This article details the history of press coverage surrounding contraception in the United States. The authors examined articles from the New York Times, the Chicago Tribune, and the Los Angeles Times from 1873-2013. The authors found that many articles identified religious, medical, legislative, and legal institutions debating whether access to contraception should be permitted. Contraception is still contested today because men still retain power over women’s bodies.
The authors posit that their examination of press throughout the past 140 years reveals the gendered reality of the hegemonic power. Men still have the religious, medical, and legislative power to control women’s access to birth control. Instead of seeing it as a women’s health issue, they approach it as a sinful act to prevent pregnancy for promiscuous women.
Contraception was linked to prostitution for many years. After the Comstock Act was passed in 1873, the dissemination of any methods or information regarding abortion or how to prevent conception was outlawed. The authors note that this was the first institutional effort to impede women’s access to birth control.
Condoms were considered illegal under this legislation, but they were legalized for the prevention of STIs in 1918, when men were coming home from WW1 with infections and giving it to their partners. Condoms were still considered illegal as contraceptive devices, however, and had to be prescribed.
In the 1920s, the birth control movement gained popularity, but so did the eugenics movement. Religious opposition was also strongest during this time. Though support was growing, it seems like the cited reason was always to curb the population, not because the woman should have a choice whether or not to reproduce. Since then, arguments like this have been made regarding contraception, but it is hardly ever about women’s health.
Even today, contraception is hotly contested. What the authors found through their detailed review of news articles from 1873-2013 was that though the views of contraception use have somewhat shifted, the ideological structures that debate to contraception are still controlled by men. Do you think we will ever be able to get beyond this power differential?