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Women on the pill don't 'need' to have simulated periods? (2017)

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Re: Women on the pill don't 'need' to have simulated periods? (2017)

#21
post #10

> The invention of the pill was one of the most significant advancements in the fight for reproductive agency; it allowed us, as a society, to dramatically reconceptualize sexuality and gender relations. Taken a step further the invention of the in vitro breeding chamber finally frees the genders from each other. Now men or women can decide when they want a child and on what terms. The course that society is headed o…

> Now men or women can decide when they want a child and on what terms

Women currently have much more choice which gives them an unfair advantage. If a woman becomes pregnant by accident then she can abort or not abort without the man having any say in it. So if you make the argument that it's her body and the man shouldn't have a say (which is fine, I agree), then at the very least the man should have the equal option of "financial abortion" so that he has the same after-the-fact choice to not have a child that he didn't plan on having. It is best for society when children grow up with parents who both wanted them.

Re: Women on the pill don't 'need' to have simulated periods? (2017)

#23

The pill causes a lot of problems later in life; something only discovered recently, since it is a relatively new creation. It also changes mate preferences, and what that means for the future is unknown.

""It also changes mate preferences, and what that means for the future is unknown.""

Genepool collisions with suboptimal pairing enghhh.

who is willing to give up 'sxxy time' all the time any time they want it.

Re: Women on the pill don't 'need' to have simulated periods? (2017)

#24
post #20
post #7

>From this point on, the specter of women's "forgetfulness" stubbornly attached itself to the discourse around birth control. A slew of ads targeted at physicians encouraged a paternalistic approach, depicting women as "scatter-brained, incompetent, and in need of guidance," Gossel writes. I'm aware that the times were unjust to women but whenever you're marketing a product at a massive scale, like 51% of the populat…

How come we've gone 60 years with these pills? There are women who have entire careers behind them in biology and medical science and we're still using these pills. There have been a bunch of refinements to the pill as well as alternative options in the years since, but ultimately I think it's about finding something that works. It's hard finding new drugs and there would be a high bar for a new kind of pill. Progest…

>Chemotherapy was developed before the pill and it's still widely used despite its side-effects.

Chemo consists of thousands of different drugs prescribed in different circumstances, and new ones are being discovered all the time. It has bad side effects because none of the drugs are very "good" when compared with for example first-generation antibiotics which would save your life without even short term side effects.

Re: Women on the pill don't 'need' to have simulated periods? (2017)

#25
post #8

Two women I know suffer from Uterine Fibroids [1] and their doctors both have said in so many words "the uterus is good for two things, growing babies and growing tumors". Both of these women took hormonal birth controls for most of their lives, and learned only after being diagnosed with fibroids that hormonal birth control promotes the growth of fibroids (and cancer). They're both pissed, and have both been advised…

The article you link to literally says the cause is not known and does not mention any links to birth control... > The exact cause of uterine fibroids is unclear. However, fibroids run in families and appear to be partly determined by hormone levels. Risk factors include obesity and eating red meat.

Hormone levels are impacted by birth control, maybe that's the mechanism.

Re: Women on the pill don't 'need' to have simulated periods? (2017)

#26

Two women I know suffer from Uterine Fibroids [1] and their doctors both have said in so many words "the uterus is good for two things, growing babies and growing tumors". Both of these women took hormonal birth controls for most of their lives, and learned only after being diagnosed with fibroids that hormonal birth control promotes the growth of fibroids (and cancer). They're both pissed, and have both been advised…

Can you link any science showing that "hormonal birth control promotes the growth of fibroids (and cancer)."?

This is not something I've spent much time looking into. When my friends mentioned their health problems to me, which happened roughly all at the same time as I was visiting family and friends in another state, I was motivated enough to read up on what the heck fibroids are (I had never heard of them) and at least do some plausibility checks on what they were saying the doctors told them.

What I came up with in my cursory reading is hormonal birth control increases levels of the very hormones complementary to the growth of a fetus which also happens to help other things like fibroids/polyps/tumors whatever in the area to grow.

I don't know that one can make the claim that the hormonal birth controls cause fibroids or cancer, as in increases the probability of these things developing. The trouble is once something like this is present, the birth control hormones make them grow larger and faster.

After a quick google search just now I found [1], which states:

"To help prevent more growth of the fibroid, your doctor may recommend that you stop taking birth control pills or hormone replacement therapy. But in some cases, your doctor may prescribe birth control pills to help control the bleeding and anemia from fibroids, even though the hormones may cause fibroids to grow."

I think there's a lot of mixed information out there and probably a lot of suppression from the industry going on, because of course there's a lot of money to be made in prescribing hormonal birth controls.

If I had a teen-aged daughter, given what I've come to understand about hormonal birth control, I'd consider a copper IUD.

[1] https://www.webmd.com/women/uterine-fibroids/understanding-u...

Re: Women on the pill don't 'need' to have simulated periods? (2017)

#27
post #8

Two women I know suffer from Uterine Fibroids [1] and their doctors both have said in so many words "the uterus is good for two things, growing babies and growing tumors". Both of these women took hormonal birth controls for most of their lives, and learned only after being diagnosed with fibroids that hormonal birth control promotes the growth of fibroids (and cancer). They're both pissed, and have both been advised…

The article you link to literally says the cause is not known and does not mention any links to birth control... > The exact cause of uterine fibroids is unclear. However, fibroids run in families and appear to be partly determined by hormone levels. Risk factors include obesity and eating red meat.

Reading comprehension fail; nowhere in my comment did I use the word 'cause'.

The hormones involved in hormonal birth control are growth factors. If you have uterine fibroids (or a fetus), the hormones help them grow.

Re: Women on the pill don't 'need' to have simulated periods? (2017)

#28
post #7

>From this point on, the specter of women's "forgetfulness" stubbornly attached itself to the discourse around birth control. A slew of ads targeted at physicians encouraged a paternalistic approach, depicting women as "scatter-brained, incompetent, and in need of guidance," Gossel writes. I'm aware that the times were unjust to women but whenever you're marketing a product at a massive scale, like 51% of the populat…

> So I just don't see the reason to paint a picture of a paternalistic conspiracy against women here. It's rather sensible marketing to a massive audience. Yeah, but try turning it around. "Easy. For you to explain… for him to use." I doubt they would have used this language for a male product. Either way, it sounds terribly patronizing.

There's an ad on British TV at the moment showing a woman saying to a man that she got him a gym membership and patting him on the belly as she says so. It's incredibly patronising and I can't ever imagine the same ad with gender roles reversed being allowed on TV.

Re: Women on the pill don't 'need' to have simulated periods? (2017)

#29
post #22

Something else not mentioned is that the pill gives you regular periods. Polycystic ovaries can cause erratic periods, so some women might like it because it gives them a period regularly.

Less "some women might like it" and more it's often explicitly prescribed to help women with irregular cycles.

Re: Women on the pill don't 'need' to have simulated periods? (2017)

#30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So I just don't see the reason to paint a picture of a paternalistic conspiracy against women here. It's rather sensible marketing to a massive audience. Yeah, but try turning it around. "Easy. For you to explain… for him to use." I doubt they would have used this language for a male product. Either way, it sounds terribly patronizing.

There's an ad on British TV at the moment showing a woman saying to a man that she got him a gym membership and patting him on the belly as she says so. It's incredibly patronising and I can't ever imagine the same ad with gender roles reversed being allowed on TV.

How is that argument against what he said? He is talking about back then and you are talking about now.

But when we switched to speaking about contemporary ads, Uber has one where woman wonders "how come he is always on time and able to find any place in city"? So women are still in ads in position of stupid people.

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