thelastpsychiatrist.com - Abusive Teens Force Their Girlfriends To Get Pregnant! (Don't Let The Truth Get In The Way Of A Good Story). Adnotated.

The girls, aged 15-20, reported

their abusive partners were actively trying to get them pregnant by manipulating condom use, sabotaging birth control use and making explicit statements about wanting them to become pregnant.

I'm not sure it's particularly surprising to anyone who works in a city that boys are actively trying to get their girlfriends pregnant, but that's not what this is all about. The implication, of course, the soundbite, is that abusive boys are using impregnantion specifically as a means of abuse. In other words, the abuse is the point; hitting, verbal abuse, sexual abuse, and forcing pregnancy are all tools for that purpose. If the guys weren't abusive, they wouldn't be trying to impregnante their girlfriends.

Interestingly, in any discussions about this article I've seen, the criticism is the small sample size of the study -- 61 girls interviewed. 53 used. But that's not the flaw in the study, the flaw is in the way these results were reported in the news. In fact, only 14 of the girls reported that this was happening. A quarter.

"We were floored by what these girls told us," Dr. Millerⁱ said.

Really?

If this article had been titled, "75% Of Abusive Boyfriends Aren't Trying To Impregnante Their Girlfriends; Many Still Wear Raiders Caps" would we be talking about this? 25% is pretty low. But it's actually lower than that:

Participants had varied responses to these pregnancy-promoting behaviors, including some sharing the same desire to become pregnant

Wow, it pays to RTFA.

Keep in mind that the pregnancy is supposed to be a means of abuse and control. It's not supposed to be an example of a guy really, really wants a baby. (I'm not saying that this is a valid reason for sabotaging contraception, but I am distinguishing it from an intended abuse of the girlⁱⁱ.)

Of those 26%, how many were being impregnated because the boy legitimatelyⁱⁱⁱ wanted a baby? What percent were doing it for access to welfare/money/services/get to move in?^iv In how many cases did the girl want to get pregnant herself? Or was at least ambivalent about it?

I have nothing against the study, I'm all for investigating abuse patterns of likely future narcissists, but the reporting of these studies takes on a life of its own. It doesn't matter whether it's true or not, what matters is that this soundbite is stuck in your head^v, and it informs your thinking about society.

And again, of course: even when someone shows you this is wrong, or you get new information to the contrary, the new information doesn't replace the bad information, the new information sits next to the bad information. Instead of one study you've misunderstood, you have two studies you contrast.

1. Here's betting that Dr. Miller's female, and hasn't seen any in a long while, and would really really like some ; but she won't put out (read : eat cunt) because "reasons" aka goange in her own head, preferring instead to fritter her life away pointlessly making up transparently wish fulfilling stories while at "work", and in the process transforming the workplace into a "workplace".

   How about, instead of pretending to be a woman, and pretending to be working, and pretending to have gone to college, and all the rest of the steaming pile of shit & pretense, Dr. Miller just humbly assumed her true condition, and lived the rest of her days happier, if quieter ? [↩]

2. The whole problem here, and moreover the whole ideological fault line between the red pantsuit and the blue pantsuit in this context, is that the latter wish to make their "women" mental construct strictly incapable of usage ; any usage at all, which strikes the former as untenably nutty. That's what the discussion is all about, not some derpy article nobody reads (and, I suspect, nobody even wrote, let alone researched) but simply that "woman has no use". That typically useless females cluster to one side of the "argument", while on the other all sorts of homemakers tend to gravitate is... well, let's say it's not coincidental.

   In the end, it's a debate between snails and sparrows as to whether mushrooms or worms are food -- leaving aside the smooth absence of any possibility of resolution, the whole thing proceeds apace on the firm ground of the complete inability of either "side" to even hear the other. What exactly could a barefoot woman that can make bread say to a woman that can't get "her articles" published that'd convince this latter she's not entirely useless ? Oh... wait... [↩]

3. What the fuck does this even mean, "the male legitimately wanted a baby" ? The only possible legitimation is marriage, and these are specifically not married sets, so what legitimacy is being discussed ? Whether the boy thought he wanted a baby from some woman independently of the woman in question ? What the everloving fuck sense does this make ?!

   There's no legitimacy in sexuality, get over it. [↩]

4. Forgetting the all-important, by very far dominant, "get a shot at a good chunk of unearned wealth two to three decades down the road". Pretty much the only time a solid earner can be dumb enough to marry one of these is then and there. [↩]
5. Stuck my foot.

   The thing in the head was there from before ; it's aching even now between Dr. Miller's legs. Soundbytes stick to it like anything does, if you strip her naked and roll her through flour -- guess what ? Flour'd have stuck to her... head. [↩]