As my colleage Ann Friedman pointed out on Twitter, we see some version of this story every year. But the quest for male birth control is slow-moving and seems to not have the backing of men that would finally bring it to the United States.
Encouraging men to think more actively about fertility would enroll them earlier in the idea of parenthood as a constant project in which they play an active role and not as a state of being that doesn't particularly require them to make the sacrifices women often make. Moreover, it would remove the persistent myth that women try to hold men hostage in their reproductive choices by controlling, or removing, birth control, and that they secretly want babies all the time.
We actually know that men secretly want unexpected pregnancies. The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancies found in a survey released in March that 43 percent of young men would be a little pleased or very pleased if their partners became pregnant.
It's not that surprising when you consider what the popular narratives about manhood and responsibility communicate to young men, and women. Suddenly having a situation in which one "does the right thing" is a more romantic, and easier, story. The alternative is more adult and boring -- considering resources, making plans and committing to do something long-term. The disconnect, between the hero who preforms honorably in the face of unplanned circumstances and the facts of real life, must be hard to deal with later. And women probably know that, since they disproportionately suffer the consequences.
-- Monica Potts