It’s Time to Deconsumerize Sex

Buying condoms for the first time was a confusing experience.

I was at DM-drogerie markt, the European analog of CVS, surrounded by a sea of products I could neither interpret nor distinguish from each other. At the time, I was a student at an international boarding school in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and my Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian skills were extremely limited—especially when it came to sex. 

More than the language barrier, however, I was completely and utterly lost trying to choose which pack of condoms to buy. They all seemed different: each pack a new color, shape, design, and even flavor. Do we really need to have so many variations of a product with one simple purpose? I didn’t think so. But more than that, I was shocked at the extent to which manufacturers were competing for my attention, trying to make me think about their products in personal contexts.

Being in the ‘family planning’ aisle was more overwhelming than it needed to be. I participated in the sexual wellness market out of necessity because, let’s face it, protection is important. Yet my desire for condoms dragged me into the trap of the inflammatory and often over-the-top marketing used by the industry to garner attention.

The borderline pornographic, over-sexualized nature of several condom advertisements I saw, for example, immediately shifted the tone to be less intimate and more objectifying. What should be a tool for having safe sex was being hijacked into a narrative that is strictly unsafe for women. Additionally, the overly casual, conversational tone adopted by companies such as Durex and Trojan in their messaging almost makes you forget the fact that these intrusive and innuendo-filled posters are being written by multibillion-dollar companies prying into your sexual affairs. Yet legitimizing this type of language and tone by massive companies only normalizes harassing language. 

I recognize that normalizing harassment and objectifying women are not the goals of these advertisements, but that’s precisely my point: even if done to spark a reaction, there are real people affected by these campaigns. There should be a distinction between selling a product and using marketing campaigns or collaborations that co-opt our private experiences into twisted interpretations of them for corporate gain. Why should massive companies be involved so granularly in my private sex life? When their presence only diminishes intimacy and creates unsafe narratives around sex, why do we allow companies to corrupt sex—one of the things that makes us human?

Sexual wellness has become another way for corporations to make money. Sex and sexuality have become highly marketable, and naturally, companies have started to exploit this for profit. The sexual wellness market was valued at $28.5 billion in 2024 and is expected to more than double to $65 billion by 2034. Moreover, the sex toy industry has seen a similar boom, reaching a valuation of $10 billion in 2024. This is not to say that the emergence of these markets is inherently problematic; having industries that manufacture and sell safe products is certainly a good thing. The issue arises when these industries scale up and shift toward a purely profit-driven, shareholder-centered approach, as we are seeing right now. 

Growth almost always shifts industries away from their original motivations. For food, drinks, and mass-produced staples, I see less of an issue: they are impersonal goods with little emotional attachment, so profit-maximizing makes sense. I wouldn’t blink twice at yet another McDonald’s collaboration with a pop culture star. While such campaigns have other drawbacks, the logic is straightforward: McDonald’s exists to make money.

Sexual wellness, on the other hand, is fundamentally different. Sex and sexuality are deeply personal and should remain so. Every element of sex should intimately focus on individual pleasure and connection, from the products used to the act itself. Corporations producing these goods do so for profit, and it would be naive to think otherwise. But the approaches they’ve taken go too far and don’t respect the delicacy of sex in particular.

When businesses overstep the ideally clear line between private intimacy and their role in it, it diminishes the personal nature of sex. My attention during sex should be entirely on my partner; Durex is not welcome to pry away my thoughts towards Daft Punk’s latest single through their collaborative “Get Lucky” condoms. Likewise, no one should think about the marketing appeal of Harry Styles’s lube testimonial mid-intimacy. The impersonality of modern dating apps already threatens intimacy, and consumerized sex only exacerbates this problem.

On a broader scale, pleasure needs to be separated from consumption. Capitalism teaches us that sexual happiness depends on condom flavor, lube brand, and sex toy color; the resultant social pressure to pursue these aspirations only raises barriers toward having safe and enjoyable sex. When social pressure can lead to using the wrong product (such as using an oversized condom), it’s the person seeking STD treatment who gets affected, not the company that put them in that situation. Similarly, when the prohibitively high costs of these products as a result of their overcommodification lead to teen pregnancy, companies are not responsible for any of the consequences. Even for people who have a go-to or favorite choice of a sexual wellness product and tend not to shop around in the market, this choice itself can become a pillar of their experiences in ways that distract from the act of intimacy itself.

In reality, what matters is you, your partner, and your safety. The more we let corporations co-opt our private lives for profit, the further we drift from one of the most meaningful human experiences. Sex belongs to us, not to the companies that see your intimacy as a revenue opportunity, and that reclamation is long overdue. Making it clear that companies are not welcome to prey on our intimacy will reduce anxiety and protect the sanctity of such a vulnerable and sensitive act. At the very least, it might make buying condoms less intimidating.

Zaid Al-Ississ ’28 (zalississ@college.harvard.edu) is not a fan of consumer capitalism.