Erections Have Consequences: Democratic Senator Proposes Cheeky Bill To Make It Illegal for Men To Ejaculate Without Intent To Reproduce
The ‘Contraception Begins at Erection Act,’ would make it unlawful for ‘a person to discharge genetic material without intent to fertilize an embryo.’ But that’s not what it’s really about.
As Republican-led states clamp down on abortion access, one Mississippi Democratic lawmaker is taking an eyebrow-raising approach to call out that it takes two to tango.
The Democratic Senator, Bradford Blackmon, in an effort to point out the “double standard” in reproductive legislation, filed a bill on Thursday that would make it illegal for men to ejaculate without the intention of conceiving a baby.
The bill, titled the “Contraception Begins at Erection Act,” seeks to make it unlawful for “a person to discharge genetic material without intent to fertilize an embryo.” If convicted, the individual would be fined on a sliding scale — beginning with $1,000 for a first offense, $5,000 for a second, and $10,000 for a third or subsequent offence.
Men who are donating sperm to a facility to fertilize an embryo are exempt from the fine. Same goes for men who use “a contraceptive or contraceptive method intended to prevent fertilization of an embryo.”
The measure, which is unlikely to be passed, was proposed by Mr. Blackmon “to point out the double standards in legislation,” he wrote in a statement. “You have male dominated legislatures in Mississippi and all over the country that pass laws that dictate what a woman can and can not do with her body,” the first-term senator contends.
After the Supreme Court eliminated the constitutional right to an abortion in 2022, by overturning Roe v. Wade, abortion access policies were placed in the hands of the states. Currently, 12 states, including Mississippi have implemented total or near-total abortion bans.
“When a bill has been filed that would regulate what a man is able to do with his own body in his own home, it suddenly has people in an uproar,” Mr. Blackmon states. “I am trying to figure out when it isn’t okay for the government to dictate what you do in the privacy of your own home, apparently it is when the laws regulate men.”
He added that “the reactions from some quarters” to his cheeky bill have indicated to him that “men are not held to the same standard when it comes to the intrusion into their personal private affairs as women” in a post Roe America.
