"Family planning" = "plan to have lots of kids!"

[glee]

@Captain Amazing

One only has vaginal sex when one wishes to bring about conception.

I hope you’re not suggesting that there is any other way to have s*x.
God will punish anyone who has any sort of ‘relations’ unless they are married and plan on having a baby. :rolleyes:

@Captain Amazing

… or, a couple engages in what’s called “natural family planning”, which is a modern version of the old “rhythm method”, and involves keeping track of the woman’s menstral cycle, and timing sexual activity to either maximize or minimize the chance of conception.

The only ‘natural method of family planning’ is complete abstinence. Everything else will mean you burn in Hell forever. :eek:

[sinjin]

@Captain Amazing

In theory? One only has vaginal sex when one wishes to bring about conception. or, a couple engages in what’s called “natural family planning”, which is a modern version of the old “rhythm method”, and involves keeping track of the woman’s menstral cycle, and timing sexual activity to either maximize or minimize the chance of conception.

Right, if you want to minimize the chance of conception, you time your sexual activity to occur only after the condom is securely fastened to the penis. If you want to maximize the chance of conception, you time your sexual activity to occur only after Johnny has uttered those immortal words: “just the tip.”

[Malienation]

@thirdwarning

(bolding mine)I don’t agree with it them about it, but it could be that what they’re looking at is the idea that women aren’t valued as much if they can’t be like guys. It does seem, sometimes, as if women have to become more like men to have more worth in society, they have to almost deny their ability to bear children to get anywhere or to have anybody respect them. I know that’s an extreme view, but so many of the advances women have achieved seem sometimes to be predicated on their becoming more like the men around them. Maybe part of the point of the statement in question is that it would be nice if women could be just as valuable if they didn’t have to deny part of themselves.

I know I didn’t express that very well, but it’s something I’ve thought for a long time. I don’t think we will have “arrived” until women get the same respect and carry the same value and weight in society, even if they aren’t “like the guys”.

This probably counts as a hijack, so feel free to let the thread just swirl right past it. I likely won’t be able to get back here very soon anyway. It’s going to be a long weekend at work.

Hey! Quit that! You’re working on the weekend when you could be at home with your kids? :eek: You’re acting like a man! :mad: Stop that this minute, you…you…acting like a man kinda gal. :mad:

[Captain_Amazing]

@glee

I hope you’re not suggesting that there is any other way to have s*x.
God will punish anyone who has any sort of ‘relations’ unless they are married and plan on having a baby. :rolleyes:

Well, clearly there are other ways to have sex than vaginally. Obviously different people will have different ideas about the morality or appropriateness of those sexual activities, and that’s something the couple needs to work out themselves. But I think you’re sort of setting up a straw man here, and imposing on the opponents of contraception the viewpoints you’d like them to have.

The only ‘natural method of family planning’ is complete abstinence. Everything else will mean you burn in Hell forever. :eek:

While my fellow Captain in this thread clearly knows more about natural family planning than I do, it’s my understanding that, if done correctly, natural family planning methods are generally pretty effective in preventing conception. While proper condom and spermicidal jelly use are, as I understand it, more effective, that option isn’t available for someone who has moral opposition to artificial contraceptions.

[thirdwarning]

@DianaG

Choosing to use birth control isn’t “denying your ability to bear children”. It’s **controlling ** your ability to bear children.

Yes, I know that. And I never said otherwise. What I did say was that it seems that society pushes woman to make that choice. That it seems as if the only way that women have managed to make some progress in earning the same money, the same respect, the same power, is to become “more like the guys”. And that may be why some people see it as demeaning to women. Ideally the value should be equal, even if the biology is different. Realistically, it still isn’t. The argument isn’t that women have to have children to have value, but that they shouldn’t lose value if they do have children.

And yes, I’m working on the weekend, when my kids aren’t home. And my husband did a whole sinkful of dishes today and some laundry.

Okay, let’s see if this gets my point across any better than the last time.

[Malienation]

@thirdwarning

Yes, I know that. And I never said otherwise. What I did say was that it seems that society pushes woman to make that choice. That it seems as if the only way that women have managed to make some progress in earning the same money, the same respect, the same power, is to become “more like the guys”. And that may be why some people see it as demeaning to women. Ideally the value should be equal, even if the biology is different. Realistically, it still isn’t. The argument isn’t that women have to have children to have value, but that they shouldn’t lose value if they do have children.

And yes, I’m working on the weekend, when my kids aren’t home. And my husband did a whole sinkful of dishes today and some laundry.

“Pushes women to make that choice?” As opposed to what, pushing them to choose to have kids until they dropped, like the old days? When men often raised multiple families with a series of wives (my paternal grandfather was one of 20 kids, something like 10 kids each with 2 wives). Is that the direction they should be shoved in? No? Too extreme? Okay…they could have less kids, I guess. Now, if only there were a way to prevent having too many kids…hmmm, perhaps modern medicine will one day solve this puzzling dilemma. Perhaps a convenient daily pill of some sort… :rolleyes:

No offense, thirdwarning, but you sound like alltogether too many women in this day and age. The more choices you get, the more you resent the fact that you have to make a choice at all. Count your blessings; at least you have choices.

For now.

@thirdwarning

Okay, let’s see if this gets my point across any better than the last time.

Better hope third time’s a charm.

[wonky]

@thirdwarning

What I did say was that it seems that society pushes woman to make that choice.

Those of us who don’t have children are pushed to have them. We’re told how immature and selfish we are for not having them. We’re told how we’re missing out on everything that’s important in life, that we’re not doing our fair share, and that we’re generally doing something shameful.

[Aspidistra]

@jsgoddess

Those of us who don’t have children are pushed to have them. We’re told how immature and selfish we are for not having them. We’re told how we’re missing out on everything that’s important in life, that we’re not doing our fair share, and that we’re generally doing something shameful.

Basically, if you’re female, then you’re fucked. Actually, if you’re HUMAN you’re fucked, but it particularly applies to women.

If you’re not married/partnered, then you’re a man-hating feminazi destined for a lonely old-maidhood in a sleazy nursing home where nobody will ever visit you or care when you die.

If you’re married WITHOUT kids then you’re immature and selfish yada yada nobody will ever visit you in YOUR sleazy nursing home either.

If you have more than three kids then you’re a selfish resource-hogging harpy who is directly responsible for the overcrowding of the planet, and what the hell made your genes so special anyway?

If you have one or two kids you’re a boring “soccer mom” who is clearly just doing it because every one else is, and you have no useful contribution to make to society apart from your uterus.

If you put your kids in daycare you’re a cold callous career-woman who clearly doesn’t care about them and shouldn’t have had them in the first place.

If you DON’T put your kids in daycare then you’re an overprotective “helicopter parent” who needs to grow a pair and let your offspring get a little independence already before then end up single, forty and living in your basement.

And the list goes on…

[Gala_Matrix_Fire]

Aspidistra, you are so right. I’ve been on this board for a long time, and mothers just can’t get a break. Makes me glad I’m not one. No matter what situation your kid ends up in, somehow it’s all your fault. And heaven help you if you ever admit that you aren’t entranced by your children 100% of the time.

[pbbth]

My problem with it is that if you put someone who feels birth control is wrong in charge and they start taking away options, it helps no one and hurts everyone. If I choose to abstain from sex birth control doesn’t matter to me at all, since I am not having sex I don’t need birth control. If I choose to have sex (whether or not I am married) I need to have options if I don’t want to have kids or, heaven forbid, I can’t afford to have kids. I can choose condoms or the pill or an IUD or any other number of options! My having options doesn’t take anything away from anyone else, where as someone imposing their moral beliefs and starting to take away options does effect everyone who chooses to have sex.

Besides, part of the reason birth control is so popular today is because previously women would go across the border to shifty doctors to get abortions or sit in their bathtub with sharp instruments trying to do it themselves. Regular use of birth control reduces abortions and I don’t see why any conservative person would have a problem with that.