Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Foreign welcome along to another episode of the Dispatchers podcast. My name is Brendan Malone. It is great to be back with you again. And today I want to talk about a truly fascinating article that has just been published by the New Zealand media a few hours ago at the time of recording this episode. And what makes this article so fascinating to me is that there is an underlying agit prop type propaganda angle going on here. But even more so, there's several different things all embroiled in this reporting and it pertains to the contraceptive pill and it is such a fascinating example of understanding the current anthropological and social cultural moment. The zeitgeist, if you like, and the underlying ideological beliefs and just how powerful they are and how ingrained they are to such a degree that when you read this article we're about to go through it together in just a second. You get that sense that basically people can't conceive of a world where birth control is not like the normalized and only way of conducting your affairs as a woman. Like you must be on the hormonal contraceptive pill in some form or another. And that's the natural way. Basically it's a complete inversion of reality. Whereas people who are actually using natural fertility methods, which is one of the big things that this article focuses on, we're about to read, they are the odd ones in this. It's such a fascinating and interesting read, so I thought we'd look through it together now. So let's read this article. As I said, this has just been published. At the time of recording this, we are talking 4 hours ago this article was published in the New Zealand mainstream media and the title of the piece is Fact versus Fear the New Social Media War Against Birth Control.
[00:02:04] Who could have ever imagined a world in which there would be a war against birth control?
[00:02:11] Like somehow birth control was the good here and people who oppose it are actually warmongers doing violence to something. Even the headline in this is loaded. And by the way, for those who are watching or listening from outside of New Zealand, this is Radio New Zealand who are reporting this. This is the major state funded broadcaster. It's not some fringe group.
[00:02:33] Radio New Zealand generally are considered to be like the BBC of New Zealand basically. And so you should expect a higher standard of journalistic integrity and a more of a thoughtful and considered view of the world. But when you read this piece, as I said, it comes across pretty much like agit prop and I don't know if it's intentional or not. It doesn't have to be intentional, to be propagandistic. It's not like people necessarily have to sit down and say, let's write a piece of propaganda. It can simply be their own fears based on their own worldview, which is so dominant and so strong that they produce a propagandistic piece because they don't recognize that their view of the world is actually not the neutral view of the world. Like it's not an objective view, it's actually colored. And they think that their colored view of the world, with all of its beliefs, in this case about birth control and contraception and everything else, is actually like the neutral position. And so anyone who disagrees with it has somehow gone off on a tangent into some propagandistic thing, but they're not coloured by propaganda. So it's, it's, as I said, really, really fascinating. And there's that tone to it for sure, and I think you'll see that. But that's not the only thing that was so fascinating to me about this article and that's why I wanted to read through it with you today. So let's have a look at this. It's a trend exploding on social media, namely on Tic Tac Tick Monday morning, I was gonna say Tic Tac Toe, TikTok and Instag, where wellness influences warn women to, quote, unquote, get off the pill, calling hormonal birth control poison and evil and urging a return to natural fertility tracking. So you see straight away that's what's the sort of central conceit, the central focus of this article. And as you can imagine, it's going to go strongly in favor of hormonal contraceptives. It's going to be pro pill videos with hashtags, stop the pillow. Hormone free natural birth control and cycle tracking have clocked billions of views and millions of likes. And straight away this is presented as if somehow this is a problem, as if it's a problem for women. Like lots. By the way, this trend is particularly predominant amongst younger women.
[00:04:36] It, it, it is really women in their twenties primarily who are, who are looking at this and going, I don't want to be on the pill. That seems to be the trend. If I look at the research, it's not mentioned in this article but in other places.
[00:04:47] And this is presented as if somehow this is a, like it's a bad thing or a worrying thing for women to large, like large numbers, even particularly young women to be saying, well actually we don't want to have the poo in our lives. Like, oh, how Dare you. And, and what's embroiled in this is a kind of intergenerational war.
[00:05:06] And I have to say there's something very similar going on with the issue of abortion too. More and more younger women are actually not adopting the pro abortion militancy of their mothers and grandmothers. Instead, they are now adopting a more pro life or neutral position on the issue, which is a lot more open to the pro life position.
[00:05:27] In fact, some years ago, the head of naral, the big North American association for activism around abortion, lobbying and law changes, and they're a pro abortion organization, they've been around for many decades. And she wrote this op ed piece that was published in one of the biggest American newspapers about how she decided to attend the March for Life, the annual pro life March in Washington D.C. on the anniversary of Roe v. Wade every year. And she talked about how horrified she was when she got on the train to go to the event. And she said she was surrounded by all of these young pro life women. And there's this famous or some might say infamous line in that op ed which she said all of a sudden she realized she was now part of an aging post menopausal militia as a pro abortion woman.
[00:06:13] And I see this sort of embroiled in this here with the pill, it's like this, this idea, oh no, you, you can't like not be on the pill. You've got to have the pill. Like to, to somehow just to have large numbers of women saying we don't want to use the pill is like a bad thing or a dangerous thing. But doctors warn. Behind the glossy filters and wellness influencer advice lies a dangerous cocktail of misinformation, fear and frustration. Now this is interesting because here they've said, but doctors warn. This is something to note, by the way. Whenever you read media articles, you see this kind of framing. It might not be doctors, it might be some other form of expert. This is technocracy in action. Listen to the technocrats, the technical experts. But lawyers warn. But experts in grass management warn. Whoever it is, it's irrelevant. What often this means though, is the way it sounds is doctors warn. Sounds like all of the doctors are a thing. And they all get together as the doctors and, and they as a group of experts, decide what is right and what is wrong. And so doctors like, as a massive group, in actual fact, like in this case, I'm pretty sure that they're actually just talking about one person who's a sexual health advocate that they've interviewed for this particular Podcast and maybe often in other cases you might see one or two experts in a field, but in actual fact, it sort of presents it as if somehow there is this consensus. Really it's a common thing. It's not just this. It's a common thing in articles. Keep an eye out for it. The other interesting thing is this whole idea of, you know, the behind the glossy filters and in other words, this, this sort of propagandistic spin. You are being lulled into a false sense of security. There's all of this sort of psychology and presentation of facts going on in such a way as to influence you. And you are being.
[00:07:58] You're not getting the full information here. You are. There's a sense of perception that is swaying your belief about the world from these influences. But the ironic thing here is that there's no sense here of accepting that maybe that could be going the other as well.
[00:08:12] So that instead of behind glossy filters, it's all of this, you know, official information presented by technical experts. You know, the doctors, for example, could also be leading women to perhaps not get the full story about the pill. And, and that's the. I guess the point here is this. There is a bigger story about the pill that our society has really not told. And what's happening, I think, is it's getting to a point where a lot more, younger women are a lot more aware of the pill and the impact of it on their body. And, and you know, they have concerns about it and so they're sort of moving away from it.
[00:08:45] And that bigger story has not really been told. But now you've got women who are starting to sort of push back against it. And, you know, they see this as a. As a bit of a problem. But there is a much bigger story here. That's. I guess that's the point I'm trying to make. And for many decades now, we have not really told the full story about the pill.
[00:09:03] Sexual wellbeing Art Medical director Beth Messenger. So that's the doctor that, I think the only one they've interviewed for this, if I understand it correctly, tells the detail, which is the Radio New Zealand program. The New Zealand medical staff have fielded questions from confused and anxious patients.
[00:09:19] We have had instances where staff have been like, what are we supposed to tell people about it? She says to me, that's an interesting admission. It's kind of a like, what are we supposed to tell people about it? Well, hold on a minute.
[00:09:33] If the pill is as is being claimed here, it's totally safe. There's no Issue. It's the best thing since sliced bread. Everyone should be on it. Or, you know, sure, maybe you don't want to be on it, but overall it's a really good idea for lots of people to be on it. And it's just this medically secure thing. We know all about it, it's as safe as houses. Then why would you have like medical staff saying, or like being engaged with by members of the public saying, what are we, you know, you know, we're thinking about coming off and asking these questions and they say, what are we supposed to tell people about it?
[00:10:06] Doesn't that sound more to you like something that people would ask if they are just repeating information blindly to the public and they don't have a professional confidence or certainty about what they're actually telling women?
[00:10:22] And so that when they're confronted with questions they're like, what are we supposed to say to people who ask questions?
[00:10:27] Like, if you're a doctor and you're an expert in this field, you know, wouldn't you just be able to tell them based on your expert knowledge, hey, here's what you need to know about the pill. Instead of asking the question, what are we supposed to tell people? That implies that there is a bigger story. There is something here that could be told to people and they are, they sort of like, no one's really grappling with that bigger story is I guess the point I'm making.
[00:10:50] Even we can be tempted to tailor our advice based on what's on social media. We have had to remember that actually we need good research to, we need to be giving information that is evidence based rather than a reaction to what's happening on social media. And of course that's all true, right? Evidence based information is key.
[00:11:10] My contention here is that women, for many decades, as a general rule, there are exceptions, but as a general rule have not really been given that evidence based presentation about the Pill.
[00:11:22] Instead, for various reasons, it's either been glossed over or there's been a lack of awareness.
[00:11:27] And so there's all these assumptions and the pill has just become so ingrained into the normative way of conducting your business in Western liberal countries now that it's just not questioned anymore. And, and so it's not really like we're even getting good evidence based information here. Going natural, she says, for instance, using the withdrawal method instead of condoms. Now this is interesting to me. Why would you say that going natural? Why would you conflate natural, which here we're talking about natural fertility regulation.
[00:11:59] Why Would you conflate going natural with using the withdrawal method? That is, I don't think that is at all a fair or valid comparison. It is what you call low hanging fruit. You go for the worst possible example you can think of which is someone saying well if you just withdraw in time then you won't get pregnant. Which is one I think has become like an age old mythology amongst the, the sort of contraceptive based sex education types. They use this because I think a lot of people are a, they get freaked out by the idea of people thinking that that will actually like you won't get pregnant if you just withdraw in time. And secondly it's, it's also sort of stupid and laughable. Like we know that in actual fact you don't even need penetration. Quite. And I apologize, this has turned into a sort of graphic biological lesson. But you, you do, you just, you can have proximity, shall we say proximity of organs. Let's, let's be nice and polite about this polite company dinner time conversation. You can have proximity of genitalia, shall we say. And that can result in pregnancy. And so like people know that now and it's kind of laughable and foolish and we think, oh yeah, those silly hillbilly hick type people who don't really, they don't even know how biology works. You know, they're all yuck, yucking it up and you know, look, it's cousin Cletus and his withdrawal method. You know that, that I think that's why this is like the low hanging fruit. But that is not the alternative to the pill.
[00:13:32] When you talk about natural in relation to fertility or in this case they're talking about contraception and birth regulation, etc, you are talking about natural fertility methods. And natural fertility methods do not include withdrawal. Withdrawal. And, and no rational sane world amongst people who are advocates of natural fertility methods is withdrawal ever presented or considered a form of natural fertility regulation. It just isn't. And so straight away you can see there's a, ironically there's a type of misinformation and a deception of the public that is very sort of propagandistic in nature going on here. It's meant to sort of make you think the worst about these people and, and what they're saying. So she says going natural, she says for instance using the withdrawal method instead of condoms could lead. And condoms are not even what we're talking about here. We're talking about hormonal contraceptive which is completely different from a barrier method. Like you know, a condom could lead to sexually transmitted diseases or unplanned pregnancies, and adds hormonal birth control is not evil or poison.
[00:14:37] Well, I think there actually are a lot of people who might debate that second point about whether it's poison or not. The question of the evil of contraceptive. Well, in actual fact, right up until the Lambeth Conference that the Anglicans had in the 1930s, every Christian denomination did actually consider to the use of artificial contraception to be a moral evil. And it is still held as such by particular Christian denominations, most famously the Catholics, by the way, Protestants who are listening. I've got a book actually on my shelf. The Protestant reformers were opposed to contraception and it was considered morally unacceptable to deliberately try and render infertile. And this is still the Catholic position, acts that should be open to life. Like when we intervene, we're doing something that God has not created us to do, when we try and intervene with the natural cycle of his fertility in this way.
[00:15:31] So the difference between a natural fertility method, my wife and I use natural fertility and we use the Billings method. And what you do is you track the female cycle and when the female is ovulating, when she's not. And so there are windows where there is. The female is infertile and the, the chances of actually conceiving a child are much lower, but they are not removed totally. So you could still possibly conceive a child. So the, the, the moral position would be on this, when talking about this as a moral issue is to say that we leave open the possibility, even if it's remote, we leave open the possibility of God's creative power working. We don't exclude God from that part of our marriage is what we say. And so that, that there's still a remote possible. It is remote, but we work with God's plan and his design. And so there's a possibility that, that, you know, you can conceive a child still versus contraception, which can result in the same outcome, which is obviously no baby, but the way contraception works is it deliberately and proactively renders the sexual act infertile. And so all Christian denominations up until that Lambeth conference in the 1930s held that that was morally unacceptable. Now it's. The Anglicans caved on that and it sort of, sort of everything sort of followed from there. I'm not blaming the Anglicans for those Anglicans who are listening, but it was just a sort of societal imposition that happened. And then others followed.
[00:16:51] But yeah, that idea is turning around and saying, well, it's not evil. Well, in actual fact, in some faith traditions, there is a moral question here.
[00:17:01] So you can't just say, well, it's just a piece of technology and it's out there, so it's not evil. That sort of seems to be where she'd be coming from. But in actual fact, that doesn't have regard for the moral traditions and moral communities that people are actually part of. And, and the second point about it being poison. Well, you know, as I said, there's a. There's an interesting. Some might debate the use of that terminology. Others might say, well, that's a very colloquial way of sort of saying that it does things to the female body that are not great.
[00:17:26] And a lot of women seem to feel that it is like a toxic thing in their body. So that point's debatable as well. But here's the other thing. The contraceptive pill actually, like, just like the withdrawal method, the contraceptive pill won't stop sexually transmitted infections. And again, that's the whole point of this piece.
[00:17:47] So she says, you know, if you use the withdrawal method instead of condoms, that could lead to sexually transmitted diseases or unplanned pregnancies. So could the pill. You could be using the pill and you could still get pregnant because of something like breakthrough ovulation. That can still happen.
[00:18:03] You can certainly still get sexually transmitted infections because the pill does not protect you from sexually transmitted infections. And you can get those 24, 7. So this here, I would argue, has created a potential point of misinformation in the minds of probably even young women who, who don't quite understand, who might read that and wrongly then take from that, that if they use the pill, they will be protected from sexually transmitted infections. Now, it's not what she's saying here, but you could see how someone who doesn't have much knowledge could sort of take that from that statement because of the. The bigger picture of what the whole article is actually supposed to be about. She then goes on to say, if you don't want to get pregnant, it is really important to use a method. To use a method like what? Yeah, of course. But that this is. Again, you see this sort of propagandistic angle here because the point of this article is about people who are using natural fertility regulation, which is in this worldview, in this way of thinking about things. It is one of those methods.
[00:19:02] And so what's the problem?
[00:19:04] Why. Why can't people use natural methods? Why can't they? Why is what's especially in a Liberal culture like this is where liberalism completely contradicts itself and it does this all the time. Abortion is another great example. Your body, your choice. Okay? That's why I actually am pro life, because when you have abortion, you are doing something to the body of an unborn child that they haven't given their consent to. So you can't do things to other people's bodies without their consent. So I don't support abortion because abortion involves destroying the body, doing something to the body of another human being that they haven't given their consent to. They have not given you permission to do that to their body, so you shouldn't be doing it. But liberalism just ignores that fact and then sort of repeats the slogan, my body, my choice while ignoring the other body involved. And here we've got another version of this here. Oh, yeah. Choose whatever you want. You're free to choose. Well, unless you're choosing, you know, to get off the pill, then we might have a bit of a problem here. It's like, this is so typical of liberalism at times. It can be quite illiberal in the way that it approaches things. If you don't want to get pregnant, it's really important to use a method, and your health provider should be able to help you pick the method that that's right for you now. And it's kind of interesting even like, well, why does it. Like, there's this whole idea of not just technocracy, but a type of imposition of technology and transhumanism here. You know, we will find a technology to suit you here. Now, why can't a person just say, in actual fact, I want to use a natural fertility approach. I don't need a technical expert telling me, you know, that I should use this particular method or other artificial contraceptive method or hormonal contraceptives, when I just want to use a natural approach. Approach to things.
[00:20:45] If people are not consistently using a form of birth control, then unintended pregnancies will happen.
[00:20:52] And this, there's so much loaded into this statement. There is so much ideology and worldview built into that one simple sentence. You hear it all the time, and people don't stop to consider it. If people are not consistently using a form of birth control, the implication is somehow you're supposed to be constantly using artificial birth control.
[00:21:13] And, and this is, this is this whole contraceptive mentality now that's just. Is so. We're so like. Like we have frogs in a pot where it's just. We're steeped in this ideology that you're supposed to be using a form of birth control. This gives rise to the whole false idea that children are accidents. And of course that children can be unwanted and unplanned. If you go back prior to the advent of birth control, which is still less than a hundred years old, the pill in particular I'm talking about here, modern birth control, less than 100 years old, then guess what? The whole idea of unwanted children in this way, or unplanned children was a nonsense. It didn't exist because everyone just understood that if you engage in the sexual act, you are engaging in the most effective way of producing a brand new, totally dependent, totally vulnerable human being. And generally it was considered actually to be a good thing. And in fact, most societies would celebrate and say that, you know, your children are this great gift. They now they've become something we control.
[00:22:10] And you see how this filters out and how it changes everything. And our view of sex, our view of children, sex and babies don't go together. This is the contraceptive mentality.
[00:22:18] Babies are now supposedly unplanned. Even though you actually engaged in the most effective act for making a baby, it's an unplanned thing. That's not unplanned. That's a natural fruit, a consequence of, of what you're doing here. But the reason we think of them in that way is because we've got an artificial barrier in there. And then, you know, like, and this is all loaded into this and like. One of the points I've been making for a while now is that I think that artificial birth control, particularly the contraceptive pill, was one of the first major instances of transhumanism in society, but we don't recognize it as such. Transhumanism is the ideology and the practical approach to the human experience which would say that you introduce an artificial piece of technology and you permanently attach it to the human person to improve the human condition, to evolve beyond our current limitations.
[00:23:06] So for example, it could be technical. We'll put a chip inside your brain like a computer chip, will marry you to a computer chip, and that will enhance your memory and cognitive abilities well beyond the normal natural limitations. And transhumanists would celebrate this. Another common form of transhumanism, though, is the use of pharmaceutical products to overcome natural limitations. And normally this is in relation to anti aging. And like, they talk about the idea of developing pharmaceutical products that will allow you to live for maybe hundreds of years. This is the utopian. Well, actually dystopian really when you think about it. We'll all be vampires together. What a disaster that would be. But that's a whole nother topic for another episode, maybe is transhumanism as the new vampirism, but basically that, you know, we'll live forever or we'll live for hundreds of years, and in other words, we'll marry ourselves to a piece of pharmaceutical technology that will overcome the current limitations of the human experience.
[00:24:00] Well, we don't recognize it as such, but my argument has been for quite some time now, and I've been speaking publicly, whenever I've spoken publicly about this, is that the contraceptive pill was actually the first clear example of transhumanism, like, or certainly one of the big ones, where women were told, if you marry yourself permanently to this artificial contraceptive device, then you will overcome the natural limitations and you will evolve to a higher state, basically a better state, where you have total control of your freedom. Fertil fertility, sorry, you won't have to have kids, there won't be unplanned pregnancies, you'll be financially better off. All of that kind of stuff. And what it did was the contraceptive pill treats female fertility like somehow it is actually unnatural and some would even argue disordered. And it has to be turned off, because that's what it does, it switches off female. The normal, healthy functioning of the female body is switched off by this pharmaceutical product. And so I think it is very clearly a form of transhumanism that we have failed to recognise as such in our society, which is all loaded into this whole statement here. She then goes on to say something profoundly interesting. And this is one of the really big things that stuck out to me when she says this could lead to an increase in abortions. That's certainly the concern that this is what will happen.
[00:25:19] And I have been saying this for many, in fact, over two decades now, I've been making a specific point about this idea.
[00:25:26] And the question I would want to put to her is, if there is nothing morally wrong with one abortion, what moral or, you know, concern could we possibly have about thousands of abortions, about an increase in the number of abortions?
[00:25:45] Doesn't that concern that she's raised here, this could lead to an increase in abortions, and that's certainly the concern that this will happen. Doesn't that statement imply that abortion, actually, there is a problem with abortion, and therefore it would not be a good thing if there were more of them happening?
[00:26:02] Well, what is the problem then? If there's nothing wrong with one abortion, how can there be any problem with 20, 30, 40, 50,000, how can there be any problem with an increase in abortion? Surely that admission is a tacit and unintended admission that there is a moral problem here with abortion. Again, this is a classic example. We just don't want to talk about it. The full story is not told. There's a whole bigger story here that's not being told. We're just being told abortion is good. Now, euphemistically, in dishonestly, abortion is healthcare. The pill is good. Why wouldn't it be on the pill? There's a whole bigger story that's not being talked about here.
[00:26:34] Hormonal birth control, including the pill, IUDs, patches and implants, works by regulating or suppressing ovulation to prevent pregnancy for most women. And look, I know some of you are listening, going, hey Brendan, what about some of the other mechanisms associated with this, like making the womb infertile, sorry, hostile to implantation? Yeah, look, we could, we could unpack that, but you know, those who know, know, but maybe that's another topic for another episode. But really I just want to focus on the other stuff that's in this article and the main thrust of this, which is sort of like, you know, you should be on the pill. It's all good. And there's a problem if women are withdrawing. For most women, it's safe and effective and it can ease heavy painful periods, reduce acne and manage endometriosis or pcos. Now what's fascinating about that statement is that reads more like an advertisement and this is what I was talking about, the sort of propagandistic angle here. Like hey, if you take the pill, then you know, it'll ease heavy painful periods, it'll reduce acne and, and look, nothing here is false and what's being said here. But there's a bigger story here that, that and, and, and the way this is presented is like, look at all the good things this can do for you, this technology can do for you. But let's not look so closely at some of the other issues associated with this. We know there is always a group of women who are contraindicated and cannot take the pill and should not be taking the pill because of the risks that it presents to them. Have we already forgotten that tragic incident that happened during the COVID period? Remember when there was concern that we actually might have had a vaccine related death of a young woman? And the final autopsy was it the coroner's report came back and said that in actual fact, based on the autopsy Reports this woman was killed because she took the pill. She was put on the pill and there was a family history of health issues. She shouldn't have been on the pill. Like that only happened a couple of years ago. That, that still happens.
[00:28:29] And so what's being downplayed here is, like I said, the biggest story. It doesn't mean this will happen to every woman, but there's a bigger story.
[00:28:37] Why? Why are we downplaying it? Well, I think there's a. There's an issue here with an institutional advantage that the pill gives. And what's being focused on more is the fact that the pill prevents babies.
[00:28:49] And that's about freedom. And it's also about economic advantage to the institutions because the institutions would look at something like this and they'd be going, oh my gosh, people have to stay on the pill because otherwise we might actually have to pay, you know, like social welfare payments or there's going to be increased costs and, and healthcare costs and all these people having babies who otherwise wouldn't be having them. The institution looks at it from that economic perspective.
[00:29:13] The liberal looks at it and says, it's about sexual freedom. I can sleep with whoever I want to and I don't have to have babies. Mean, look at this. Who are errant in their behaviour. Not all men, but errant men. And they go, oh, no, no, no, we've got to have the pill. Cause I want to be sexually libertine and I don't want to take responsibility for my actions. All of this is embroiled in this.
[00:29:31] Like some years ago, you might remember that there was a push by the then national government to require women who were solo mums, who were receiving social welfare payments to actually be required to take hormonal contraceptives. That was a eugenic proposal. And ironically, even some people on the right were supporting this. But in actual fact, they. Not only is it a eugenic proposal, basically the state will own your body and tell you that, you know, you actually can't have babies and we don't want certain types of people having babies. But the argument that was being made was basically, well, why should the taxpayer, why should the state pay for the upkeep of your children?
[00:30:09] That very argument was made by eugenists like Margaret Sanger and others who talked about the unfit were breeding and multiplying all the wrong people and the state was having to pay for the, the upkeep of these unfit ones. It's a very common idea in the history of eugenics. But also, ironically, people on the Right. Who are supporting this approach, this policy.
[00:30:30] It's actually a communist way of viewing the person in society. Because what you're saying there is that you, once you start receiving support from the state, you now become part of the collective and the state effectively owns you like property. And the state can now tell you whether or not you can have children. Your freedom is now removed if you receive welfare. That is not the Christian view of the world, by the way. It's a very communist way of thinking about a person. They're part of the collective. They have no individual autonomy outside of the collective. Now, it's limited, obviously, because they don't view everything that way. But if you receive welfare payments, they are saying, well, you're part of the collective now and effectively the state should. You must be faithful and obedient to what the state says you can and cannot do, because you don't actually have a dignity or a right beyond that in this particular scenario. So that's the institution looking at this and freaking out and going, oh, you know, people have babies and they cost money. But there's other reasons as well going on here.
[00:31:25] This next one was absolutely fascinating. From the quote here, I'm assuming it's Beth messenger, and if you don't want to have a period, you don't have to have one.
[00:31:35] What an astounding statement to make.
[00:31:40] A normal, healthy function of the female person, of their body, of their physiology, of their natural being in the world, is their monthly cycle. And this is now being presented as if there is such a thing as the right not to have a period and somehow that avoiding natural functioning of the body.
[00:32:03] We're not talking like this is treating a period like it's an optional thing instead of a healthy functioning. And I don't even like using the word function, a healthy part of the human experience for females.
[00:32:15] And it's treating it now like you have a right to not have a period. Like this to me, is just so crazy. It is so disconnected from reality. And it is not just a technocratic way of viewing the human person. It's a definitely a transhumanist way of viewing the human person. Your body is just a collection of functions. We use products to turn off those functions. It's your right to craft your body in your own image. It's a very similar ideology. In fact, it is the same mentality that underpins the transgender ideology. Your body can be reconstructed in your own image according to your desires. You self create yourself in your own image. If you want to self create as a male. When you're a female, then who's to say that's wrong? If you want to self create yourself as a female who never has another period because you use a period product to stop that, then why shouldn't you? So she's not talking here about health reasons or controlling endometriosis. It's literally just, if you don't want to have a period, then this is such an unhealthy attitude to be promoting and instilling in the minds of young women. So if you want to talk about influences and what they're doing with the pill, what this woman has just put out into the public sphere on our biggest public broadcaster, to me, it is absolutely shocking and that is not a healthy message for young women to be receiving at all. The most common side effect is change to bleeding.
[00:33:33] In actual fact, I would dispute this.
[00:33:36] The most common side effect is change to bleeding and there's an increased risk of blood clots or breast cancer with combined pill. With that combined pill, says messenger, who had a blood clot caused by the pill in the 1990s, causing her to switch to a copper IUD. This is so amazing.
[00:33:54] You see why there's so much happening in this one article. There's so much going on.
[00:33:59] After telling us these people are crazy for wanting to get off the pill and go natural. The woman who's trying to convince us all of this then admits that she had her own experience where she got a blood clot caused by the combined pill in the 1990s and that caused her to switch methods.
[00:34:19] And you're like, what? Well, wouldn't that maybe be a. Like, you've also just told us it's totally safe and fine, but now you're telling us there's a version of the pill because this is a particular type of the pill. For those who are not aware, it's not. The combined pill is not every pill. There's the mini pill, which is different again, for example. And so she's saying there's a version of the pill which actually does this to people. And the paragraph, though, starts with a statement that I think is actually kind of misleading. The most common side effect is a change to bleeding. When you look at the research in actual fact, and we'll get into this in just a second, there's a lot more reasons why women report going off the pill that really aren't to do with bleeding. So. And there are other side effects which actually seem more common than this, actually. Things around depression and feelings of depression, anxiety, things are feeling not Quite right with myself.
[00:35:07] Weight related issues.
[00:35:09] So yeah, it's kind of interesting or really sort of, again, downplaying the reality of this.
[00:35:14] Some of these risks can be quite significant. She says. Well, the article started by saying there's no problem here. It's crazy to want to get off the pill. And now we're hearing this statement. Some of these risks can be quite significant. No, no, the pill is amazing. It's awesome. It's totally safe for most women. By the way, though, I should also let you know that there are some risks and some of these risks can be quite significant. But other than that, you know, other than that it's, it's totally fine to stick your hand in the blender while it's working.
[00:35:41] Most people won't extend their fingers. They'll have no problem. As long as you keep your hand closed in a fist, you know, you won't lose your fingers. It's, it's kind of, oh man, it's just madness. It is. And, and you see the propagandistic and confused nature of what's going on here. Hopefully you can see now why I felt like when I read this article I was like, I have to actually talk about this. There's so much going on here. This has prompted wellness influencers to promote fertility awareness based methods where women track their basal body temperature, cervical mucus and menstrual cycles. The influencers, along with advocates say this helps women reconnect with their bodies. And that's absolutely true. And it is, I find that reprehensible that they are framing that as if that is an untruth. Like the influences, along with advocates of natural fertility say this say like in other words, it's an unproven claim. Say this helps women reconnect in quote marks with their bodies. Because that's exactly what it does do a woman who's been on the pill for a long time, you don't have to have that same connection with your body. You've just turned off a natural cycle. And by actually having that natural cycle happening and natural fertility also allowing you to be aware of what's going on in your body. I've got so many personal testimonies that I know of. Like people I know who were able to recognize because they were connected with their fertility cycle through natural methods, they were able to recognize very quickly when something was amiss and they actually sought medical help because they knew themselves because they were aware. And that led to sometimes discoveries of health related issues or fertility. It advanced or enhanced their ability to conceive children, if they're trying to conceive because they were aware of what was going on. My wife has had that very experience.
[00:37:26] Like, she's very aware of what's going on in her body. She's very connected to her body, as opposed to someone who's not even actually aware, who's never been taught this, who's never thought about it. I'm actually a big fan of young women. I'm talking young teenage girls. Nothing to do with sexual activity whatsoever. I'm a big fan of young teenage girls being taught natural fertility tracking when they're in high school. So they are aware of their cycle and how it works and how their body works. They're really, truly aware. Not just, you know, told to, hey, take this pharmaceutical product and you won't have to worry about it. They're actually aware of what's going on in their body. But that's presented as if somehow that might be not a good thing or might not even be true. It's absolutely true. I mean, there's just no disputing that you are more connected with your body if you're aware of what's going on in your body. You know, be like a doctor who has an amazing knowledge of physiology. They're obviously a lot more connected with their bodies, their own bodies, than someone who has no knowledge whatsoever of human biology. It's. That's an indisputable truth. And their movement has taken off online, prompting researchers at La Trobe University in Australia to analyze 100 videos on TikTok from the top five hashtags related to contraception methods that had collectively gained nearly 5 billion views and 14.6. Sorry, million likes. Most of these videos were ranked quite poorly in terms of accuracy and reliability, says Megan Bogdan. I think that's how you say that. A lecturer in public health in Australia who co authored the study. We saw a number of concerning things. Almost half of the videos explicitly rejected hormonal birth control. Things like the pill implants or IUDs. Like, see, in her mind, this, this actually feels like the real problem here is these women are rejecting, you know, our, you know, they've been handed the feminine power and they are rejecting it.
[00:39:16] Cause that's what she said here. We saw a number of concerning things. Almost half of the videos explicitly rejected hormonal birth control. Things like the pill implants or IUDs. Like, somehow that's an evil and wrong thing to do. It's so fascinating what's going on here. Like I said, the people who are not using these products are viewed they are pharmaceutical products and the people who are not by the way they make a huge amount of money for the pharmaceutical companies who produce them. They are big bread and butter products for them and so the people don't use these products. The other dangerous ones are the odd ones or the weird ones. Like it's, it's unusual. That's what's underlying this idea. And one in three of the videos obviously expressed distrust towards healthcare professionals. While you gotta again wonder why that is. Obviously there's a breakdown in trust in the institutions which is not good. But also on top of that a big reason for that is the institutions far too often have allowed themselves to be co opted and we saw most recently during the COVID period a disastrous co opting of the healthcare profession. And so we should not be surprised now to see flow on effects in other areas related to that. It's not a good thing. Healthcare professionals should be listened to and we want those institutions to actually be reliable. That is the conservative way. But there is a problem here with trust caused by behaviors from within the institutions and the state and the relationship and also corporates probably as well and the entanglement they all have. She also tells the detail that completely incorrect contraceptive information was discovered. Things like if. And again what you're about to hear is more low hanging fruit. Like no serious promoter, trainer, advocate for natural fertility tracking is going to be saying to woman any of what you're about to hear. Things like if you eat papaya seeds or use coconut oil that these are effective spermicides, in other words they are effective at preventing pregnancies. There is absolutely no scientific evidence to support that regardless of the scientific evidence or falsity of the claims being made here. Like I said, no serious advocate. There is no one who is saying to you well you know, if you really want to enhance your natural fertility tracking your natural fertility method, quote unquote, then papaya seeds or coconut oil are absolutely essential. No one's serious advice saying that it's low hanging fruit. It's stupid stuff, it's silly stuff. It's not then it's, it's a straw man.
[00:41:40] They're not engaging with the real issue and the real truths that are being talked about. They're just going for the silly low hanging and irrelevant fruit. That's not part of the real issue. She says this was promoted by people calling themselves wellness influencers and health influencers but who have no medical background. And yeah, fair enough. I think it's, it's not invalid to critique people who lack expertise in a particular field like medicine, who are trying to present medical claims. Got nothing wrong here. But again, underlying this though seems to be that technocratic idea that somehow if you haven't got the qualification, you're not worth listening to. That was a little bit surprising and worrying to see. Well, in the current age, I don't know why we're surprised by this on social media. Plenty of crazy stuff on there. She was equally worried about the promotion of natural fertility awareness based on contraception.
[00:42:31] Interesting, isn't it? Why? Why would you be equally worried? Like literally.
[00:42:36] So she said here, people who are claiming, making medical claims who don't have expertise and people who are saying things about coconut oil and papaya seeds. And she's equally worried as that about people who. About the promotion, sorry, of natural fertility or fertility awareness based contraception. So fertility awareness based methods, fertility tracking, et cetera. Why would. That's not the same thing at all.
[00:43:00] To say someone who is presenting themselves due to a mistrust in the institutions, who's presenting bad information is the same as natural fertility promotion. What are you talking about? In actual fact, natural fertility awareness is a very good and important holistic thing that as I said, I think all women from a young age should actually be taught and trained in because of the beautiful gift that it is and what it gives to them and awareness about their own bodies and fertility. That's profoundly important. We've experienced, my wife and I use it, we've experienced nothing but goodness from this. And that is a common report that you hear from people who use it. These ones were particularly worrying to us because while this method in itself is not an inherently bad one, this is like someone who says to you, look, I'm not a racist.
[00:43:49] But in other words, she doesn't really have much faith at all. She probably doesn't even understand it. That's been my common experience. A lot of people who attack and who ridicule and who look down upon natural fertility tracking, apart from the small minority of committed ideologues, the, I think the overwhelming majority, particularly in the expert class, it's because they just don't understand it in their mind. They think it's the, the old rhythm method, the old calendar based method, where you take a calendar, a literal 30 day calendar, or maybe you apply the 28 day cycle method and you try and present that as if every single woman has the same 28 day cycle and you just impose that calendar upon her. That is not natural fertility awareness. It is so scientifically literate and advanced now. It's unbelievable. It's for decades it's involved the tracking of ovulation because of the scientific discovery many decades ago of symptomatic expressions in the female body, which actually. So you can read the symptoms, the expressions of things that happen, like mucus changes in the female body, which tell you when ovulation is happening and when it's not happening. And so there's. This is not, as I said, someone just going, well, you know, here's the rhythm. There's an old joke, by the way, about Catholics.
[00:45:09] You know, Catholics love to use the rhythm method. And the reason they have so many kids is because none of them can keep the beat. And so it's not that. It's not what this is at all. It's a highly scientific and profoundly holistic and very connected way of looking at the body. But you. So a lot of people are looking down on it in the expert classes because I think they just don't understand what it is. They've never been taught it. They have caricature sort of versions in their mind, cheap caricature versions of it. And especially if you're comparing natural fertility methods to the withdrawal method, then that's a total straw man. It's just an absurdity.
[00:45:45] So while this method in itself, and by the way, it's not one method, that's also another interesting thing that speaks to, I think, a lack of awareness on her part because it's not one method. There are multiple different natural fertility methods that can be used and are utilized. So it's not one single method in and of itself itself. Because while this method in itself is not an inherently bad one, what was, was how these videos were failing to disclose the potential limitations of this method.
[00:46:12] You see, again, we're getting to the root cause here. And the real issue is the possibility of people having babies.
[00:46:20] And, and, and also the, the possibility of spreading sexually transmitted infections, which goes back to then, are you going to engage in sexual virtue and live according to sexual virtue and virtue. Sorry. And not be promiscuous? But that's, that's the issue no one wants to tackle. The real issue here is even if you're using condoms, your risk of sexually transmission, getting a sexually transmitted infection, and, and some of the more common transmitted and easily transmittable infections is extremely high. There's no guarantee of protections at all in some cases. And even where condoms can produce a greater degree of risk reduction, the risk of the promiscuous behavior, even with a condom is still an unacceptably high risk. And we're not telling our young people and people in society that. We're just saying, do what feels good. Be sexually libertine. Why shouldn't, why should you allow some musty, fusty, outdated, old repressed clerics from the Christian tradition to tell you what to do with your body? And in actual fact, all the Christians are like, hey, we're having babies. We're living fulfilled, happy, married lives. We're not getting sexually transmitted infections because we're not being promiscuous. Oh, how awful this is. Look at us in the corner withering away while you're flourishing with your, you know, your 10th case of chlamydia this decade. It's like, it's just madness. It is such madness. But you see, that's what really underlies all of this. Messenger tells the detail she's not against women coming off hormonal contraception. It kind of sounds a little bit like they are though, in a lot of cases, to be fair. I mean, it does sound that way. Right? And you don't really need to say things like that unless it does. The impression you're giving is that you are kind of opposed to that. She's not against women coming off hormonal contraception, but insists decisions should be grounded in evidence, not Internet fear mongering. Fair enough. But what the research does show us that the most that in actual fact, it's not Internet fear mongering. This has been going on for several decades. It's not Internet fear mongering that causes women to commonly come off hormonal contraceptives.
[00:48:15] The common reasons that they cite have got nothing to do with what they're seeing on the Internet. It's what's going on in their own bodies when they take these products and they don't like it and they just come off it because they don't want to experience those experiences anymore.
[00:48:27] So it is really important to talk to a health provider who is experienced at providing contraception, who is able to talk about all the available options.
[00:48:36] And again, that assumes that your healthcare provider is not gonna be so steeped in a pharmaceutical product based based approach to fertility and like that they're actually, they're going to have awareness. Again. Most in my experience, they've never received any training in natural fertility.
[00:48:55] And like the methods that are available, they just, their knowledge is very limited. This assumes they're going to know stuff that they might not actually know at all. And so they might not be as helpful to you as you think. There might be a bias towards artificial contraceptive methods because something is incomplete here. And that doesn't even address the question of behavior change. Is, is your doctor, your contraceptive doctor really going to sit down with you and say, look, Jan or Jim, you know, I would really encourage you to actually address your sexual decision making here and think more about virtue and maybe not be as promiscuous. I mean, I, I serious. Like if a doctor actually tried to advise you and give you proper health advice about sexual behavior, that probably be the subject of a health and disability commissioner complaint. The medical council would be complained to. It'd be all over the media. How dare this doctor be doing this?
[00:49:47] I just come here to get products. I want technical advice so that I can make my own decisions about promiscuity, thank you very much. You know, like that's not gonna happen, is it?
[00:49:57] Let's be frank, let's be frank and earnest about this. That that is not gonna happen. Right? There's going to be a major problem if a doctor actually did try to give you the full advice. In most cases, the important thing is to not stop your current method until you have made a decision about what the right thing to do is. Well, yeah, that's kind of obvious, isn't it? You know, don't stop doing a thing until you've made a decision about whether or not you want to do that thing. When it comes to birth control, the truth, like women's bodies, is a little more complex than a hashtag.
[00:50:29] Bingo.
[00:50:31] So what this article doesn't have. And I don't know if the podcast does. Cause I didn't want to take lots of time to listen to the podcast. I'm very busy at the moment preparing for presentations coming up this weekend. Weekend. But did they actually. Cause the article doesn't seem to imply that they did. Did they interview actual experts in natural fertility? I don't think they've done that. They've scaremongered about it. That's certainly what they've done in this article. Quite astoundingly so, really like when you think about this, this is such a pro pill approach. Natural fertility. Oh my gosh. How dare they. And the implication here is that these women are. They might even be going crazy, like they're going to withdrawal methods. Claims are made in this article that really are quite astounding. Like the implication being given that the pill, unlike the withdrawal method, can actually help you with perhaps staving off sexually transmitted infections. You would certainly be forgiven if you're a young person who's not well informed in thinking and taking that idea from that statement I read you to I think I don't think that'd be unreasonable in this situation.
[00:51:30] And of course it's like the failure to actually present the truth about why so many women are actually leaving hormonal contraceptive which leads me to this article and I could have chosen many, I could have looked at studies but I thought this article would just be an interesting one. A couple of statements from this article which appeared on Oprah Daily last year. Why are so many women quitting birth control? A 20 something so that's the age of the reporter reports on this growing trend and wrestles with her own decision to go off the pill in a post Roe world. So this is after Roe v. Wade, remember? And here is a young woman so clearly that tells you something deep is going on here. That that this woman is actually is someone who's explored that question of what if I get pregnant and still wants to come off hormonal contraceptives.
[00:52:19] Last November my sister got married. It was the most beautiful day, full of love and flowers and joy. It was also the day I realised I needed to dump my birth control. After five years with an iud, I had restarted the pill about four months before the wedding. My gynecologist had assured me that any physical changes from the different hormones would be minimal. She said that at most I might gain three pounds and that it would largely be due to an increased appetite. So that's an effect of the pill. That previous article didn't even talk about the effect on appetite. Tell me why then in my maid of honor dress, which fit perfectly and comfortably in August, why did it leave bruises on my collarbones? Because the straps had become too tight. If you compare a picture from the late summer bridal shower to one from the wedding, the change in my cleavage is simply obscene. I hadn't adjusted my diet or workouts in that window. The only variable was my contraception. Wtaf. What the actual flip. According to Tiffany Pham, a Texas based obgyn and medical advisor at FloHealth, a woman's health app, I'm far from alone in my agita. She says that at least 30% of women listen to this taking oral contraceptives report some form of negative symptoms. Radio New Zealand didn't mention that in their article. And by the way, we've known this. I've seen this in research papers and survey data. It's for decades we've known this.
[00:53:42] She says that at least 30% of women taking oral contraceptives report some form of negative symptoms. This leaves about 70% feeling fine on the Pill. But still one third of users having issues isn't something to ignore. Exactly. And that's what this article does. We typically see skin changes, weight gain, mood swings or irritability, more anxiety, headaches and sexual effects such as decreased libido and vaginal dryness. Fam says all of these are in the research and have been done about for decades and no one talks about them in this Radio New Zealand article.
[00:54:21] It is astounding to me. And that's what's really going on here. This is like this is why you have an increase in young women who are saying we're just opting out of this.
[00:54:32] We are not interested at all. Of course, none of this is new. No, it's not. We've known this for decades. Women have experienced the Pill's unpleasant side effects for 64 years to be exact. The difference is that today they're done tolerating them. National statistics are scarce. But Pham and Sarah Hill, PhD, a psychologist and author of this Is yous Brain on Birth Control, have both noticed increased interest in non hormonal forms of birth control over the past few years. And that's true. Actually, in the work that I do, the whole question of natural fertility stuff comes up a lot. And particularly like I'm Catholic, my wife and I use it, we're often asked about it. And what's interesting is there is an increasing trend towards women who have no religious faith whatsoever, but are more interested in a natural holistic approach to their bodies and to life in general and to sort of trying to rid anything artificial and, you know, excesses that they don't really need. And there is an also an increasing sort of environmental concern because this is the other thing that they didn't talk about, by the way, in that article, is that the Pill is putting artificial synthetic hormones into the female body. And what does the female body do? It just flushes out the excessive and excess synthetic hormones as quickly as it can and that goes out through waste, through urine. Where does that end up? Well, in a lot of countries that's ending up in the streams, waters and riverways. And again going back well over a decade now, we've got well documented research, got nothing to do with the Pill. But it's related to environmental research showing that this is having an effect in some regions where it ends up back via wastewater disposal into the waterways. Cause it's very hard to break down. How do you filter out synthetic hormones. And so it ends up in fish populations, animal populations, and it's creating problems there. So there is an environmental effect as well. That's another part of the story. We're not talking about it. We're just not talking about the pill is not the rosy, glamorous, hey, baby, take this pill product. Take this pill. It's literally called the pill. Just take one solves all your problems. You have all the sex you want, no babies, no big deal. And there's a whole bigger story that's not being told here. And it is absolutely fascinating to me to see this and the concern and the fear and again, that sense of intergenerational warfare or concern between the different female generations and the behaviors of the younger female generations who are perhaps charting a new and different and I would argue a more hopeful course in this regard. Thanks for tuning in. Don't forget, live by goodness, truth and beauty, not by lies. And I'll see you next time on the Dispatches.
