An app to have sex

Do you want to have sex?

Are you sure?

There is an app for that.

I am not talking about Tinder, but about the new We-Consent app.

For the generation that will not go to the bathroom without a smartphone, finally the app that will allow them to take technology to bed.

Looking at the We-Consent promo one would think desire is a formality.

Something to be discussed outside the bedroom, with no passion involved, while touching a phone instead of each other’s genitalia.

Needless to say this representation is incredibly misguided, possibly because the app’s creator, Michael Lissack, was never touched by a woman.

But see it for yourself and let me know what you think: does this promo look like something that could happen in real life?

Affirmative consent is dangerous

A privilege many women have is that we can flirt our way out of troubles, from speeding tickets to bar tabs.

Most of us have done it at least once.



Back when only no meant no, when a woman did not want sex with a man she had been flirting with, she would say it.

In absence of the word “no”, flirting was considered a conscious and voluntary agreement to move things forward.

The man would make the move, the woman would decide whether to stop there or keep going (and vice versa.)

Today a woman can flirt, kiss, even perform oral sex and still be considered non-consensual.

It should not surprise us that college students are being offered consent contracts.

A few questions

I doubt Michael Lissack will ever read this, but I have some questions for him:

-What about group sex? The app only lets two people participate, but if there is one situation in which affirmative consent really is needed it is group sex.

-What if halfway through sex the guy wants to poop on my back? I did not consent to that.

Yes, there is a Changed-Mind app (I’m not even kidding), but by the time you opened it and recorded a video the guy will have pooped already.

-What about the mood? I know some will say nobody cares about the mood.

They are wrong, I do.

-The app creates a 7 year encrypted record I will not be able to access nor delete. Does it mean that unless I buy your Changed-Mind app I just said yes to 7 years of sex with that person?

So what?

Humor apart, what worries me the most about this app is the cluelessness it shows. These people do not trust their partners enough to have sex without a contract, but expect a potential rapist to wait for them to record their consent -or lack thereof.

A/N

Shorty after reading this, Michael Lissack contacted me on twitter

@UnoffendedBlog if you want a dialogue i am open to one BUT one the telephone or by email not here (I do not do well within the 140 char lmt — Michael Lissack (@MLissack) July 26, 2015

I emailed him all the questions written in the third paragraph of this post. This is part of the conversation that followed:

The statistics mentioned in my email come from here, here and here