Fortunately One Needn't Have a *Good* Reason To Get a Vasectomy
Lux Alptraum of BOINKOLOGY says
Well, some men are, it seems: according to the Details blog, more and more young men are getting vasectomies. Which, quite frankly, we support. If men don’t want children, and they know they don’t want children, taking the steps to prevent it is the responsible thing to do.
I got a vasectomy at 21 because I didn’t want to get anyone pregnant. And because the only alternative was condoms which, at the time, was considered better than nothing… but only barely. Unlike every other form except tubal ligation, though, vasectomies are permanent and that’s pretty unreasonable. When I got mine I did so with the intention that if a partner and I wanted children at a later date we’d try for a reversal or, if that didn’t work, we’d adopt. Or at least *I’d* adopt if *I* wanted children.
It turns out that in strictly mechanical terms vasectomies are a little more reversible than the numbers indicate: most men get their reversals in their 50s, often with partners in their 40s, and so even when the procedure works sometimes it’s just too late anyway. Because I was younger than typical (late 30s) and my partner even younger (early-30s) things went, well, swimmingly. I already had an appointment lined up for a second vasectomy when our second, planned child was born because I really believe, passionately that every child should be a planned, wanted child.
Leave it to Details Magazine, though, to populate their article with the moral equivalent of trolls. No "kumbaya"-playing contraceptive responsibility over there.
"Now I can never have a girl say I made her pregnant," [Marcus] Whitlock says. "I don't have to worry about being tricked."
Or "oopsed," as some advocates of vasectomy put it—as in "Oops, I guess that was a breath mint, not a birth-control pill."
...
Tim Vass, a 34-year-old technical writer in Florida, got snipped in May 2007 after a half-dozen pregnancy scares, including what he says were two attempted oopsings. Both of the latter were one-night stands; he says one woman admitted she didn't know who the father was and the other demanded a DNA test that proved her wrong. After his procedure, Vass experienced swinging-from-the-chandelier sex for the first time. "It's like eating junk food and knowing you're not going to get fat," he says.
Fortunately Details suggests other reasons a man might want a vasectomy.
But men opting to get vasectomies before the age of 40 aren't motivated only by an irrational fear of sneak pregnancies. They're also spurred by a philosophical argument: Why should women be in control of when—and if—they have children?
Charming, no?
What's the deal with Details Magazine anyway? Like the male equivalent of Cosmopolita every article seems specifically designed to make the reader an even bigger loser! This article makes me think of the Seinfield character George when he was trying to break his engagement someone. Kramer says asking for a pre-nuptual agreement is a sure-fire way to insult someone into breaking up with you so...
George: Listen... there's something that's been on my mind and we haven't really talked about it. It's kind of important to me.
Susan: What is it?
George: Well... I put a lot of thought into this and I think I would like you to sign a prenuptial agreement.
Susan: A pre-nup?
George: Yeah.
Susan: [bursts out laughing]
George: What's so funny?
Susan: You don't have any money. I make more money than you do. Ha ha. Yeah, gimme the papers I'll sign 'em.
So, like, yeah, in exactly who’s dreams would a woman want to "oopsie" the average Details reading career Kinko’s desk clerk into parenthood? (Sheesh. Did you see their article on "demanding" anal sex last year? Same kind of lame.)
Anyway, the good news is “stupid” is never the same thing as “wrong” when it comes to personal reasons for using birth control. And the more demand, from any quarter, for more male contraceptive options beyond latex and scalpels the better the odds industry will finally start to deliver.
I think we're all better off when guys like don't breed.
I'm all for early vasectomies as you've described previously, but the guys aren't doing it from a sense of responsibility but out of misogyny. Doofuses. (Or would that be doofi?)
My husband's vasectomy definitely removed the fear of unplanned pregnancy and gave us a feeling of freedom. Other birth control methods had resulted in two unplanned children and we weren't terribly confident in continuing with hormonal methods. My husband has never worn a condom (I am his only partner ever) and didn't want to start. I would have gotten a tubal when I had my 2nd c-section, except that I had the c-section in a Catholic hospital that would not permit it. My normally jerkish husband even realized that it was safer and easier for him to have the vasectomy than for me to have surgery.
Yay vasectomies, but for the right reasons.
[Definitely improving the gene pool when those guys get clipped. Which is sort of what I meant when I said there can be no *really* wrong reasons for getting one. :-) Thanks, Bunny. --fl]
What Bunny said: yay for Darwin Award winners; we're better off with these guys not breeding. I just wonder what the "Young, single men terrified of unwanted pregnancies, and sick of condoms" are doing to protect themselves of STDs. That man has "half-dozen pregnancy scares", several one night stands without using condoms and nooooo, nothing on his behavior is wrong, it's the women who are out to get him. When he gets syphillis he'll say she did it on purpose too.
But really, what's up with that magazine? I discussed that article about anal sex with a friend and I was surprised when he didn't understand why I was upset. He said the reporter was only quoting what the interviewed men said, and it wasn't the same as agreeing with them. Sure, the interviewed men were idiots, but he thought I already knew there were idiots in the world.
It's only that I think a serious reporter would interview people with different points of views. He'd have looked for someone that wasn't a jerk to interview too. If he didn't, he either thought he was already covering all the possible POVs, or he didn't care. And neither did his editor/whoever revised the article prior to publishing. Seeing this new article now I suspect the first option is closer to hit home.
[The problem with the reporter on the Anal article, as with this one, is that he almost certainly had to screen dozens and dozens of interview subjects to find people who could give him the answers he wanted. Years ago a reporter from a cooking magazine got hold of me (I'd posted frequently about being a stay-at-home dad and doing the cooking at home.) Anyway she must have tried 37 ways to get me to tell her how my mother had taught me everything I knew about cooking. But my mom didn't *like* to cook enough to value teaching me how -- she could do it but like a lot of people from her generation she thought frozen and packaged foods were a godsend. Instead I learned to cook by reading, among other things, the "Joy of Cooking" one summer. Once the writer finally got that I *wasn't* a chip off my mother's block she very nicely lost all interest -- her "thesis statement" was about men who's moms influence them and so, unlike science or math, my input wasn't needed. That's fine since it *wasn't* a science or math article, but it still illustrated the principle: the Details author chose men who told him what he, or his editors, wanted to hear. Everyone else with, you know, brain cells and/or a conscience, and/or (unlike the feebs, dweebs, and Crocks-wearing toolbags who evidently read Details) actual experience with partnered sex were screened out. Thanks, Colorlessblue. --fl]
... Hmm. I was expecting this entry to go a different direction.
A vasectomy at 21? Lucky. The medical world will sooner trust a young man's decision to sterilize himself than a woman's.
It's difficult, if not downright impossible to get your tubes tied if you're under 40, healthy and have had no children. "You might/will change your mind when you're older" is what many young women, both straight and queer are hearing from doctors.
[Hi Quickley. I was sort of lucky I suppose, though to be honest I didn't have much problem finding someone to give me a vasectomy, nor did most of the friends I had who sought them. My one woman friend who wanted a tubal took a *much* longer time to find one -- several years -- although last I heard (decades later now) she's still never regretted it. The thing about tubals is that they're *really* intrusive abdominal-cavity surgery and that's a *much* bigger deal safety and expense-wise. They're *very* reliable though and if you want one I'm very sorry you can't find someone to help you out. --fl]
I'm still reeling from "They're also spurred by a philosophical argument: Why should women be in control of when—and if—they have children?"
What...? Is that a rhetorical question? Because if it is, the context would seem to imply that women SHOULDN'T "be in control of when or if they have children," which I don't even know where to begin with what all is wrong with that. For one thing, most women I know for one reason or another don't want kids. Hell, even a few of my multi-be-offspring'd female coworkers (single and married) admitted they didn't like/want kids until after they'd had a couple.
And then there's the enormous investment of time, money, and--well--life that children are in the first place, and they want to know why women should be in control of whether they have kids and the timing thereof? Argh...
[And all that you talk about is available to men to *if* they're willing to be in, y'know, actual *partnership! Which is just another *gigantic slice* Details tries to carve out of men as if there was no mileage in being a parent. And the thing that's so stupid is that it really is a legitimate question... if you drop the piss-ant antagonistic tone! And it's a completely legitimate reason for men to seek contraception... if you're willing to look at it in terms of *taking* responsibility rather than *resenting* it. But yeah, Nekobawt, I'm with you that the author's working every angle completely backwards. (Biggest bet, by the way? No way the author's had one. Or would. Lame.) Thanks! --fl]
Yeah, I know condoms sometimes break, but I have trouble believing that any guy who reliably used them would have half a dozen pregnancy scares, at least two of them with one night stands. That sounds like a guy who's not using condoms at all, and probably not even bothering to ask whether the women he sleeps with are using birth control, either.
I'm glad he finally showed the sense to get that vasectomy, though; it sounds overdue.
[Yup. I only managed one pregnancy scare and that was enough. Thereafter I just didn't do intercourse unless I was very sure the woman I was partners with was using something. And so it *is* irksome to have to rely on someone else there *are* alternatives. Like everything but intercourse. Or, of course, a vasectomy. But there's no reason to be such dire turds about it. Thanks, Lynn. --fl]