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Comment by TheAdamAndChe | Hacker News Reader

It's definitely too popular to blame everything on middle-aged white guys. It's sad that even bloomberg is jumping on the bandwagon.

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It doesn't even make sense. Women have the possibility to abort a pregnancy while men have no say whatsoever (in regions where the big pharma companies are coming from). So the argument that women would do more for male birth control is somewhat strange considering they have all the power in their hands right now.

That's adversarial thinking. If the man and woman are in a trusting relationship, the question changes from one of "power" to responsibility.

Today, most reversible contraceptive methods (pill, rhythm, IUD, abortion) rely on the woman owning responsibility (one which they may be unwilling or unable to carry out). Male contraception relieves women of that burden.

> If the man and woman are in a trusting relationship

That's the problem right there...

A lot of sex happens outside of trusting relationships. The woman with whom I lost my virginity tried to trick me into being the father for a child that wasn't mine. It most likely isn't representative but as a polyamorous man, with financial stability, I can assure you that a lot of women I've met would gladly have an "accident" with me. I sleep easier knowing I had a vasectomy.

I don't deny that, but the majority of women are not so manipulative. The GP's blanket claim "the argument that women would do more for male birth control is somewhat strange" would assume that the majority of women are so immoral. They most certainly are not.

Male contraception relieves women of that burden

You would think so, but... there are women (maybe a lot of them) who think the loss of power over conception would be bad for women [0]. Read the column. I don't know about you, but it gives me a very queasy feeling. Like there is some subtext that this woman believes she should be able to force parenthood on an unwilling partner.

[0] https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2006/apr/28/malepi...

Contraception isn't a zero sum game. Giving men more contraceptive power doesn't take anything away from women.

You are right, but that's not what the article the GP linked is about. It's based on two (IMO very flawed) arguments, one, that men having the option of birth control forces women to trust them (which may be true, but is a problem faced by men today), and two, the – quite creepy – belief that women should be able to unilaterally decide when a couple starts having offspring. (As if men were not legally beholden to care for their offspring.)

The argument in the first paragraph of that article addresses the issue of having to choose between distrusting partners, or being vulnerable to those who lie about using birth control. There's maybe some merit in that, but today, men face the same problem.

The rest of that article is… creepy. That's way more than subtext.

I can't even...

> At the moment it is the woman who retains control over the moment at which that melting in the bones feeling is allowed to over-take the firm "no this would ruin my life" feeling in the head.

Is not the whole point of contraception insurance againt emotional losses of control?

The thinking may be adversarial but it's equally valid. That you think you are in a trusting relationship doesn't mean that trust is well-placed or even mutual.

It's not an either-or question. Both statements about male contraception are true: it relieves women of the responsibility (by allowing couples to decide to place the burden on the man) but it also gives control to men that previously only women had.

Giving men power of their own birth control does not lessen the power women have, except in the case of coerced trust (i.e., "trust that I have birth control since it's now possible, even though I really don't"), or in the case of wanting the power to deny contraception, which I think many would agree seems unethical, given the legal responsibilities men have to their offspring.

It doesn't lessen the power women have, it just gives the same power to men. Specifically we're talking about the power to decide whether to risk conception (assuming it's not mutually desired) or not in advance to the sexual encounter.

Yes, lying about contraception in order to trick a man into getting you pregnant is unethical, but it's not unheard of. Women are humans (duh), some humans do unethical things, some of those humans are women, using pregnancy as leverage.

Personally I wouldn't think this behaviour is very widespread (although I have heard women joke about it being an option -- not implying any of them would actually consider it) but considering the significance of the consequences, I think it's understandable why some men might value this risk far greater than its actual prevalence would suggest, regardless of whether this risk assessment is rational or not. The tired meme of the poisoned M&M springs to mind.

Most women would like to avoid getting pregnant by accident, even if they have the option to abort an unwanted pregnancy.

This method seems to have no side effect and would reduce the chance with another contraceptive method with 98% success of prevention would make the odds of pregnancy within 1 year negligible (and they only go down over time)

The article claims that since the executives of pharma companies are rich, white men they would not be inclined to threaten their manhood by using this contraceptive and therefore don't see a market to bring it to.

But what does being white have to do with it?

Maybe the Indian creator feels that this is less of an issue in their culture and conflates culture with race?

Perhaps Western would be a better adjective. I agree with you though, as it stands skin colour seems to have little to do with it.

I can understand how executives being male may impact decisions to pursue male contraceptives but the white part is really irrelevant and unnecessary

It is a money issue - it is cheap and effective but needs clinical trials and potentially cuts recurring revenue from women's birth control options.

After reading the article, I agree. The shaming is just how they're trying to get Big Pharma to take it up, but you cannot convince someone to reduce their salary willingly.

Are you sure you are commenting on the correct article?

Yes - from the article:

"The fact that the big companies are run by white, middle-aged males who have the same feeling—that they would never do it—plays a major role"

this seems like yet another bash at the white male, but if you think of it there's already vasectomies and if you're rich you'll have a few children followed by a vasectomy. this is for the poorer individual that doesn't want the burden but might want to reverse it, which is more appealing to the non-rich-guy. and maybe in india* you can still be seen a virile as it's reversible. *i don't know about indian culture.

I don't know, the assertion in the article makes little sense. The white part shouldn't play any role at all in this; easily reversible male contraception has been a dream of many for a long time. These companies want to maximize profits, and it's obvious that they aren't limiting their products and procedures to what they as middle-aged men would want. If they were, there'd be no products or procedures for women.

I think it's far more likely that these companies don't want to fund trials as it won't be nearly as profitable to them as current contraceptive options. If this was a pill instead, I have no doubt that the companies would champ at the bit for it. I think it's not coincidence that they could only find a non-profit to fund the trials for this specific product/procedure.

yes, i think whiteness is purely incidental. it's just another not-all-statement.

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