The Washington Post ran two articles in the last week condemning women who ditch hormonal birth control due to its side effects, claiming that talking about side effects included on federally mandated drug disclosures is “misinformation.”
“Women are getting off birth control amid misinformation explosion,” a Washington Post headline last week blared. The article was accompanied by another, penned by the same reporters and published at the same time, aimed at “Debunking common birth-control misconceptions.”
The first article laments that women are increasingly ditching hormonal birth control linked to cancer and other bodily harms for “‘natural’ alternatives” such as tracking their cycles or — gasp — abstaining from sex altogether. The Washington Post authors are particularly irked that the movement has gained traction post-Dobbs v. Jackson when “abortion is now banned or restricted in nearly half the states.”
The article brushes aside concerns of women like influencer Nicole Bendayan. She says she felt ignored by doctors who continued to advise her to use birth control even though she had a “lot of really bad symptoms.” Instead, the authors quote a male OB-GYN who recited the same old “safe and effective” speech our culture, medical establishment, and media tout about chemical contraception that can put women on synthetic hormones for up to a third of their lives.
What the Washington Post completely missed in its essays is that women aren’t just getting off of birth control because it’s trendy or they’re misinformed. They are ridding themselves of the pill and other chemical contraception because it damages their health.
A Hard Pill to Swallow
Hormonal contraception was never supposed to be the one-size-fits-all solution to women’s ailments that our culture and medical establishment sells it as. The “pill,” as it is most commonly known, can change how women feel, look, and think, and has caused a wide array of medical episodes in women from influencers to celebrities to normies like me and you.
Yet more and more girls are prescribed hormonal contraception younger and younger each year and for far more reasons than maintaining sterility. Doctors prescribe the pill or IUDs as the magical potion to soothe period pains, mitigate acne, temper mood swings, and in teens struggling to deal with the physical and emotional changes that come with puberty.
Those girls who were the experiments of decades-long birth control use are grown now and speaking up about the negative effects long-term hormonal birth control use has had on their bodies and minds. They are turning to fertility awareness-based methods because those can be effective and require no interventions that often cause unwanted side effects like the many the U.S. Food and Drug Administration forces drug companies to publicly acknowledge.
When they speak out about their experiences, these women’s voices are silenced by a cabal of Democrat-controlled media mouthpieces who have an unhealthy obsession with the lie that to be successful, women must get comfortable with promiscuity and serial sex and avoid children at whatever cost.
Corporate media have inaccurately diagnosed the wide range of women breaking up with their birth control as women who were lied to by “right-wing,” “far-right,” and “conservative” commentators who tout drug-free hormone regulation and pregnancy prevention methods. In reality, many are women struggling to come to terms with the cultural lie that attempting to control their wombs using drugs, birth control, or abortion is the best thing they can do for their bodies and souls.
Sexual ‘Freedom’ Isn’t Free
In its second article on birth control, the Washington Post claimed chemical contraception doesn’t cause weight gain, depression, or low libido in most women. The authors even insisted that most women experiencing side effects from these forms of birth control will see all of their pains and ailments solved by switching brands. The data, however, suggests that’s not true for many women.
Every package of pills comes with a pamphlet that rivals CVS Pharmacies’ comically lengthy receipts. But there’s nothing funny about the list of side effects of hormonal contraceptives. They are classified as class 1 carcinogens by the International Agency for Research on Cancer.
Their side effects include bleeding, headaches, weight gain, headaches, nausea, increased blood pressure, breast tenderness, low libido, acne, mood swings, heightened stroke and heart attack risk, blood clots, liver disorders, vaginal discomfort, depression, abdominal swelling, dizziness, vomiting, exhaustion, body hair changes, loss of vision, numbness in the extremities, increased vulnerability to sunlight, increased risk of suicide, increased risk of cancer, death, and more.
Every hormonal birth control product on the market increases women’s risk of contracting breast cancer. Similarly, oral contraceptives put women at a significantly greater risk of depression than those who don’t take them.
Even if studies didn’t back anecdotes from women who say their health problems started when they began or stopped taking hormonal birth control, the disconnect between doctors’ messaging and patients’ symptoms should at least be cause for media concern. We’re many decades now into doctors beginning to shift their approach from treating women with concerns as hysterical hypochondriacs to instead take women’s claims about their symptoms seriously.
Instead, media like the Washington Post are going so far as to use their influence to demand the censorship of people who notice the government labels on hormonal birth control. The Washington Post’s pair of birth control propaganda articles weren’t just out of touch. They were out of line.
Corporate media have no problem amplifying complaints about how the medical community shorts women. On hormonal birth control and abortion, however, media like the Washington Post instead help with Big Pharma gaslighting to protect the reputation of the sexual revolution despite its many devastating effects.
Jordan Boyd is a staff writer at The Federalist and co-producer of The Federalist Radio Hour. Her work has also been featured in The Daily Wire, Fox News, and RealClearPolitics. Jordan graduated from Baylor University where she majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow her on Twitter @jordanboydtx.
Comments are closed.