The Pill- More harm than good?

"It is illicit and shameful for a man to lie with even his lawful wife in such a way as to prevent the conception of offspring."

The Pill was released to mainstream American society in 1960 and many argued that it unleashed a new, immoral sexual fervor. Opposition predominantly came from the Catholic Church, who has always been against unnatural birth control methods, with the basis of their beliefs coming from the passage Genesis 38: 7-10. In the passage, God asks Onan to bore his sister-in-law's children because her husband (his brother) had recently died. Onan refuses "and therefore the Lord slew him, because he did a detestable thing". In 1968, Pope Paul VI called a press conference to reaffirm the Church's traditional teachings on birth control. He classified The Pill as an artificial method of birth control because it deliberately excluded the basic purpose of sex- procreation. The Church states that the pleasure sexual intercourse provides is just an "additional blessing from God".

The Pill has broken down the sacrament of marriage. Before the sexual revolution, marriage was viewed as a holy union, and pre-marital sex was uncommon due to the belief that women would not be able to find a husband if she were not a virgin. The Pill replaced the emphasis on marriage and virginity and promoted a singles culture, particularly through Hugh Hefner's, Playboy, and Helen Gurley Brown's, Sex and the Single Girl. The Pill allowed women to have sexual relations outside of marriage without risking pregnancy. In 1960 around 69% of the population were married, but in 2000 only 52% were. The divorce rates for these years are very similar although there was a 17% decline in marriages from 1960 to 2000. Similar to Helen Gurley Brown and Hugh Hefner, our contemporary media promotes this type of 'loose' behavior, for instance, pop icon Britney Spears, and HBO comedy Sex and the City. Not only did The Pill break down the sacrament of marriage, it also severed the family unit. In 1960 90.6% of children were raised in two-parent households compared with 71.5% in 2002. There has also been an increase of children born outside of marriage; between 1970 and 1992, the proportion of babies born outside of marriage leaped from 11% to 30%."

Pope Paul VI believed that the revelation of The Pill would cause men to lose respect for women and see them only as "instrument of selfish enjoyment". At the core of the sexual revolution was the concept that women, just like men, enjoyed sex and had sexual needs. Pope Paul VI used the example of the 1960s "free love" movement, and said it was a time where men had an opportunity to take advantage of women who were experimenting with their sexuality. The "free love" movement is a symbol of the immoral western culture. Many eastern societies view the United States as a sinful and evil country. Sex is all over the media and has even infiltrated to our top levels of government. A few years ago, President Clinton's sex scandal made headlines all over the world. The United States has successfully secured an image of being corrupt and immoral. Ask yourself, if this is how you want your nation to be portrayed?

The Pill is only useful in preventing pregnancy; it does not protect a person from contracting a sexually transmitted disease. A few decades ago the only consequence to sex was becoming pregnant. In today's age that is not the case; unprotected sex can leave you with a life-long disease or even dead. The Pill has created a free sexual environment making it seem that skipping from partner to partner is harmless. The estimated total number of people living in the United States with an incurable sexually transmitted disease is over 65 million and at least one in four Americans will contract a sexually transmitted disease at some point in their lives. It is the 21st century yet we are facing problems that did not exist in the 19th century. Should this be happening?

The Pill created a new sexual era and uncaged innate desires in human beings that were previously controlled. Before the wave of sexual pandemonium, intercourse was kept to marriage by a man and a woman. The Pill was supposed to be a revolution in preventing pregnancy yet it seems to have done the opposite. Teenage pregnancy, births out of wedlock, divorce rates, and the contraction of sexually transmitted diseases are all on the rise, but the marriage rate isn't. The Pill may have modernized society, but it tore apart a nation and created many social problems that did not exist before its invention.

The University of Southern California does not screen or control the content on this website and thus does not guarantee the accuracy, integrity, or quality of such content. All content on this website is provided by and is the sole responsibility of the person from which such content originated, and such content does not necessarily reflect the opinions of the University administration or the Board of Trustees