Yes, you read the headline right: that most intimate of accoutrement, the condom, has undergone social media integration courtesy of
Planned Parenthood. And I’m not talking about condoms getting a profile on Facebook (although I’m sure that’s happened too). I’m talking about the actual, individual condoms
themselves.
As part of National Condom Week, which took place from February 14-21, Planned
Parenthood of the Great Northwest distributed 55,000 condoms with QR codes on the wrappers to college students throughout western Washington State. Recipients are supposed to “check in”
by scanning the QR code when they are about to open the condom, thus registering their, um, active endorsement of safe sex.
The condom check-ins are being mapped to an online,
interactive map of the world at the dedicated Web, www.wheredidyouwearit.com. And there’s no denying that this map of collective mojo makes for interesting
browsing.
Considering that the condoms were only distributed to students at about a dozen schools in western Washington State, they have traveled far and seen much, with a
prolific range that almost beggars credulity. Not only are there check-ins across the U.S. -- oh no, these fair shores are just the tip of the, um, iceberg.
Indeed there are
condom check-ins on all six inhabited continents, including some hard-to-reach places like Myanmar, formerly Burma; Yellowknife, in Canada’s far north; the Amazon rain forest in Brazil;
Zimbabwe; Reunion, an island in the Indian Ocean east of Madagascar; Teheran, Iran; Kashmir, in northern India; Kathmandu, capital of Nepal; the Spratly Islands, in the South China Sea; and the
outskirts of the Siberian city of Novosibirisk.
Assuming this map is accurate, I am at a loss to explain the astonishing distances traversed by these prophylactics. College
students do like to travel, and there are also probably a good number of foreign students among the recipients; some of the students who received condoms might be members of the armed forces who
were deployed shortly thereafter; and condoms can always change hands. But still, all I can say is: hats off to the young people of the great Pacific Northwest! You do your country proud!