Birth control shouldn’t be rocket science

In our generation, there’s no issue surrounding women’s health that has been as debated and politicized as birth control. 

From the pill to abortion, everyone has an opinion on what women should be doing with their bodies. But one perspective is often overlooked: young women trying to understand their own health. 

Oral contraceptive pills have been available for purchase in Canada since 1969, and they have become the most common form of reversible birth control. Despite this, the conversation about birth control is still riddled with inconsistencies and misinformation directed at women. 

At the peak of second-wave feminism, there was hope the next generations would have more of everything — more support, more resources and more access to reliable information. The reality is the world Gen Z is growing up in has more interference than before. 

Even with all the improvements, our bodies and sexual freedoms are just as disputed. This results in endless opportunities to keep young girls confused.  

Following the decriminalization of abortion and birth control in many western countries, there was a fierce push for research on women’s health. This led to hundreds of studies on contraceptives — which were seen as a common good between both sides of the political spectrum. 

Progressives knew women would benefit from more attention to their health, and conservatives were rallying for anything that would prevent teen pregnancy that wasn’t abortion. 

The studies have only gotten better since, so if we’ve had the information for decades, how can we still be so confused? 

You can’t separate birth control from its misconceptions and the division of the general public. From a young age, girls are told horror stories about the distressing alter egos and intense changes to their bodies that would emerge at the hands of contraceptive pills. 

However, the common fears associated with birth control, such as weight gain and personality shifts, are not commonly caused by birth control. 

Jodi VanderHeide, a manager at the Sex Education Resource Centre at Dalhousie University, says that “it’s not super common that a birth control would do that.” 

“[The pill] is mimicking natural hormones in your body already,” says VanderHeide. “If anything, there are times when birth control is used for hormonal balance. So, if someone has something like premenstrual dysphoric disorder, they would be prescribed combined birth control pills to help balance that.” 

These myths stem from a culture that tells women they should fear everything they put in their body. First it was carbs, then it was tampons and now it’s birth control. 

It may seem well-intentioned, but it stems from a deep obsession with monitoring how women look, how they act, and how they make their own decisions. Birth control is just another example of something that has been made a threat first and a necessary safety precaution second. 

So why are new worries appearing seemingly within the last 10 years? One culprit is social media. 

The problem isn’t just the misinformation. It’s that the definition varies from person to person. If you search the words birth control on TikTok and scroll for less than 30 seconds, you will find dozens of videos, all with different opinions. 

One user claims “birth control should be banned because it’s murder.” Others share stories about how it was the only thing that helped with their debilitating period symptoms. With so many different narratives, useful explanations are hard to come by.

How can we expect young women to accurately understand their options if the people giving them advice aren’t even talking about the same thing? 

All it takes is one voice that seems legitimate making claims to invoke fear, and suddenly a toxic mix of politics and personal experience is created with zero quality control. 

And no one wants to fix it. 

Rather than giving young girls the tools to make their lives safer, we have created an environment where they are set up to fail because their health comes second to conversation.

It should concern people that we are still not any closer to giving them an objective truth.