If you ever have the desire to get yourself downvoted on the Men’s Rights subreddit, here’s one sure-fire strategy: Write a sensible comment suggesting that birth control benefits people with penises as much as people with vaginas.
Here are the two top replies to this comment:
I was going to point out some of the ironies inherent in Men’s Rightsers getting mad about women getting “free” birth control, but I suspect you can figure those out on your own.
This is why the so-called Men’s Rights movement is not so much a rights movement as a take-away-other-people’s-rights movement.
Don’t forget the Hot Rods.
But yeah. All for free condom programs, but there’s a big difference between prescription medicine being covered like other prescription medicine, and non-prescription OTC products being made more freely available.
“Hate speech is meaningless when it’s not applied to the incitement of violence! Now excuse me while I ignore the Thomas Ball section on AVoiceForMen.com, helpfully listed under “Activism” on the front page. I will also be pretending that the non-legal definition of hate speech, which is communication that vilifies a person or a group on the basis of color, disability, ethnicity, gender, nationality, race, religion, sexual orientation, or other characteristic, does not exist.”
Also, $60 for a yearly supply of b/c? Not likely in the US. I only pay a copay for mine, and get a generic, and it is still $10/mo or $120 a year. If you aren’t covered (and I don’t think I’d be covered except I have a documented medical need), then it is even more. Is that estimate based on birth control coverage in health insurance, or are b/c pills just that cheap in Sweden?
I didn’t even have to look for this bit of incitement to violence in Thomas Ball’s manifesto, I just scrolled down and stopped:
“do you have any evidence-based justification for using for going with sex once per day as your baseline or did you just decide you were gonna baldly game the parameters and pray nobody called you on it?” the latter but it was just an example. I find that condoms are cheaper if having sex less than each fifth day, but if more often, the pill is cheaper.
So Polliwog, I don’t find your poor mailless person example appropriate.
Wait, when did we decide we were only talking about Sweden? Does Sweden even have health insurance per se? I thought it was a universal single-payer system, but I freely admit to not being some sort of expert on Swedish health care. If it is a single-payer country, though, it seems really silly to use it as your standard for what birth control costs under insurance plans.
Also, 365 fucks per year isn’t even close to average. 18-29 year olds have sex an average of 112 times per year, 30-39 year olds an average of 86 times per year, and 40-49 year olds an average of 69 times per year (Mosher, Chandra, Jones 2005). It took me literally about 6 seconds to Google that. Come on.
why are we supposed to set policy based on your lazy ad hoc speculation again? that sounds really dumb and irresponsible?
And yet you’re the one who replied to my posts several times even though I never addressed you. Quit tugging on daddy’s trousers, kid.
Speaking of birth control costs, the first time I went on birth control (7-10th grades) my parents had to pay $25/mo, because evidently my insurance didn’t cover my birth control even though it was recommended by my doctor for medical issues. This meant that my sister delayed getting bc for her cysts because she didn’t want to cost the parents that much–I told her that we could afford it (because we could) but worry about the price cost my sister a few months of pain. However, they must have changed their policy, because by the time she went on the pills and I got back on them (12th grade, in my case) it was down to the $10 copay.
I wonder how many women and girls go without because they can’t manage to scrape up the cost. Sure, if it is for sex then condoms are an option, if one with pros and cons, but birth control is the best option for preventing me from ending up in excruciating, disabling pain every few months.
“Also, $60 for a yearly supply of b/c? Not likely in the US. I only pay a copay for mine, and get a generic, and it is still $10/mo or $120 a year. If you aren’t covered (and I don’t think I’d be covered except I have a documented medical need), then it is even more. Is that estimate based on birth control coverage in health insurance, or are b/c pills just that cheap in Sweden?”
It’s based on the state insurance. if you have other prescriptions, it will be even cheaper, and teens pay even less or free in most regions.
What does B/c cost uninsured in the US?
Hahahaha, this is fantastic.
“ONLY THE CHOSEN MAY ADDRESS ME! HOW DARE YOU RESPOND TO MY COMMENTS IN A PUBLIC SPACE?”
This didn’t jump out at me the first time, but yeah, basing this comparison on bc with insurance vs. condoms w/o insurance is either deliberate dishonesty or just incompetence
Now, let me be clear – I totally support offering free condoms in schools, colleges, at PP clinics, etc. I am all in favor of finding ways to help people get condoms if they want them. But by and large, the barriers to buying condoms have very little to do with cost, and comparing them to the pill, which does have huge financial barriers in a whole lot of places (albeit possibly not Sweden! Which is pretty cool for Sweden!), is fairly nonsensical.
It also doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to single out condoms when talking about OTC products not covered by insurance. Why would insurance cover condoms and not Tylenol, or band-aids, or Neosporin, or heating pads, or toothpaste, or contact lens solution, or nasal spray, or friggin’ tampons, which I definitely use more of per year than condoms? And how would this coverage even work? I’d be happy to read and consider a real argument as to how insurance could practically fund OTC medical products, but that argument hasn’t been made yet.
yeah dude i replied to some comments on a public message board that sure is evidence of a thing?
do you think this weird faux-tough guy bullshit out before hand or is the plane always to just sort of stumble through here screaming about how much girls suck?
Our budget Al Gore kinda doesn’t understand the purpose of this site, does he?
lol, of course.
this should have occurred to you already but the comparing subsidized and unsubsidized costs between two products is apple and oranges
if you have no problem with manipulating the numbers then yeah, there’s lots of things you can prove, but it doesn’t really prove anything except that your either a liar (and not a very clever one) or you honestly dont know what youre doing
i dont think he really gets the internet. apparently he was under the impression that it’s a place where you don’t speak unless spoken too.
oh shit, cloudiah, did i have permission to reply to this. it’s important to know because otherwise im internetting wrong or something.
“this should have occurred to you already but the comparing subsidized and unsubsidized costs between two products is apple and oranges”
Why, if the point is that both products should be subsidized?
But Dark Lord, there are so few of the Chosen left, I—*garglewheezespurgle*
/WoTnerding
I do like that we have two trolls in the same thread making hay of other people replying to their comments in a public forum. It’s almost like they’ve got jack shit to say otherwise.
He’s like an evil clone of Al Gore. However, in order to install the evil, they had to suck out the intelligence, common sense, and netiquette.
I’m not even sure if ‘netiquette’ is a word any more, but pants that, I’m using it. 😛
“It also doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to single out condoms when talking about OTC products not covered by insurance.”
Yes,to stop the spread of STDs, which is good for the society
Sharculese, I will forgive you this once.
By the way, I have now copyrighted my name, (c)laudia-H and anyone who uses it owes me 40 oz of really good beer.
well yes, if the point is to reinforce what you already wanted to believe and not to find out whether the comparison is actually valid, then yes, you should use the comparison that shows what you want to see
that’s not the same thing as making an argument though. that’s telling yourself a fairy story.
Is that weight ounces or fluid ounces?
I figured it was Troy ounces.