MEN AND WOMEN TOGETHER: THE IMPACT OF BIRTH CONTROL TECHNOLOGY ON MALE-FEMALE RELATIONSHIPS

Four major components of male-female relationships are love, intimacy, sex, and marriage. Throughout most of history, these components have been structured to accomodate the fact that sex could not be reliably separated from procreation. Before birth control, especially in Western culture, the only socially sanctioned sequences of these four components had marriage preceding sex, since marriage and the family were the basic institution for raising children. Pre-birth control morality governing male-female relationships was explicit, clear, and often restricted the role and sexuality of women. Birth control technologies have fundamentally altered the nature of male-female relationships. After the dissemination and widespread use of birth control, marriage was no longer required to precede sex, since post-birth control sex did not necessarily result in pregnancy and birth. New sequences of love, intimacy, sex, and marriage in male-female relationships emerged. The expanded number of choices for individuals has simultaneously created new freedom and opportunity, as well as uncertainty and confusion in male-female relationships. New norms for cross-sex interactions and the new post-birth control morality are still evolving.