Article How Celebrity Smear Campaigns Are Inspiring Attacks on Birth Control
Article How Celebrity Smear Campaigns Are Inspiring Attacks on Birth Control
Quote:I’ve been reporting on anti-feminist smear campaigns, anti-abortion lies, and right-wing media strategies for years now—so I can see through these posts as the astroturfed slop that they are. The problem is, many young women aren’t journalists or aware of the pink pill pipeline. Many will see the sheer volume of posts about the supposed dangers of birth control and conclude birth control is unsafe, or that IVF is an exploitative, predatory industry.
The goal is to flood the zone with so much anti-birth control content that young women believe we’re encountering this content organically. In reality, what we’re experiencing is a coordinated effort by right-wing actors, steadily manufacturing our consent to ban birth control—and more. The result? More and more women self-reporting worsened experiences with birth control as a self-fulfilling prophecy, according to researchers, or changing their contraceptive method based on what they’re hearing online.
Quote:I’ve been reporting on anti-feminist smear campaigns, anti-abortion lies, and right-wing media strategies for years now—so I can see through these posts as the astroturfed slop that they are. The problem is, many young women aren’t journalists or aware of the pink pill pipeline. Many will see the sheer volume of posts about the supposed dangers of birth control and conclude birth control is unsafe, or that IVF is an exploitative, predatory industry.
The goal is to flood the zone with so much anti-birth control content that young women believe we’re encountering this content organically. In reality, what we’re experiencing is a coordinated effort by right-wing actors, steadily manufacturing our consent to ban birth control—and more. The result? More and more women self-reporting worsened experiences with birth control as a self-fulfilling prophecy, according to researchers, or changing their contraceptive method based on what they’re hearing online.