To think contraception has been a greater liberator to men than to women?

Well this is even more Aunt Lydia coded tbh. I celebrate breaking the link between womanhood and motherhood on my own individual behalf. I don't think living an independent life without children is "male-pattern" at all because I don't consider biology to be destiny, or even all that relevant. Your implication is that women only succeed in reaching full personhood and leading a "female-pattern" life if they become mothers, which I'm not even going to bother getting offended by.

Again, I'm not sure why that's my problem, if I've managed to navigate what's now apparently called situationship culture without that sort of emotional torment? Look, relationships (and not-quite-relationships of all sorts) are just potentially messy and heartbreaking, especially when you're young. It's an inherent part of the whole deal and it can be agonising for men as well as women (surely you don't think men are navigating it blithely either). But ultimately it's your own responsibility to set your boundaries and your standards and act accordingly, not to blame contraception or OLD or other women who enjoy casual sex.

A life where you are in control of your own autonomy isn’t male, it’s just that historically women have been prevented from having any autonomy and thus an autonomous life became the preserve of being male. A “male pattern life” is simply one that, prior to women becoming liberated through things like access to the workplace, the ability to control their own money and own their own property, and contraception, only men could enjoy. And only men could enjoy that sort of life because women had no power in any of those realms. Women only did obtain full personhood by achieving the ability and right to lead a “male pattern life” and by breaking the automatic link between womanhood and child rearing, because that’s ultimately the link which was used to justify women not being allowed men’s rights and freedoms in the first place.

I also think it's a negative for women that much of modern/liberal feminism is centred around (and celebrates) breaking the link between women and childbearing/rearing.

No, it is so people can have a choice. Some want to have children, some don’t - some people celebrate it and some don’t, neither are wrong. Some want one or two children, not the risk of being pregnant every time you have sex. Not all women are the same, yet we are treated as such. Giving people the choice is so powerful, contraception has transformed women’s lives.

I think standards are changing. Women are seeing they have a choice and not having to conform to this stereotype of being ‘picked’ and being passive. The younger generation is embracing this. Some men aren’t happy with women being self sufficient, aren’t tied to a man because they’re got pregnant, having their own money. This is why the incel movement is so vocal. Women are choosing the men they want to be with and it isn’t the misogynistic ones. No longer do we have to make do, we make the choices.

As a more philosophical point, maybe even more controversial than the last one: I also think it's a negative for women that much of modern/liberal feminism is centred around (and celebrates) breaking the link between women and childbearing/rearing. As if the only way for a woman to reach full personhood is to disconnect herself from children and live a male-pattern life. As if motherhood is nothing more than worthless drudgery, and the path to fulfilment is despite it and never through it.

Kind of a strawman of what I said. I do think women like sex, and get a lot out of it. I do. It's very important to me and I couldn't live the rest of my life without it. Something essential would be missing.

But I've also watched a lot of friends play the game of desperately agonising over whether a man that they're sleeping with regularly will even deign to call her his girlfriend, let alone propose marriage. Or they're playing it cool and claiming they don't even care, they're just looking for fun too, but then they're upset with themselves for being upset when the "situationship" ends.

Look I've got no skin in the game, I've relied on contraception before and will again, and been very happy for it. But I think situationship culture is overall negative for women, I think it's a shame that women's standards are so low that they think "being exclusive" is an exciting relationship milestone instead of a bare-minimum expectation, and I don't really care if that makes me Aunt Lydia...

I'd say the only benefit that Men get from it that Women don't is they don't have to have the possible side effects.

Well thank god for that. I would hate to have had to marry every man I wanted sex with.
Some people don’t even want to get married, are they supposed to be celibate all their lives. What about the women who don’t want children, are they supposed to be celibate too? What if you only want one or two children, no sex ever again after.

Men who pressure women to have sex with them either before or after marriage are not the sort of man most would want to marry, so I think it’s a huge benefit - see their true colours early.

Just because a man wants something, doesn’t mean women have to succumb. This sounds like the incel movement to me. Keep women knocked up with no control over their bodies. Women have many more choices now, which scares some men. We can choose to have sex with however is willing to have sex with us instead of being scared into marriage and children with an unsuitable man.

I don’t think the restriction of the sexual and reproductive freedoms of others is a preferable state of affairs to this.

If a woman or man wants to wait then it’s their responsibility to hold their own boundaries. Some may struggle to find someone of the same mindset, but that isn’t a problem anyone else is required to solve.

What a very arch use of scare quotes there.

This is the thing though. The idea that a woman can enjoy sex for itself, and not necessarily in a loving and committed relationship, is still anathema to some people. And those people will do everything possible to police and slut-shame women who don't fit into their world view, where sex is something only men want (and that men only ever want) and women reluctantly give in order to have children (which is what all women actually want).

This thread is giving Aunt Lydia tbh. You can see the exact mindset in several posts here. I grew up in the church so I'm not unfamiliar with it, but it's still shocking that in 2025 there are women who think that, on balance, contraception is a net negative for women.

Overall, I think the greater beneficiary has been women, simply because of being liberated from 20+ years of constant child bearing or struggling with less reliable methods of contraception. However, I also see numerous downsides and unresolved issues, many already alluded to here. One thing that certainly didn't happen in the early days (I was a teenager in the 1970s) was consent. It was assumed by men that if you were on the pill, there would be sex. As an ex once pithly put it during z discussion on that very subject: 'You wet? Yes. You hard? Yes.' Et voilà! The sex was usually on their terms ie little attention paid to female pleasure. Even now, I think that men who are properly curious about female sexual pleasure are in the majority.

What’s the alternative don’t take it and risk getting pregnant to spite the men?

More so if you take in to account the impact to women's health of hormonal contraception and the impact of failure of contraception (eg anti biotics can impact effectiveness of contraception)

@Macrodatarefiner "
Not in a culture where men are no longer considered responsible. Any children are now the woman's choice"

Fortunately, CMS does not agree with you.

But without contraception, many of those women with poor self confidence desperate to keep a man would also be raising more babies. If it’s lack of confidence or fear of loneliness which pushes those women into feeling they need a man, they aren’t likely to risk him leaving them because they aren’t offering any sex: they’d just be risking that sex unprotected.

Yes but these men have drifted from woman to woman. How often do we see threads on here about women putting up with complete pricks because they don't want to be in their own or lack self confidence. Without contraception, these men couldn't behave as they do.

Certainly there’s a strong argument that the sexual revolution and women’s so called sexual liberation which came about as a result of the contraceptive pill has changed things in ways which are more beneficial to men than to women. Though this would probably be better discussed in depth elsewhere than in AIBU.

The availability of contraception has meant that the "default" has flipped from expecting no/limited sex before commitment, to expecting years of sex before commitment.

Most women who "like sex" like it with a loving partner who cares for them.

It's not that contraception hasn't benefited women at all but I don't think it's possible to answer the question of whether it's benefited men or women more, without reference to the social changes that it has wrought. Unless you have a proposal for a world with freely available contraception but some other generator of social mores that discourage years of sexual access without commitment.

Maybe the human race will die out because no-one is having children. By choice or because of the very long term effects of hormonal contraception on fertility.

Er... You think that contraception is going to stop working because we all become resistant to it? Or what?

A woman is 100% entitled to not want sex until a certain point in a relationship or even not want sex at all.

A man is 100% entitled to think "that's not the right woman for me."

I don't see how the availability of contraception has liberated one more than the other.

Sorry op. I slightly missed the point. I thought you were saying it liberated men as much as women but you’re saying it liberated them more.

It’s a fair suggestion, but I think it’s liberated men and women in different ways. Men can shag about but then I think they always did. Either through ignorance or by force. Pre-pill it was mainly religion and social codes of morality that kept open promiscuity in check. Behind closed doors men still did what they wanted. Now they can stand a queue with a 1000 other chumps and fuck away in full view. They rape and get away with it because there is no evidence that bears their genetics on its face.

For women it’s freed them up from the obligations of child bearing as they were going to get fucked either way (see above). The sexual freedom comes secondary I think. Not all women are driven sexually - just from reading MN I’ve gathered that women who enjoy a lot of sex say things like ‘it’s about closeness’ or ‘I like feeling desired’ - they don’t necessarily emphasise the enjoyment of the physical side of sex which is what I think the pill gives us. It also allows those women who don’t want kids more options than going to a nunnery.

Men. Patriarchal societies. People who pander to patriarchal ideas.