represented and talked about Scarleteen in the past that you perhaps are seeing a great divide when in actuality, there may be some divides or differences in opinion, but far less than you'd think or have seen.

I don't want to scroll off the page, but per the gender divides with birth control, one of the trickiest things is that we DO have a natural divide we can't bridge because it IS only women who can become pregnant and also because we simply have so few methods of birth control which men can use or be equally responsible for.

I think you all have posted great notes so far...keep them coming. With respect to the birth control philosophy I do think that we really need to re-evaluate everything. So often, birth control is viewed as a liberating thing-a way to have sex without getting pregnant. However, it is important to note that birth control is not always 100% effective. So, when you use birth control and it doesn't work and a woman becomes pregnant then what? Does she keep the child? Have an abortion? What is the next game plan? I think that no only really thinks this far ahead. The society we live in seems to stress instant gratification. It is about getting what we want now. This is very sad. Such ideologies have led us to the state we are now in. Selfishness has consumed us. In so many capacities we have become self centered. It seems that as more time progresses we fall deeper and deeper into the selfish realms. These days men don't even want to pay for birth control. People will try and argue on all sorts of grounds but to me this is just a reflection of selfishness-another way that seeks to take instead of give. When pregnancy occurs by accident so often much pressure is placed on a woman to have an abortion-another reflection of our selfishness. I remember about a year or two ago I met a mother of a 17 year old girl. She said her daughter had sex and became pregnant and she was now having the baby. I was relieved to hear this and said instinctively you must at least be happy that she (the daughter) is having the child. The woman looked shocked and said to me "No, I wanted her to have an abortion, but the boyfriend's family was Catholic and didn't want to." I couldn't believe that this girl's mother was saying this. Did she not realize the implications involved in abortions? I am not even speaking from a morality perspective, but rather just from an emotional and physical perspective. It later dawned on me that this mother too was filled with selfishness. Upon hearing of her daughter's pregnancy her selfish heart could not so much as even think about what would be the best thing to do for everyone. Rather, she could only think about what she wanted to do. If a mother could behave in such a fashion is it any surprise that men too have become more selfish? Is it any wonder that they want to enjoy the pleasures of sex but don't want to take responsibility? If they cared so much they would consider everyone's best interest ahead of time, but they do not. Such men (and women) only take into consideration their own selfish desires. The woman shouldn't even have to ask the man to chip in-it should come instinctively. The man should be looking our for the woman's best interest in every capacity-her emotional well being, her spiritual well being etc. If men do not want to chip in for birth control I would interpret that to be a reflection of their lack of concern/care and their selfishness. If one were to possess such undesireable traits it makes me wonder why women are drawn to these men to begin with and most importantly how they can agree to share themselves (on any level) with someone who obviously does not care for them.

Regarding the idea of helping to pay for birth control as a "commitment"--at the university where I went to grad school, and I'm sure many others, women buy six-month or yearlong supplies of birth control pills. It's very convenient, saves health center pharmacy (wo)man-hours, and is easier on students who forget to call in or pick up their refills. (I admit that I'm one of those.)

Paying for a one-year supply at $12 a pack was a financial pinch for me, but nothing like the $30-50 I'm hearing quoted in the media. So perhaps when the young man said that chipping in for birth control was too much of a commitment, his partner wasn't buying her pills, patch, or ring on a monthly basis.

This is a sore point for me because the hormones started to give me debilitating migraines about 5 months into my year's supply. Now I have $72 worth of pills and no use for them.

As I wrote to Wendy on Facebook, as a comment on her posting a link to this:

"I disagree with birth control in the first place. Philosophically, it makes men out of women ("the men are men, and, the women are, too"): a being who can have sex and not get pregnant. A fertile women is HEALTHY! To squelch that is to make a woman UNHEALTHY! Birth control, from the woman's perspective, says, "I love you, but, I will kill any of your sperm that come my way." I, for the record, will NEVER wear a condom. That must be the equivalent of wearing a rain-jacket in the shower.

For the record, I am not married, thus am not having sex at all, as I believe in waiting until one is married."

Toni Weschler, in her book 'Taking Charge of Your Fertility' notes that women are fertile less than ten days out of their entire cycle, whereas men are fertile at all times.

So, putting aside all my Christian perspectives on the issue, it would only be 'fair' for the men to take the brunt of the responsibility in birth control.

However, realistically speaking, even if the men were willing, there aren't a whole lot of options for men to control their own fertility. And the women are the ones who bear the pregancy.

So life isn't fair.

And this is where my Christian perspective screams to come in and explain that's why God created marriage, and why sex outside of marriage is so abhorrent to Him.

Is it fair that one puzzle piece doesn't get the same part of the picture as it's next interlocking piece? No. But it certainly is better that it doesn't! But each piece must play its proper part for it all to work out better.

That first sentence should have read: "I don't mean to nitpick semantics, but I think that saying having money to handle some of the costs of sex, as one of MANY aspects of readiness, is NOT "equating" readiness to having money." Were that what we intended, material or financial items would be the only matters on that list.

You can also remove a good half of the "too"s and "but"s in my last comment up there. Yesterday was clearly a longer day that I thought.

In any event, if you want to chat about this further, you're welcome to contact me. I'll be frank: as a woman and a feminist, I don't entertain nor want to be anywhere near men like Joe Muir telling women -- particularly in what is clearly a women's community -- why it's not acceptable for us to own our own bodies and decide if and when we want to reproduce (including those women who are married). So, if we're going to continue this discussion, I'd prefer not to do it here where that is at all engaged or tolerated.

If you aren't interested in doing that, I'd just encourage you, given how much you tend to talk about Scarleteen, to consider doing so with greater context, with a fuller understanding of who we serve as a readership, and with an eye towards seeing where we intersect, rather than creating what has looked to me like artificial divides which may make for great sound bytes, but appear rather disingenuous.

Heather,

I understand it can be difficult to read views with which you disagree, but if I didn't publish comments I disagreed with, then that would mean not only censoring Joe's comment, but yours as well. As long as people don't attack others personally and they have a point to make, I always try to include all points of view because I think we all benefit from hearing the other side.

In terms of your comments about me, it's interesting that in your posts so far you have raised only two possibilities: we either a.) deep down, agree or b.) I'm being disingenous. I would submit that neither is the case, and the more obvious answer is that we simply disagree, and that's OK. I don't think you're a bad person or you're being dishonest just because we disagree. As I said before, I don't question your good intentions.

To me, people can have different opinions because they have different information, different experiences and/or different ways of looking at the world, and that's fine. I don't expect you to agree with me on everything; but it seems to me that you have to allow for the possibility that others might disagree with you and that, like you, their intentions are also sincere.

Getting back to the substance, I appreciate your clarification about the sex budget but the checklist doesn't refer to "some of the costs of sex," but rather "$50 minimum per month to take care of any needed birth control," so I got the impression you were referring to ALL of the costs for contraception. If you really mean only "some" and to imply shared cost, perhaps that could be made more explicit.

About shame, if we were living in Saudi Arabia I might agree with you, but since we're living in North America where most schools have comprehensive sexuality education programs and sex not only sells but sex tapes are star-making vehicles, I do not that think that being ashamed of their bodies is what typically motivates teenage sexual reticence.

And so I think sending that message is problematic. If a teen is feeling more modest because, let's say, they want to wait for the right person and they are told that modesty is about "shame," they might not have the confidence to question that message--whether in your forums or in other places. They might just accept this as received wisdom and feel bad about themselves.

I'm sorry that you are unhappy that I'm talking about this, but I think it's actually a good thing that we both have our own opinions and hopefully, girls will have more choices because they can hear both sides.

Let me preface my comments by saying, I am a woman. I'll also say that I work in a male-dominated career as an electrical engineer in the auto industry. I agree with Joe - and I too am waiting for marriage. I'll be 42 years old this Christmas Eve, so I'm not some young thing in high school or college who hasn't seen anything of real life - I've dated many men who are, to use an old fashioned term, cads, only wanting what they want. Which leads to my agreement with Rachel's comments. And, more importantly, I don't have to budget or worry about where my birth control is coming from - it's free!

Hi, I just wanted to pick up on Rachel's' point about the mother who wanted her daughter to have an abortion - while my views on abortion are probably similar to yours Rachel in that I am very much against them, I do not believe that the mother was necessarily being selfish: she could have truly wanted the best for her daughters future and saw a child as an impediment to that, it could have been love for her daughter that encouraged her viewpoint. I had a friend that went through very similar circumstances and in that case the mother told me how she felt and I don't believe that there was selfishness involved - it doesn't mean it's right however...

What about adoption? I'm sick of how no one mentions adoption. Nine months of pregnancy will not ruin your life people. As a plus, you won't be killing anyone and you'll be giving a childless loving family the opportunity to provide what you cannot.

Hi Priya,

Thanks for your note. While I do appreciate your sentiments. I can vouch that I believe that the mother's intentions were in fact selfishly derived. The daughter wanted to have the child and the daughter's boyfriend did as well. In North America we have a number of agencies that would happily accept children if one were to want to give their child up for adoption. The mother could have supported her daughter to have the child and then give the child up for adoption if she felt that she was not able to raise the child at the time. That way the daughter could continue her life and education and better herself and her situation and then if she wanted to raise the child she could take the child back into her care. In the alternative, even if the child was given up for adoption and adopted by another family it would probably still be better for the daughter. From a physical and emotional perspective the daughter would probably be in a better position.

Being someone who has studied abortion, the various techniques used and the long and short term consequences I can tell you that from a physical and emotional perspective an abortion is anything but pleasant. So many women are fooled into believing that it is nothing-a five minute procedure. They are not told that this apparent five minute procedure is something that can possibly haunt them for the rest of their lives. In my high school there had at one time been an abortion epidemic in which a number of girls would get pregnant, panic and then have an abortion. I cannot even begin to tell what sort of an impact abortions can have on young women (and women in general). But please, do not take my word on it. Let us recall the frightful words of Lori Nerad, the former national president of Women Exploited by Abortion. Her painful words resonated very much with me when I first heard them and still do. With respect to the abortion she chose to have she has said the following: "Two weeks after the abortion, I went into labor. I staggered into the bathroom. And there, with my husband beside me, I delivered a part of my baby the doctor had missed. It was the head of my baby… "I'll wake up in the middle of the night, thinking I hear a baby crying. And I still have nightmares in which I am forced to watch my baby being ripped apart in front of me. I simply miss my baby. I constantly wake up wanting to nurse my child, wanting to hold my child. And that's something the doctor never told me I would experience." If these words have the same impact on you as they did on me when I first heard them I am sure that you can see where I am coming from. I remember upon hearing these words I thought to myself what would one do if after having an abortion one were to deliver the head of their child? Would they bury it? Would they simply throw it in the trash? Would they continue to believe the lie that is being spread that it was never really a child but rather just a bunch of cells? What is one to do? Such haunting and grotesque experiences are the norm in the abortion world.

In addition to the devastating psychological impact abortions have they also have an equally devastating physical impact. Dr. Bohumil Stipal, Czechoslovakia's Deputy Minister of Health, stated: "Roughly 25% of the women who interrupt their first pregnancy have remained permanently childless." Sterility is not the only physical consequence of abortion. Cervical damage, bleeding, chronic abdominal pain, ripping or perforation of the uterus, convulsions, and endotoxic shock are just a few of the many physical consequences one can experience as a result of having an abortion. With respect to my particular experience, I recall that the mother mentioned her daughter's pregnancy and that she wanted her to have an abortion. We were at a fitness studio at the time which I suppose in retrospect was quite ironic. A woman who appeared to care so much about her health that she would come to a fitness studio did not seem to have the least bit of concern for her own daughter's health. When she made the remark about wanting her daughter to have an abortion another woman that we both knew heard that comment as it was in ear shot. She remarked and said the following "I agree, in fact I would even take that one step further. If I could have my way it would become mandatory for all teenagers who get pregnant to have abortions. They can't take care of kids and so the burden will fall on the rest of us." The mother agreed.

I hope that all who are reading this can see the pathetic nature of such people's sentiments. I have always maintained that people are the most precious and valuable things we have in this world. We cannot place a value on human life. Each and every life is so precious. All the money in the world could never make another identical person. Once we lose someone they are gone forever. Upon being presented with these facts most would feel compelled to value and treasure human life to the best of their abilities however, this is not the case. We discard human life like it is garbage. What a warped world we live in when we are willing to throw away something so precious that can never be bought, replace of replenished for no better reason then "it would be a burden to the rest of us."

In conclusion, I do not believe this mother in the case I mentioned actually did have her daughter's best intentions in mind. If she did she most certainly would not have been pressuring her into having an abortion when a)there are so many potential negative effects that abortion can have and b)when both the daughter and her boyfriend wanted to keep the child. As I have said before true love seeks to give, not to take. If the mother had her daughter and grandchild's best interests at heart she would have sought to do everything in her power to help her daughter and grandchild live the best lives they could live but she did not. Her selfishness consumed her heart to the point that she was willing to do anything to get rid of the "burden"-anything at all even if that meant harming her grandchild and potentially bestowing a life time of pain and suffering upon her daughter.

While I appreciate you sentiments Priya with respect to some people thinking that abortion I do have a few things to say. First of all, I question if these people really believe that it is the best thing. Do they really hold that opinion true to their heart or have they fooled themselves into believing that they do? Remember, we are masters of self-deception. Furthermore, for the population that genuinely believes that abortion is the best thing for a girl to do they obviously have not examined the facts properly. As mentioned earlier adoption services are available in North America and so a woman is not doomed if she cannot raise a child. There are many people who would love nothing more than to adopt a child. Why subject oneself to a lifetime of potential suffering when there is another discourse? People who decide that abortion is a great idea have not examined the facts properly and therefore I would argue that such people are ignorant and sadly, ignorance is not bliss!

I think you are being needlessly critical of the Scarleteen checklist, or that your reading of it is too narrow.

The list suggests that women who want to be sexually active should be able and willing to cover the cost of birth control (whatever method they choose — condoms, the Pill, etc.). It doesn't explicitly endorse the idea that women should solely be responsible for birth control, as you suggest; rather, it's stating that, if necessary, women should be ready to take on that responsibility, since using birth control/protection from STDs should be something that all women consider an essential part of being sexually active, not just something that they consider or use when it's convenient (financially or otherwise).

I think it's a good thing for young women to be encouraged to think about such practical matters if they wish to become sexually active; too often women are still encouraged to think about sexual encounters in romantic or emotional terms, not practical ones. I can speak from experience; the first guy I ever slept with infected me with chlamydia. He didn't know he had it, and he didn't mean to infect me. But because I thought he was a "good" guy, and thought because he loved me that he obviously wouldn't do something like that, that it wouldn't happen to me. If I had been encouraged to address the real-life health responsibilities of being sexually active at that time in my life, I can guarantee I would've behaved more proactively and responsibly.

To close, nothing on Scarleteen indicates to me that the authors think women should be solely responsible for birth control (and as Heather pointed out, this whole argument favors heterosexual pairings anyway). As has been mentioned, I think you are looking for disagreements here where there are none. There is nothing in the world wrong with encouraging women of all ages to be proactive and realistic in considering their birth control options if they choose to become sexually active. I think it's a great idea!

Well Rachel, that is the saddest and most horrifying story. Abortion is taken far too lightly these days.
In my friends case she was a single person, she did not have the abortion and her mother came round but was still somewhat sad about the diminishing opportunities that having a child meant which in a way could also be seen as selfish but not in her mind...

This is simple. You teach your children responsibly about sex. You encourage them to abstain until they are mature enough to deal with the emotional issues (both theirs and their partner's). Then you hope and protect. You ensure your children have access to condoms and birth control. If they won't talk to you about it, you make sure they know where to go. Hopefully, you've built up a support network for your child so they can seek help from a family member, a religious leader, or a teacher.

And then you hope they make the best decisions after you have taught them to be responsible, honourable, and safe.

There is one aspect of this issue which I find intriguingly absent from the discussion. Much has been said about how much money college students can save by simply waiting until marriage for sex, which is what I chose to do. However, it is then assumed that after marriage, the woman will be fine with possibly becoming pregnant at any point in time. I am still a student, still married, and still paying $50/month for contraceptives; please don't forget that getting married does not mean that a woman is instantly agreeable to having a child.

Anon: I think this is a slightly different issue - being married means that contraceptive involvement is not the first sign of the commitment/no commitment dilemma.

It just occurred to me, reading this over, that my girlfriend pays for her birth control pills entirely. I don't chip in. She never asked, and I never gave it much thought. We live together and share many finances liberally, so it isn't much of a financial issue to begin with - I'd probably pick up the slack buying something else - but it is very funny how buying the pills has implicitly been her role, in both of our minds.

I'll offer to split the cost, if only for the sake of principle.

Hello, hello every girl who thinks her "religion" should have nothing to do with this discussion.

First of all, DO NOT put aside your religious views when speaking on any terms concerning any topic in which you believe. Your religion is supposed to be what you BELIEVE TO BE TRUE AND RIGHT, it is supposed to be the WAY in which everyone would profit in following. So, that said, please realize that your beliefs have EVERYTHING to do with this discussion, please do not leave them out. Without a higher law giver, there can be no law, no better way to follow than "that which is right in our own eyes"; and if everyone has a "right" to do what he feels is right in his own way, then this discussion about sex and birth control is totally worthless.

Now, with my Christian views in mind, may I say that because I believe that Jehovah God's way is the right way, and that His Word has revealed to us this right way, I tell you that God forbids fornication and not only promotes abstinence until marriage, but commands it for our good! Ok, so if this is your belief, it would be sensible to assume that birth control should not be even an issue in one's life until the day that person is committed in marriage.

Concerning men and their refusal to pay for birth control, well, has any girl thought of the idea that maybe guys no longer care about the girl's they have sex with, because these women are allowing guys to think of them as whores? I mean, hey, do these women actually expect guys to treat them with respect when these same girls act as if they don't want any in the way they dress, in their attitudes, and in their sex-driven lifestyles? These ideas used to be common sense in the days when guys actually paid for their girl's birth control, and maybe that is why they did, because girls were, for the most part far less openly promiscuous.

Honestly, if the birth control being used is "the pill", I think that the man should foot the entire financial bill. I know, this might not be a popular view. But my reasoning is that the woman "pays" by altering her body chemistry. There are many health risks to this. I think we take this too lightly.

Also - and this is also not a popular view - but men have so many fewer physical risks to contend with as a result of sex. They don't need to see a separate doctor (and pay the bill) once per year for invasive exams. They don't have the same risks with infertility, cervical cancer, vaginal and urinary tract infections that are often brought on as a result of sexual activity. Add to this the fact that they are often more pushy and interested in sex. I think it's just a biological fact that sex is more important to them than it is to women. I know we often don't like to admit that.

Another important thing to consider: when taking the pill, pregnancy is still possible. The woman is still bearing the brunt of this risk. Honestly, I think that footing the financial end is very minor compared to the rest of what the woman pays, physically.

Lastly (and this one continues to baffle me), if men love sex so much and are so driven to have it, why *would* any of them would balk at footing the financial bill to facilitate it happening more often and with less worry and complication? Especially if this ensures them, well... more sex!

I really truly think that if a man isn't willing to foot the bill for sex-related risks and supplies, he can't possibly want it *that* bad!

to anon 12/12 6:20-
you'd be surprised how many college guys DON'T take it upon themselves to buy condoms, or even go over to the health center, where they give them out for free. my ex-boyfriend never kept condoms on hand, and then did not understand why I wouldn't have sex with him.

and Emily-
having premarital sex does not make you a whore. sure, it might not be a good idea and sure, there are plenty of girls who are promiscuous. Maybe I am reading your comment incorrectly, but it seemed as if you were saying that any girl who was engaging in premarital sex obviously has a whorish attitude, dresses like a hooker, sleeps around, and shouldn't expect to get any respect from men. I, for one, am offended by that. No, I'm not a virgin, but that doesn't mean I'm running around campus in stilettos and mini skirts with all kinds of cleavage hanging out. No one should disrespect a person because of their personal decisions, period. In addition, what kind of a guy would date a girl he doesn't respect? if you're dating someone because you think that they're an easy lay, the problem is with BOTH parties, not just the girl.

There's a 5-letter chatroom acronym that springs to mind but which I hesitate to type as it's not very modest :o) But even with the profanity it contains, it would have been better advice than what she got, which was instructions on how to better capitulate to being used sexually by her boor-friend.

Why is it young women are continually given this crappy advice? Why are we being schooled to be ever-flatter doormats? Why is it rude to tell a young woman she shouldn't put up with such things? Why do we offer advice on how to 'keep' this dork, as opposed to pointing out that... well, this dude might be a bad bet, y'know?

Woman have the legal right to abort during just about any point of a nine month pregnancy in every state in the US. A man's opinion is treated as worthless. Women don't even have to notify the father when they get an abortion. Conversely, if a woman decides to keep the child and the man doesn't want it, he becomes financialy bound by her choice for 18 years. Steve Martin said it best in the movie "Parenthood" - "Women have choices, men have responsibilities." Given these basic facts about reproduction in the modern world, I think it shouldn't be a big deal when men don't offer to help pay for birth control.

I seem to be one of the few who've had a considerate ex - the ex I was the most serious about always bought the condoms, and when I was complaining about the method of birth control I was using being dropped by my drug plan when my school switched carriers, he just said he'd buy it for me, no problem.

As an aside, that wasn't entirely the point to my complaining, the plan switch was a breach of contract with the previous provider, and with us, I was thinking that their bait and switch wasn't entirely legal, but it was good to know he was at least *somewhat* considerate (even if he still eventually ran away)!

As usually the guy's the one who wants it more, he should be bending over backwards to take care of the girl in that department, if he expects to get some.

I agree with Daniel. It shouldn't be a big deal when men don't offer to help pay for birth control. Along with that I think it also shouldn't be a big deal to the man when women don't want to have sex with him. And it also shouldn't be a big deal to the man if he does have sex with a woman, and then has to care for a child for the next 18 years.

Birth control is a really easy way for a man to avoid at least some of the risks of possibly creating the child with the woman, and then "being financially bound by her choice for 18 years". It's not really her choice that he's being bound by. It's his (and her) choice to have had sex in the first place. Sex leads to babies. We all know that! It's common knowledge.

If a man doesn't want to deal with that possibility, he doesn't have to have sex with a woman. It's HIS choice to have sex that creates the baby in the first place. Daniel's post makes it sound like women are forcing sex on men, and then the poor men have to deal with HER selfish "choices" regarding the consequences. I don't think that's the case at all.

I agree with Sarah. If men want to have sex and the woman gets pregnant then they should be equally as enthusiastic about being fathers. It is important to remember that no form of birth control, other than abstinence is 100% effective. Condoms fail and so does the Almighty birth control pill. People are aware of this when they have sex (or they should be), and this includes the man. Abortions can be extremely damaging to a woman's body. I have already written about these potential effects in some of my notes above. As a result, if a woman gets pregnant and decides that she doesn't want the abortion then that is completely understandable and unlike Daniel's position I feel that the man should suck it up. He knew that the woman could still get pregnant, even if she was on birth control and he CHOSE to have sex with her. So, if the result is a baby then c'est la vie...time to grow up and accept the responsbility that comes with sex, instead of just enjoying the benefits!

I completely agree with Sarah and Rachel. I'm so tired of men complaining about having to pay up/be bound by the woman's choice for 18 years etc etc.

Hi Jen,
I am tired of men stating that they should have the right to decide whether or not they want to have the child and that they shouldn't have to be "bound" by the responsibility. However, I am equally as tired of hearing women say that they should have the freedom to have an abortion as they don't want to be bound by the responsibility. When people have sex, they should accept the responsibiltity that comes along with it. If that means getting pregnant, then they should be responsible enough to have the child. If one is not willing to assume carriage of responsibilty then they should not be having sex. From a practical perspective I believe that we each should be the author of our own life. No one should have the right to take our life away from us. As a result, no one (man or woman) should be allowed to take the life of an unborn child. It further angers me to hear fallacious claims that the unborn child is not really a child. In the United States, in some states a woman can have an abortion up until the 9th month, provided the baby doesn't come out! This is pathetic. Don't tell me that it is not a child in the woman's womb. My younger sister was born almost 1 month premature. When she was born she had to be put in a incubator and a lot of extra measures had to be taken to preserve her life. However, I assure you she was not "just a bunch of cells" when she was born. She was a baby who cried and had life. In turn, when a woman has an abortion she is not simply terminating "a bunch of cells" or something that "would have been a child." Rather she is taking the life of an innocent child who cannot so much as even defend itself. I do not support capital punishment however, when criminals are sentenced to capital punishment at least they have the opportunity to defend themselves and make their pleas. However, when babies are aborted, they are not even afforded the same opportunity. We reserve the death penalty for the most harsh of crimes yet we choose to give the same punishment to innocent children who are guilty of nothing other than being born!

Who should pay for birth control is a moot point, as it is a question that each individual person will have their own answer to. The real question here is this- why is the government now trying to make it MORE difficult for young women to have access to birth control? Do they WANT girls to get STDS or get pregnant?

Just wanted to add one thing- you can get free condoms in many places. Right now, it doesn't cost $50 to protect yourself- but if the government has it's way, it soon will.

I am in a serious long term relationship with the man I hope to be with permanently and have children with when the time is right. Although using the IUD, I got pregnant after we had been together a year. I originally planned to have an abortion, but was deeply distressed when I saw the scan of the foetus. The obstetrician said she would not recommend me for an abortion unless she was sure I was completely at peace with it, and told me that although the clinic I went to was very rigorous in only granting abortions to women who were at peace with their decision, nevertheless fully two thirds of women who had abortions regretted them and suffered serious trauma.

She gave me a timeframe in which it she would be willing to abort if it was my final decision, told me to come and see her every week until I had decided one way or the other, and was very encouraging about other options such as adoption, either by strangers or by a family member whom I have already helped to have a baby through egg donation. My boyfriend said he would support whatever decision I made, although his feelings were strongly in favour of parenthood.

In the end I decided to keep the baby. Abortion felt like it would be too violent and traumatic an action on so many levels. In a horrible irony I had a second trimester miscarriage, losing my daughter at 18 weeks. This is where it gets complicated. I mourn that loss as the loss of a baby, a daughter. We named her, and buried her. I have pictures of her and still weep with the lack of the baby that I could never hold in my arms. Neverthless I know, from my very intense and painful experience that she was not yet a person at the time of her death. She was in the process of becoming a person. I attribute personhood to my baby, because she would have become one, and because it is necessary to have a focus for one's intense grief, which is uniquely complex and painful. Abortion would not have hurt her; she had not yet developed a nervous system with which to feel pain. It would have damaged me, for a liftime.

Although I could not have had an abortion, and I am eternally grateful for the obstetrician's compassionate and strongly ethical care of me and my potential baby, I still know that it can sometimes be the least wrong choice for a woman to terminate a pregnancy, as long as it is done early on. It is not the same as murder, although it is tragic, and it is necessary that safe and legal abortions should be available for women who need them. I say need; as many of you rightly point out, it is not merely a lifestyle choice. I'm sorry for going on at such length, but for many of us the issue is complex, and cannot be treated with a blunt one size fits all ethic. I am in the UK by the way, and the care I received was on the NHS. I don'y know how my experience might have differed in the USA.

Dear Rose,

Thank you for sharing your story with us. I grieve with you and am so sorry to hear of your story. I am also exceptionally proud that you made the decision that you did. I am sorry about your loss and am certain that this must be difficult for you to deal with but at the same time find comfort and consolation in knowing that you daughter's passing was an accident that happened and was not your fault.

My mother lost two children via miscarriages which was very difficult for her. One was about 4 months developed. I spare the readers the gruesome details but when she had her miscarriage parts of the baby were visible. That is, it wasn't just a bunch of cells but rather a life that had begun.

I am very happy to hear of the support that the obstetrician gave you and the fact that she shared the other possibilities with you and assured you that abortion was not the only way out.

Your story touched me greatly and reminded me of a posting I once wrote on regarding unrequited love. So often when we hear the words unrequited love we think about romantic love however, the actual word unrequited means unreturned. That is, a love that we may feel for someone that is not returned. Therefore, the concept of unrequited love extends to and should include many people from the orphan who weeps for the parents they no longer have to the parent who grieves over the loss of their child who has become a drug addict-who has lost themselves and become mixed up in a world where they don't belong.

With your words I feel as though in your heart you too must feel that you have unrequited love for your child. You miss and love the child that you never had the chance to meet. However, in these moments find comfort in knowing that your love is not really an unrequited love per se. For the love you have for your child does not go unreturned. Your child is in a better place with God and her love for you is very much returned and alive. She is with you now and always will be. I believe that when we are children we are in our most innocent stages of life-free from the imprints of even the smallest of transgressions. With such innocence when we go to God how can he do anything else but embrace us into his loving arms?

It is with such hope that we are saved at the end of the day-saved from our saddness and pain. Saved from our grief. When our heart is weak and heavy and our eyes swollen with tears at night-tears that no one in this world sees we must remember....we must remember that our loved one is not lost or gone but rather just away from us temporarily to some day be united again to us.

It is under the mantle of love that our spirits shall be lifted so that the heaviness in our souls will cease to exist. Even in our darkest moments we must believe in life and love. We must believe even if we have doubts. For faith is faith because we do not have proof. If we had proof we wouldn't need faith. However, be thankful that we do not always have proof for with faith our souls are able to be taken to a higher level. When we believe we become courageous. Our courage facilitates so much. It allows us to be the people that we yearn to be and love in the way that we are meant to love.

I conclude by saying that my heart grieves the most not for the one who has lost their life but rather their love. For if our corporal bodies were to cease a mere norm would have occurred. However, if our love was to cease a flagrant tragedy would have occurred and for this we should grieve to no end.

With respect to the comment

"Just wanted to add one thing- you can get free condoms in many places. Right now, it doesn't cost $50 to protect yourself- but if the government has it's way, it soon will," I have a few things to say.

First of all while you do get condoms in some places condoms are not fool proof. Condoms break and women get pregnant. However, even by spending $50/month you are still not engaging in fool proof bith control. Even women on the pill get pregnant believe it or not. The only 100% effective form of birth control in abstinence.

I found the part where blondgirl said "it doesn't cost $50 to protect yourself- but if the government has it's way, it soon will" to be very interesting. You are quite right. I agree with you but probably not in the sense you think. I agree with you that it doesn't cost $50/month for a sexually active woman to protect herself. There is not price tag a woman can put on "protecting herself" or any amount of money that she could pay to be protected. For a woman who is sexually active makes herself vulnerable to the man she is intimate with.

That is why it is adviseable to wait until marriage to have sex. Because when a woman becomes intimate with a man she bonds with him and nothing in the world can spare her from that. No amount of money could "protect her."

I realise Blondgirl that you probably meant this from a physical protection more than an emotional one but I just thought that I'd throw this out there anyhow.

It's misleading to say that women must abstain from sex in order to avoid pregnancy- it simply is NOT TRUE. The pills isn't 100%; condoms aren't 100%; but how about using BOTH at the same time? Doesn't that just make sense, anyway, as you are protected from disease and pregnancy at the same time?

Any doctor will tell you that the odds of getting pregnant when using multiple forms of birth control are virtually nil. However, every morning when you get in your car to go to work, the odds of getting into a car accident are actually VERY high.

The point is, we don't avoid driving, or skiiing, or any other risky activity just because there is a SLIGHT change of getting hurt or killed. Yet, we ask women to avoid sex so as to avoid the very small chance of getting of getting pregnant. Why? Why pick out sex from the dozens of risky activities we do every day, and demonize it in this way?

Sex always gets picked on. Sex is always seen as leading people to embrace an "instant gratification" culture, and leading them down a path to moral destruction. Well, so does fast food. So does TV. So does a lot of things that the modern world embraces and takes for granted. Yet, we take all this time out, expend all this energy, all those billions of tax dollars spent on totally useless abstinence education. Why?

Because religion demonizes sex, and religious people want to push their values down the rest of our throats. That's why.

And I said- free condoms are distributed in many places, and Planned Parenthood (among other organizations) provide the pill free or at reduced prices.

The point is, there is reliable birth control available for every single woman in the US, and there is no real reason that every one of them shouldn't take advantage of that, and enjoy her sexuality to the fullest- as she personally sees fit, and feels emotionally able to.

Blonde in Tokyo, pardon my nitpicking focus here but, your last line "enjoy her sexuality to the fullest- as she personally sees fit, and feels emotionally able to" seems in itself as an admission that a free for all sexuality that is ready to be "taken advantage of" is in fact emotionally taxing - or worse. Am I wrong in my reading of this...?

I think there are many ways in which overly accessible contraception rather than knowledge of the real implications of the different modes of expressing sexuality, or choosing not to express it for the time being and aiming for deeper relationships or understanding of such first, actually limits the feeling of choice and leaves a lot of the youngest with the feeling that physical protection is the only advice there is - this in turn can actually lead ( in my opinion ) to more risky decisions, pregnancies and diseases rather than less. Education should go deeper than just the physical.

"The point is, there is reliable birth control available for every single woman in the US, and there is no real reason that every one of them shouldn't take advantage of that, and enjoy her sexuality to the fullest- as she personally sees fit, and feels emotionally able to."

Ms Blonde In Tokyo - do you think we should live as an endurance test and do what we are able to or should we benefit from the wisdom of others, our own intuition and observations and do what will give us the most meaning and satisfaction in our lives. The freedom to take advantage of our sexuality in the most open ways is for many an incessant pressure to hide our individual yearnings for more integrated lasting experiences.

Haven't read every comment; forgive me if I repeat anything said already.

I think this is just another fallout from the "my body, my choice" movement. If a woman believes that she has total rights over the growing life in her womb, whether it gets to live or die, and irrespective of what the father thinks of it, or anyone else, why should the responsibility for kindling that life be any different. Mothers have the option to "opt out" of motherhood by abortion, and fathers have the option to opt out by running. If that responsibility can be avoided, why should men even bother to consider the lesser responsibility of preventing a badly-timed conception?

It seems to be (at least in part) just another unfortunate result of the pro-choice movement and "sexual liberation". We live in a culture that shirks at every opportunity the responsibility created by sexual activity.

Isn't birth control demeaning to women? It says "I want your body but not all of it." It turns women into an object for desire. Fertility is part of our make-up but people see it as a problem. Who needs birth control when we have chastity? Why stuff up your body for someone who doesn't like your whole person? When you consider a woman is lucky if she's fertile 25% of the month it seems mindless not to work with it. If you don't like the consequences then don't do the deed.

I spoke with you about this in person tonight, but I wanted to put it down in a comment on your blog, too, because this is very important to me.

The evidence that you cited about birth control pills decreasing women's sexual drive in the long term is bunk. This is coming from the doctor who prescribed my BCPs, an OB/GYN and a scientist who heads a well-known institute of women's reproductive biological research and happens to also be my father:

"Retrospective studies (like the one quoted there) are replete with biases, especially when dealing with difficult issues, such as sexual function. Moreover, [there is no evidence that] elevated SHBG leads to sexual dysfunction. Also, not all BCPs are the same. You cannot do such a study on 30-60 patients and publish in a reputable journal."

Wendy, this study is crying wolf. You can't spread this kind misinformation and claim to be doing good. Most people lack the time, resources and training needed to follow up on this stuff. Intellectual honesty REQUIRES that you refrain from citing studies published in the scientifically irresponsible Journal of Sexual Medicine. Please be more careful!

There is a dichotomy being established here of reckless, unhealthy, dangerous sexual behavior or abstinence until marriage. I don't think that anything in this world is that black and white, and I certainly don't think that the issue of sex is.

Respect is something that can be present in any relationship, sexual or otherwise, as long as women demand that it is there. How about serious monogamous relationships that are not marriages? How about people outside of the heterosexual paradigm?

Putting the emphasis on the social institution of marriage doesn't seem liberating to me. There is no inherent human benefit to marriage - it's a social construct. One that I, personally, respect and value, but a construct nonetheless.

What's liberating is the ability to know myself well enough to decide when it's right for me to have sex. And sometimes that can be a one night stand, and sometimes that can be with someone I love. But I don't think see any evidence that suggests that I can't have beautiful, loving, perfect sex that uplifts me as person outside of a simple, civil institution.

The pill is not only used to prevent pregnancies! I am not sexually active but am on the pill to literally save my life. I suffer from some physical ailments that would require invasive surgery if it were not for the pill. This medication literally saves my life every month!

To the girl--i have no idea what your bf's financial situation is like, but he should at least pay for part of it if the only reason you are on it is for him. also, studies show that couples who cohabitate before marriage are more likely to get divorced over the course of the marriage. something to keep in mind, and good luck!

A young woman who can pay for her own birth control is not "Empowered", she's just protecting herself.
I don't get up every morning saying "Whoa! Now I take my hormones! I'm empowered! I'm a true woman". I won't ask a men to pay for my own pills, still if I'm not in a relationship.

I was recently in a relationship with a man who insisted that I go on the pill (he also, boorishly, insisted that "condoms take all the fun out of sex"). When I asked him if he was going to pay his share of the contraception, he blanched. "No way babe, you're on your own there." Needless to say, that relationship didn't last very long! I say we stop giving men a free ride and hold them responsible, esp. if they are insisting that we take chemicals to alter our hormones (which I find intrusive to say the least!)

Ronni,

How can I know that a comment by someone I know nothing about on an internet blog is more reliable than a medical journal I know nothing about? Generally speaking, I would trust the medical journal and not the random commenter! Also, the study was of 124 people, not 30-60.