The Impact of the Birth Control Pill

Birth Control Pill 

In 1965 the Supreme Court gave married couples the right to use birth control pills because in the Constitution it was protected to their right to privacy. However in 26 states, if you were a single woman you were not allowed to have access to birth control pills. The birth control pill had an impact on the American culture in the fact that the tradition would be for women to marry and then have children, but with the birth control pill it allowed women to have more freedom which wasn't popular among many that didn't want change and did not want to break the normal tradition that society had. 

Fears about the Birth Control Pill 

In 1964, President Lyndon Johnson created a federal funding of the birth control pill for the poor. Even though this was made as a good act, this was something that was not necessarily accepted within the African American community. There was a suspicion, especially with the pill. In the 1960s many African American were suspicious about the government funding birth control clinics, because they thought that it was a plan to control the population among the African Americans. The reason that there was this fear among the African American community, is because back to when slavery was allowed, African American population was crucial to whites that owned slaves. But in the 1960s when African Americans were beginning to gain some power, there was a fear that the government was trying to control them by lowering the population. This was a big fear because whenever a woman would give birth, she would be unable to have more children after. Not only that, but rumors would increase about the pill. There was a rumor growing that there were two different types of pills, one for white women which would temporarily prevented ovulation, and another type of pill for African American women in which caused sterilization. 

Even though the birth control pill created a big change among women because it gave them a new type of freedom, there was fear among many especially women that came from minorities because they were fearing that these pills were made in order to decrease the number of children that African Americans could have, since they were beginning to have their voice heard during the 1960s.

Sources:

http://www.ourbodiesourselves.org/health-info/a-brief-history-of-birth-control/
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/pill/peopleevents/e_genocide.html