Desexing Birth Control

Abstract

When Margaret Sanger initiated the American birth control movement in the early twentieth century she stressed female and sexual liberation. Victorian views on morality have since combined with the compromises necessitated to achieve legitimacy for the movement to lead to a desexualization of the birth control movement. The movements communication now concentrates on reproduction and ignores sex; it emphasizes family planning and population control but does not mention sexual pleasure. Taboos against publicity concerning contraceptives are more powerful even than laws restricting the sale or distribution of contraceptives themselves in many countries. The movement must recover its earlier revolutionary stance.