Book Club: Ejaculate Responsibly

I was recently given this book after having experienced an unsuccessful IUD insertion that left me feeling frustrated and even embarassed. I considered trying again so I asked around to other people I am close to and what their experience with birth control has been and it turns out everyone’s story and experience was so different it honestly didnt really help me in mine. It’s only recently that birth control has become something I had to consider and I realized pretty quick that I had no serious opinion or knowledge for myself about not only what does female birth control do but what are all the different reasons one chooses to use it. Everything was telling me I shouldn’t try again and that this choice to use hormonal birthcontrol wasnt right for my body but it wasn’t till I read this book that i really understood why I felt this way.

Gabrielle Blair’s Ejaculate Responsibly, I believe, is a genuine feminist literature that acknowledges and puts the responsibility of unwanted pregnancy and birth control on the one who actually does the impregnation rather than the one who is being impregnated. Blair’s arguments are blunt, clear and comprehensive, and factually rich will real-world examples that expose the simple biological logic of heterosexual sex and wanted versus unwanted pregnancy. This read was extremely validating for navigating specifically my own beliefs and values around having “safe sex” and how I want it to look for me despite patriarchal expectations and norms of sex, while also knowing and learning my own boundaries with my body and the birth control industry.