In 2006, two doctors from King's College in London developed a non-hormonal birth control pill for men called "dry orgasm pill." Men would take the pill approximately two hours before sex and it would prevent their bodies from producing semen, without affecting their ability to orgasm. Fertility would return to normal half a day later. Besides preventing pregnancy, this pill can prevent the spread of the HIV virus, which is something that no female contraceptive method can do as of yet.
However, the original developer of the male pill, Carl Djerassi, explained in an article in Sabado magazine that men will ultimately be resistant to any sort of male birth control method- hormone based or not. "Men are afraid to lose their virility. Even if taking a pill carries only a remote chance of impotence, they won't take the chance," he said.
Statistics show that most men wouldn't even consider taking a form of hormonal birth control, even in pill form. Yet, so many women do because they realize the importance of taking control of their own reproductive health. Why is it that women are consistently more willing to put their bodies through things that most men won't even consider?
Men's rights activists, such as the MRA, often argue that men have to pay child support for children that they don't want (a dubious claim in most cases). Producing the male pill would make this point disappear: "well, you could have taken birth control." It is in men's interests, as well as women's, to have control over conception and reproductive health.
Pharmaceutical companies must be willing to produce alternative male contraceptive methods. In order for this to happen, men must also be willing to take them. Yes, oral birth control products are not perfect; but women still choose to take the birth control pill (and more detrimental products such as the morning after pill) in order to take control of their own sexual health. Men deserve to have the same option, whether they are "marketable" or not.
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