# Withdrawal method & condom use have about the same level of birth control effectiveness! **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [May 1, 2016, 2:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/withdrawal-method-condom-use-have-about-the-same-level-of-birth-control-effectiveness/753571 "2016-05-01T02:03:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2016, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/withdrawal-method-condom-use-have-about-the-same-level-of-birth-control-effectiveness/753571/21 "2016-05-03T02:36:57Z")
> [@Mk\_VII](#): > > Also psychologically unsatisfactory. And messy. That stuff just sticks to everything. > [@thelurkinghorror](#): > > Not hard but the point is: who the he’ll wants to? Sure some places teach abstinence-only, but teen pregnancies occur even in places with extensive education because teenagers can be idiots. If the school is teaching “abstinence-only” sex education, it isn’t the teenagers that are the idiots. The human body is evolved to one ultimate end; effective reproduction during the period of peak health and fertility. All other functions, from astronomy to zulu dancing, are secondary at best. (Well, breast-feeding and “mother hearing” are pretty important to the survival of the species, too, but you get the idea.) The belief that some combination of mouth noises about the dangers of pre-marital sex are going to hold back the combined hormones of two virile teenagers is about as smart as bungee jumping with wire rope. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2016, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/withdrawal-method-condom-use-have-about-the-same-level-of-birth-control-effectiveness/753571/22 "2016-05-03T03:01:00Z")
> [@astro](#): > > I’m not in your camp re “satisfaction”. Condoms for STD safety and superior birth control all the way but from a physical sensation perspective the real world difference in sensation is huge. Non-barrier penis vagina sex (IMO) is a 1000% more satisfactory sensation when there is not a rubber barrier in the way. I think in some cases getting some skin to skin contact and withdrawing would be more “satisfactory” overall than using a condom. Same here. I prefer penetrative non-barrier sex with finishing outside vs barrier sex with finishing inside. Never been difficult to stop for me and pull out well in time, but I also prefer other forms of sex to PIV. ---
**Author:** ![Heracles](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/heracles/32/487_2.png) [@Heracles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Heracles)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2016, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/withdrawal-method-condom-use-have-about-the-same-level-of-birth-control-effectiveness/753571/23 "2016-05-29T19:44:22Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > The belief that some combination of mouth noises about the dangers of pre-marital sex are going to hold back the combined hormones of **two virile teenagers** is about as smart as bungee jumping with wire rope. (Highlight mine) I agree with your sentence, but the specific case of two [virile](http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/virile) teenagers is probably safely outside the scope of this discussion. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![usedtobe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ec9cab/32.png) [@usedtobe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/usedtobe)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2016, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/withdrawal-method-condom-use-have-about-the-same-level-of-birth-control-effectiveness/753571/24 "2016-05-29T23:47:59Z")
I just kinda shook my head (I’m retired from the game) when the “Solution” to HPV and lesser STDs was “always use a condom and you’ll be safe!” Um… Given that pregnancy requires lots of things go right at the same time, and disease transmission requires MUCH less concurrent stuff: The fact that condoms can’t even prevent pregnancy in 5-10% of cases indicates that they are NOT a “safe” mechanism for disease prevention. “Better than Nothing” is NOT a re-assuring statement. ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2016, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/withdrawal-method-condom-use-have-about-the-same-level-of-birth-control-effectiveness/753571/25 "2016-05-30T14:16:32Z")
> [@usedtobe](#): > > I just kinda shook my head (I’m retired from the game) when the “Solution” to HPV and lesser STDs was “always use a condom and you’ll be safe!” > > Um… > > Given that pregnancy requires lots of things go right at the same time, and disease transmission requires MUCH less concurrent stuff: > The fact that condoms can’t even prevent pregnancy in 5-10% of cases indicates that they are NOT a “safe” mechanism for disease prevention. > > “Better than Nothing” is NOT a re-assuring statement. Especially when you can transmit disease with hands and mouth, not just genitals. ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 6:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/withdrawal-method-condom-use-have-about-the-same-level-of-birth-control-effectiveness/753571/26 "2016-05-31T06:02:30Z")
> [@Jophiel](#): > > Yeah, I never got that. Frankly, using a condom and staying in to completion sounds more satisfactory to me than withdrawal. Withdrawal might be better than no sex at all but those are rarely your only two options. It’s subjective. But pull out is far superior than condom for my wife and me. Now it can be a tiny bit difficult to be 100% compliant but I feel it’s terribly unfair to knowingly increase her risk of pregnancy beyond what we’ve agreed to. ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/withdrawal-method-condom-use-have-about-the-same-level-of-birth-control-effectiveness/753571/27 "2016-05-31T06:06:19Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > The failure rates for birth control pills includes women who forget to take the pills. The failure rates for condoms includes times people don’t use condoms. > > Yes, it sounds stupid but it’s actually smart. A birth control method that you don’t actually use is a failed birth control method. A birth control method that you can’t remember or don’t want to use correctly is a failed birth control method. If you say you use condoms for birth control, and then you don’t actually use the condom when it counts, that’s a failure for condoms. If you get in a car crash because you were texting and not looking at the road, that’s still a car crash even though there was nothing wrong with the car or with your eyes or your hands. > > Condoms are very effective if you actually use them. But people constantly fail to use them, or fail to use them correctly, because obviously not using a condom feels better and is a lot easier. So if you plan to use condoms but don’t actually use condoms, then condoms are not very effective for you and you should stop relying on condoms as a method of birth control. Jumping out of a plane without the parachute is not a parachute failure. It’s a personal failure. It’s just easier to blame an item. ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 6:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/withdrawal-method-condom-use-have-about-the-same-level-of-birth-control-effectiveness/753571/28 "2016-05-31T06:09:08Z")
> [@DataX](#): > > I never got the people that use the withdrawal method. Those numbers confuse almost everyone - and are relatively poor quality data. No one thinks “if I use a condom over the course of a year - what are the chances I will get pregnant”? > > Or at least I don’t - I think most people assume they are per act - which obvious;y doesn’t make sense if you think about it. What if I have sex twice as often as the people in the study? > > And you certainly can’t make decisions based on these studies as the individual behavior of people that use them - are different. You shouldn’t assume that switching to something that has an APPARENT similar rate - will be similar - these are basically surveys and not true studies. > > I think (but have no evidence for this) - that people that use the withdrawal method are often using it as a one time thing - cause they forgot a condom.at least this is my experince talking to friends/partners. Also part of my bias is I can’t see someone planing this as a pleasurable experince. I hate condoms, but - geeze - no. > > More problems with the stats > > No thanks - I’m not taking that risk - and why would a woman necessarily trust the guy either. Not a one time thing here. 15 years or so of 4-5 times a week. We have two children but those occurred when wife was fine with the probability of being pregnant if we did not interrupt. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 7:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/withdrawal-method-condom-use-have-about-the-same-level-of-birth-control-effectiveness/753571/29 "2016-05-31T07:26:37Z")
> [@thelurkinghorror](#): > > Not hard but the point is: who the he’ll wants to? Sure some places teach abstinence-only, but teen pregnancies occur even in places with extensive education because teenagers can be idiots. My cohort had extremely high pregnancy rates from the school that combined teaching “abstinence only” with teaching that women’s only worth is her ability to attract men (yeah, that worked out well); low from the schools that taught “girls, take the Pill… uh? Boys? Why would we teach the boys anything? It’s her who has to take the Pill”; 0.1% for my school, which actually taught a good sex-ed class. Note that the first combination appears to be very common. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/withdrawal-method-condom-use-have-about-the-same-level-of-birth-control-effectiveness/753571/30 "2016-05-31T18:38:26Z")
> [@octopus](#): > > Jumping out of a plane without the parachute is not a parachute failure. It’s a personal failure. It’s just easier to blame an item. Sure it’s a parachute failure, if you include the entire system of parachuting rather than the device itself. If someone jumps out of an airplane with a ripped parachute, that’s a parachute failure. If someone jumps out with an improperly packed parachute, that’s a parachute failure. If someone jumps out with someone’s lunch bag rather than a parachute, that’s a parachute failure, because what was the lunch bag doing there with all the parachutes? A failure has to include operator error in it’s analysis. If a safety system is so cumbersome that users routinely disable the safety system it’s no good insisting that the safety system is perfect, it’s the stupid users who don’t use it that are the problem. If they can’t actually use the system when the safety system is enabled, then the safety system is useless. Comparing it to withdrawal makes sense. Wouldn’t you say that if you use the withdrawal method, but you accidentally come before you can pull out, and she gets pregnant, that’s a failure of the withdrawal method? To say that withdrawal works perfectly, it’s only people who accidentally don’t do it correctly that makes it fail is nonsense. People have to actually be able to use the method. Otherwise we could say that abstinence is a perfect form of birth control, just don’t have sex with your partner and you’ll never get pregnant, and all these other forms are a waste of time. The problem is that in real life lots of people won’t abstain. And they get pregnant. That’s a failure of the abstinence method, people don’t actually abstain. If you say that your method of birth control is to abstain from sex, and then you have sex and get pregnant, that’s a failure of your birth control method. If your birth control method requires you to solve a quadratic equation at the moment of orgasm, that’s a terrible birth control method because people can’t do it, even if it worked perfectly if people could actually do it. ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/withdrawal-method-condom-use-have-about-the-same-level-of-birth-control-effectiveness/753571/31 "2016-05-31T18:59:28Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > Sure it’s a parachute failure, if you include the entire system of parachuting rather than the device itself. If someone jumps out of an airplane with a ripped parachute, that’s a parachute failure. If someone jumps out with an improperly packed parachute, that’s a parachute failure. If someone jumps out with someone’s lunch bag rather than a parachute, that’s a parachute failure, because what was the lunch bag doing there with all the parachutes? > > A failure has to include operator error in it’s analysis. If a safety system is so cumbersome that users routinely disable the safety system it’s no good insisting that the safety system is perfect, it’s the stupid users who don’t use it that are the problem. If they can’t actually use the system when the safety system is enabled, then the safety system is useless. > > Comparing it to withdrawal makes sense. Wouldn’t you say that if you use the withdrawal method, but you accidentally come before you can pull out, and she gets pregnant, that’s a failure of the withdrawal method? To say that withdrawal works perfectly, it’s only people who accidentally don’t do it correctly that makes it fail is nonsense. People have to actually be able to use the method. Otherwise we could say that abstinence is a perfect form of birth control, just don’t have sex with your partner and you’ll never get pregnant, and all these other forms are a waste of time. > > The problem is that in real life lots of people won’t abstain. And they get pregnant. That’s a failure of the abstinence method, people don’t actually abstain. If you say that your method of birth control is to abstain from sex, and then you have sex and get pregnant, that’s a failure of your birth control method. If your birth control method requires you to solve a quadratic equation at the moment of orgasm, that’s a terrible birth control method because people can’t do it, even if it worked perfectly if people could actually do it. I can see your point to a degree. It’s just that I think proper use ought to be the clear in the statistics. For example, I’m going to pull out properly. I’m going to use a condom properly. There won’t be a mistake. I won’t forget and I won’t use the method incorrectly. So when it comes to judging which method to use, I want to know those statistics. I don’t want the statistics with all the people who lie on surveys, have intoxicated sex, or who have no discipline included. Because that doesn’t accurately describe my risk with that method. So, I wouldn’t mind a set of statistics for each method. And then people can make a more informed choice. Of course that means they have to be honest with themselves. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/withdrawal-method-condom-use-have-about-the-same-level-of-birth-control-effectiveness/753571/32 "2016-05-31T19:14:35Z")
Those stats are broken down by “perfect use” and “typical use”. If you say your method of birth control is condoms, but you don’t use them half the time, and you get pregnant, that counts as a failure in typical use. If you use condoms correctly all the time, and she gets pregnant anyway, that counts as a failure in perfect use. Condoms can fail when used correctly but not very often, the problem is that lots of people fail to use them correctly, and “sometimes not using them in the heat of passion” counts as failing to use them correctly. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/withdrawal-method-condom-use-have-about-the-same-level-of-birth-control-effectiveness/753571.md?page=1)