Condom sabotage in the hopes of getting pregnant — or impregnating someone – without a partner's knowledge is unfortunately nothing new. While the "crazy girlfriend pokes holes in condoms because she so CRAZY!" still tends to be the immediate go-to, Fatal Attraction-style, a 2010 study found that reproductive coercion perpetrated by men was also linked to physical and sexual abuse. (The rate was 4.8%.)


Out of 641 ob-gyn patients surveyed in a Brown University study, 16% reported that the only reason they'd become pregnant was because their significant other messed with their birth control — it's thought to affect primarily unmarried, sexually-active women in abusive relationships. Men often perpetrate it because they're longing for a nuclear family, particularly if they came from a dysfunctional one.


One interesting element of the study is something of a contradiction: One ob-gyn voices her surprise that it affects women of all socioeconomic backgrounds and education levels. But the next one seems to pin it on one particular demographic, explaining that it's a status symbol in gang culture to impregnate multiple women. Hmm.

Incidentally, reproductive coercion is kind of a fallible term for this — isn't that like calling rape "sexual coercion?" Maybe I'm wrong.

'Number Of Women 'Tricked' Into Parenthood Is On The Rise' [Opposing Views]