Oh oh oh … This could be BIG. The new “Consent App” Good to Go, has enormous potential to bring reason to impulsive, unmarried sexual behavior. Although the Slate writer didn’t care for it, I do and here is why. While its intended purpose is to create a legal document to prevent he said/she said date rape situations, I believe its real value lies in a completely different area: Raising awareness about the possible consequences of thoughtless or impetuous sex.
When left to Mother Nature, sex has inherent risks: STDs, pregnancy and criminal allegations … not to mention unintended or even unwanted emotional entanglements. The new app, while not a magic wand, does use the popular medium of techy smart phone apps to interrupt hormonal flushes and ask some reasonable questions that people might want to consider before having sex. Questions like:
— Do you want to have sex with this person?
— Do you want to have sex now?
— How old are you
— What kind of condition are you in? (Are you drunk or under the influence of drugs? If so, how much?)
To which I would add several other questions:
— Do you have any STDs? If so, have you informed your partner?
— Will you use safe sex measures?
— Do you want to become pregnant? If not, are you using birth control?
— Are you ready to accept the emotional/physical complications that could result from experiencing intense pleasure with a person?
While no app is going to completely eliminate sexually transmitted disease, stop unwanted pregnancies, rape or getting into bad relationships, just the buzz created by this sexy sounding app could generate a lot of interest and get people thinking and be a valuable resource for raising awareness about the risks and potential consequences of impulsive sexual activity.
Of course this app isn’t perfect and there are limits to its usefulness. For example, it doesn’t apply to teens who are under 18 years of age. Even so, this app could a be major step forward in helping single make better decisions and certainly is a huge improvement from the idiotic “Just say no until marriage” advice.