Let’s face it: the new ‘consent condom’ won’t prevent rape – but it will protect men from rape allegations

Sign up for the Independent Women email for the latest news, opinion and features Get the Independent Women email for free Get the Independent Women email for free SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Consent culture – or, as most women like to call it, “the concept that men might no longer be able to get away with rape” – has given rise to an even stranger set of products and experiences. A Warwick University student called George Lawlor made waves three years ago when he wrote, for The Tab, that he refused to attend consent classes because he knew he wasn’t a rapist The classes are “full of people pointing out the obvious, thinking they’ve saved the world”, he wrote. While he didn’t exactly paint a sympathetic figure – especially after following up a year later with an article which claimed consent classes are “still a waste of time” and he’s “still not a rapist” – there are some parts of Lawlor’s argument I agree with. This isn’t a product which celebrates or enables consent so much as it is a tool to protect men from all those nefarious, lying women waiting to say they were raped by them.