SYSK Selects: How Condoms Work

The earliest depiction of a condom is found in a 15,000-year-old cave painting. Ever since humans realized sex led to children, we've been using condoms to prevent pregnancy. Join Josh and Chuck for this comprehensive tour of all things condom.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, everybody, it's me Josh and for this week's S
Y s K Select, I've chosen How Condoms Work, which
we released back in December of two thousand twelve. Thrill
to the number of times we use the word penis
and squirm and titter at the number of innuendows that
we unintentionally make and walk right past. It's a good

(00:23):
episode all around. I think you'll enjoy it. So here
we go. Welcome to Stuff you should Know from House
Stuff Works dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast.
I'm Josh Clark with me as always a Charles W.

(00:45):
Chuck Bryant. Uh, you put us together, rub Us and lube,
you got yourself stuff you should know. You have a
lawsuit on your hands from you right, yeah, yeah, I'm
seeing somebody. How you doing? Man? Oh, I gotta speeding
ticket on the way here. I'm piste off. Well, everything
of the last fifteen minutes before we started recording is

(01:05):
now explained. No, we talked about regular stuff that didn't
influence my my feelings about this. No, but you're still
like you had to burn your bonnet well for that
cop man. This state patrol, they don't mess around, No,
they don't. There's no like, there's no small talk, there's
no nothing. It's give me your license and then here's

(01:26):
your ticket. I was like, but get what anyone who
refers to you and what the second person is citizen?
They're they're pretty serious people. Yeah, I'm gonna go to
court though, why not? Good for you, man? You know,
we don't we don't work. You never know. You might
get out of it. Yeah, we'll give it a shot. Yeah.

(01:47):
So aside from that, I had my condom on, so
I was safe driving. That's good. Yeah. You always wear one, right,
you can't be too careful. How often do you change it? Gross? May?
That is so gross? All right? Uh, let's talk about
Measure B. Have you heard a Measure B H. It

(02:08):
is a referendum that Los Angeles County floated in this
last election that passed of the vote. Um. It said,
if you're in the porn industry and you're filming, you
have to wear a condom. Good. Well, it depends on
who you are. If you are a citizen, yeah, you
probably think it's good, especially if you voted in favor

(02:28):
of it. If you're in the porn industry, though, you're like,
people don't want to see that, And um, they're actually
talking about moving from Los Angeles, which is a big deal. People,
I don't want to see a condom in their porn movies.
I guess I don't want to see any of that stuff.
I don't want to see what's attached to the condom either. Okay,

(02:51):
so you wouldn't care, Uh no, yeah, I guess so
I don't want to see any that stuff. Apparently there's
a longstanding thing in the porn industry that's like, you
just don't show condoms and just it reflects the unnatural
nous maybe of of what you're seeing, Um, what you're like, well,
wait a minute, that's probably not the pizza guy after all,
you know. So, um, it blows the illusion that that's

(03:14):
real stuff. Yeah, so they're talking about, um about moving
from Los Angeles, which is huge Los Angeles because apparently
in just Los Angeles County porn it's a billion dollar industry.
Oh yeah, dude, in the valley, just in one county.
Can you imagine that. So there's a big kerfuffle going
on right now over condom usage in the porn industry.

(03:35):
Did ever tell you about the time I scouted the
porn stage for a video shoot. No. Was this did
key for Sutherlands Driver take you there? No, But I
was working as a p A and we couldn't afford
like a real stage, so they sent me out to
the valley of this porn stage to go videotape it
and see what it looked like. And uh, it's like
a boardroom with a bed in the corner, and a
candy shop with a bed, and a gymnasium locker room

(03:58):
with a bed. It was really gross and I didn't
want to touch anything. And uh, as I was leaving,
a bunch of big muscly men came in to get
their shoot on. Is that right? Yeah? It was a
gay porn I had that afternoon. It was Oh, so
it's just like whatever it like, it's a it's a
sound stage. Yeah, they take all comers, you know. And

(04:20):
so these two dudes walked in and I walked out,
and I don't think we ended up using the stage,
but it was funny. In the conference room set there
was a framed like Oland Mills or I was a
painting of Burt Reynolds and Lonnie Anderson like at the
head of the conference room. No way, yep, sort of God. Well,

(04:41):
that's one thing about porn and stream moguls. They seemed
to always have like a great sense of humor. I
think this is before Boogie Nights, even because I didn't
make that connection. It was just Burt Reynolds that was
definitely before Boogie Nights. But I mean, think about Larry Flint,
He's he has a great sense of humor. Um, Hugh Hefner.
Maybe I think the less hardcore you get, the less away,

(05:03):
the further away from hardcore you get, the less the
less of a sense of humor the publisher has. I
bet there's some mathematical formula in there. Serious. Maybe we'll
see it one day. Alrighty, so condoms is what we're
talking about. Um, we should say, if you're young, you
might want to ask your parents if you should listen
to this. Oh man, you know that is a good
c o A like. I think it's up to parents

(05:25):
how they educate their children with this stuff. So we
have you have been forewarned. Go put your little pot
uh player down glass, Mom and dad? Should I be
listening to this. We're gonna be very clinical here, but
it's about sex and reproduction, so you can't be too careful.
I wonder how many kids just like pull the cheeks
over what do you think? I don't know, vast majority. Okay,

(05:50):
so um, let's try this again. We're talking condom um
and apparently they what we think of condom usage normal, widespread.
It's talked about, there's billboards, whatever. Is actually a fairly
recent phenomenon. The billboards and things. Yeah, and just the

(06:13):
idea of like using condoms like that, that's pretty recent
um from the eighties. And actually it was HIV that
kind of um spurred this condom age that we live
in now. But there have been like another golden age
of condoms shortly after the Great War, right, that's right. Uh.

(06:34):
Venarial diseases were pretty easy to get if you were
a sailor on leave in Europe, and so they encouraged
troops to use use condoms and distributed them in the
in the ranks, among the ranks, and when they came
back home they kept using. My guess they hit a
big boom here in the in the nineteen what I
guess forties. Post war era died down in the sixties

(06:56):
because the pill and then picked back up again in
the eighties because of HI be Yeah, because we we
figured out things too clever, things like penicillin and all
that stuff. Um that most of the STDs that condoms
were preventing at the time, you could just treat with antibiotics,
so people weren't too concerned with that kind of thing.
And then the pill came along and I was like,
we have no need for condoms whatsoever. But then AIDS

(07:18):
hit and then condom usade started to go through the roof,
which is good. Yeah, um, but apparently condoms are an
extremely old idea. At the very least, putting something on
the over your penis, whether for recreational purposes or whatever,
is at least fifteen thousand years old, right, Yeah. I

(07:40):
think Tray Tracy of pop Stuff wrote this article. We
should point out she's responsible for the most comprehensive podcasts
we've done. Yeah. I never even think twice when I
look in and see her name in the biline, like, oh,
well we should totally do this. Um. Yeah. She points
out that fifteen thousand years ago we have found cave
paintings that show images of a sheath penis. Yes, so

(08:02):
it's unclear whether or not these garments and decorations and
sheaths on the penises of Egypt and Greece and India
and Japan were for uh contraception as a barrier method
or adornment. I guarantee they weren't probably thinking of the
woman's comfort, no, especially with all the Yeah, the Japanese

(08:25):
version of the penis sheath or condom was made of
horn or tortoiseshell. They didn't care about the lady's pleasure.
That's just mind bogglingly painful sounding, I know, no kidding. Um,
So we know people started using condoms as a means
to prevent pregnancy by the Roman era, I think, of course, yeah,

(08:50):
anytime it's sexy time stuff. They were leading the way totally.
You know, yeah, anybody seemed Calligula can tell you that. Um.
But then by the time Shakespeare rolls round, condoms are
pretty common. Yeah, if you count you know, wrapping linen
around the penis and tying it in a little bow

(09:11):
with a ribbon at the bottom. That's a condom back then,
or stuffing something into the urethra and using a draw
string um ribbon to jump it on. It's another way
that they did things. I should post um photos of
your face, patures of your face that I'm taking like
throughout this episode. Um and well, by the time Shakespeare's age, Uh,

(09:34):
people are using condoms pretty frequently, and one of the
things they're using it, probably the main thing they're using
it for, is to prevent syphilis, because just like in
World War Two, sailors to the New World came and
contracted this new disease that was found only in North
America at the time, um, and or I should say
the Western hemisphere. Uh, and uh, they brought it back

(09:57):
and they figured out after a little while, like, well,
wait a minute, I think it has to do with sex.
So they started using condoms for disease prevention through that.
So this is a pretty big point here, right, like
by the the Age of Exploration. Yeah, people understand that
you can cover the penis to prevent pregnancy and to
prevent disease. Yeah, that's a huge advancement in society. I guess,

(10:19):
oh totally. They were. They were on it. They still
like rolled in their own feces and like you ever
washed their hands or took a bath, but they knew
how to prevent syphilis with a little something in the
urethro with a draw stream attached to that's right by
the mid seventeen hundreds, Tracy points out they were starting
to use um condoms made from animal membranes, animal guts basically,

(10:41):
which if you they still have these today, if you
use something called cheap skin. It is not cheap skin,
but it is you know, cheap guts and testine lining. Yeah,
and you could still buy those. I think they were
about what like one percent of the total sales these days.
And they recommend those only if you are like a
monogamous bowl that's disease free and you're just using it

(11:02):
to like not get pregnant, right because it's very thin. Yeah,
but it's not. It's it's porous, I believe enough for
pathogens to pass through. Like, you don't want to use
that if to prevent getting HIV? No, not smart? No, Um,
well you want to use is a rubber condom? That's right.
Thank you Charles Goodyear, Yeah, who gave us not only

(11:25):
rubber condoms, but um tires, uh, rubber hoses, rubber belts,
pretty much anything that they made of rubber. You can
thank Charles Goodyear for because of his process of vulcanization,
which is he added um sulfur and lead oxide to
rubber from the Heavia braziliensis tree, yeah, which they had

(11:48):
been tapping that tree for a while to get this.
You know, latex is liquid rubber, but um, yeah, vulcanization
is where it became a thing that you could mask,
you know, produce and it was safe and it was
uh stronger and uh more elastic, so you know, less
likely to break. But it was also thicker and rougher.

(12:09):
And you had to go to your doctor to be
fitted for one of these condoms. The good the good
part is you could wash and reuse it. It was
basically like your your your condom. You probably have your
name on it. I imagine if you got fitted though,
in the doctor's office, that would have to be with
an erection, right, yeah, you remember the little reflex hammer? Yeah,
I do. What does that have to do this? That's

(12:32):
how they did it, all right, So I guess back
in the day, you would go to your doctor and
get an direction and he would fit you with a
condom right made from vulcanized rubber. Probably a bit of
a uh investment at this time as a man, so
I doubt if a lot of people were wearing them still.
So again, imagine this is what I imagine it basically

(12:54):
probably looked a lot like um, a the nipple of
a baby bottle. Yeah, sure, you know. I'll bet you
there's somebody who collects old time e condoms, some rich
dude who has like an old time e condom collection. Yeah,
of course, Um, there's someone who collects everything old. Uh.
So by apparently people were using this. This is eighteen

(13:17):
thirty nine when Charles could with volcanization. So we're talking
like the mid to late nineteenth century. People are using
these rubber condoms from usable robber condoms. And then everybody
padded on the back a guy named Frederick Killian, Killian's
Red Beer inventor. Maybe no, it's possible. Um. He's more

(13:37):
famously known, however, for um creating a process of making
condoms directly from latex, which again is the sap of
the rubber tree found in Brazil, West Africa now Southeast Asia.
Now um, and he would take these glass molds that
where you could argue fallack in nature, you know, and

(14:00):
that he would dip it directly into latex. I don't
think he did it with his hand like that. I'm
just just like maybe initially he did. So he would
dip these these molds or um forms, right, what they're
called formers? Yeah, just into latex and uh he would
then vulcanize that, and what you had was a thinner,

(14:24):
stronger um better I guess condom. Yeah, thinner and stronger,
which is like, that's what you want out of a
condom because you want to have the sensation intact, but
you want to be safe and also had a longer
shelf life, and all of a sudden, Latex was the
way to go. Yeah. Now it's all condoms worldwide are latex. Yes,

(14:48):
and that's a lot of condoms as we'll see. Yeah,
some numbers. Should we should we talk about nicknames or not?
This seems all silly to me. I thought it was
silly too. Well, let's skip it then, Okay, maybe we
should just drop them indicasion lye. Okay, you know, so
people know because it's in here, so it's legit, right,
Instead of condoms, will say jimmy hat. Okay, Frederick Killian

(15:10):
came up with the latext Jimmy hat. That's right. Uh.
I guess if you don't know what a condom is
at all, we should go ahead and say it is
h a tube, it's a bag like tube that the
male penis fits in, open on one end obviously and
closed on the other. There's a little reservoir tip to
collect the semen um, supposedly, and um, it's got a

(15:37):
little ring around the open end, a thin rim that
you uh that you roll down upon the penis, and
that is a condom and it it basically it blocks
fluids from touching each other, which is how you get
pregnant and how you get disease. Keeps all those fluids
separate right the the form of this, the basic concept

(16:00):
of the condom hasn't changed much over the eons, but
just these little advances and technology like making them latex.
Late tex is not porous, yes, Um, the only way
something's going to get through is if there's some sort
of damage to it or something like that. Um, the
condoms the same what you just described as generally been
in use for hundreds or thousands of years. Right, Yeah,

(16:21):
it's a barrier method. Um, these days there are I
don't think we should talk about all those standards because
my eyes started to water a little bit when I
was reading all those with the length of within the thickness. No, no,
we should talk about that. But later on all those
standards when it was just like really yeah, international codes.
There are international codes governing how they're made. Well, which

(16:42):
is good. I'm not knocking that, sure, it's just not exciting. Um.
So yeah, these days the length they are at least
six point three inches hundred and sixty millimeter. Uh well
you did the conversion. Well I think you kind of
have to say an inchest, don't you? But have you
noticed that how stuff works? Articles have gone my trick. Yeah,
now it's metric. The meat one, the lab ground meat one,

(17:05):
both in in metric. All right, Well, I don't know
what to say about that. What about the width? What
is the width of econom when lead flat fifty two
millimeters which I did not convert to inches, the thickness
is point zero seven millimeters. That's that's very thin, which,
like we said, that's what you want out of a condom.
You want something strong, but you don't want to ruin

(17:26):
the sexual experience by wearing a rubber glove. You know
what I'm saying, ubber glove to and keep the rubber
gloves on your hands. That's right. They powder these things
with things like silica and corn starch and magnesium carbonate
to keep the latex from sticking to itself in packaging,

(17:48):
or they can come loubed up with either regular lube
or made from silicone, or spermicidal lube, which this is
good to note now that I'm married, but I was
shown it on this back then. Apparently the spermocidal lubricants
can make things worse, specifically non oxidal nine. Yeah. It

(18:09):
says that they found that when used with a condom,
it doesn't really do much to kill sperm, and even worse,
it can cause vaginal irritation, which can lead to easier
disease transmission. Yeah, so that's apparently not a good thing
to use non oxid A nine on your condoms. Very
good to know. And that's not knocking in nine because

(18:29):
I think that's what's also you use outside of a condom,
right as as spermocidal right, so it's more effective there.
I guess, how about manufacturing on them? Chuck about it all.

(19:04):
It all starts um either in the forests of Brazil,
Southeast Asia, or West Africa, which is where you'll find
the rubber tree, which is still to this date where
latex comes from, unless it's synthetic latex of course, but
Let's say you're you're going the natural route, and um,
you go to Brazil and get you some SAP, which
again sap from uh latex or rubber tree is latex. Okay,

(19:29):
so you get that, you take it back to your factory, right,
that's right. Maybe in Brazil, maybe in Thailand, who knows?
Is that what they make these? Sure? Okay, I think
they make them pretty close to the rubber plantations. All
the pictures in this article are in like Thailand or
Brazil or whatever, and that's where you're gonna find rubber trees. Okay. Um, well,

(19:50):
it doesn't only contain latex. You're gonna probably have some
other ingredients in your bucket there of sap, well, yeah,
you added along the way. Yeah, antifungal and antibacterial compounds.
You want to keep the things clean. Zinc oxide, which
is accelerates the vulcanization process. UH, stabilizers like potassium laurate,

(20:11):
UM sulfur maybe which is another vulcanizing agent, ammonia anti coagulant.
I didn't know that. Yeah, it keeps things from coagulating really,
and UH other pigments and preservatives too, you know, because
you wanted to have that lovely fleshy look in strawberry flavoring. Well,
we'll get to that too. Um. So these add to

(20:34):
the shelf life. Um. They make it harder to break
down because rubbers biodegradable naturally, and you don't want it
to break down. That's what happened the old days, when
the easiest lubes, the natural rubber, would just break down.
Your condom wasn't worth much for long, right, um, and
Tracy points that this is a good reason why you
never want to throw a condom used or otherwise in
a toilet. That's not how you throw a condom away,

(20:56):
because it doesn't break down. It's just gonna gum things up.
It's gonna catch all the hair and toilet paper and
all that stuff and grow bigger and bigger and just
basically become this big giant condom damn in your sewer pipe.
That's right. So what do you do? Uh? You um,
wrap it in tissue paper, She suggests, wrap that tissue

(21:19):
paper in foil, put the foil in a five millimeter
thick black garbage bag, and bury it in your yard.
That's how you properly dispose of a used contom. That's
not true, but she does recommend the tissue and the
waste basket. Yeah, just not the toilet, or if you're
in New York City, just on the street or sidewalk,
just fine, in the back of your cab. Have you

(21:41):
ever noticed all the condoms on this There's a lot
of them out there. It's just it's a thing. It's
definitely a thing. If you live in New York you
know about it, or you can bet the tiles or something.
I just don't get it, Like, are these people having
sex in the street they throw them out of the apartment.
Maybe maybe that's what they're doing. That's gross, I know.
Could you imagine walking down the sidewalk after a nice dinner? Okay, alright,

(22:04):
So you've got the liquid latex goes in the vats,
and then you've got the formers, which have been around
for a while, and they are glass or ceramic molds
of a penis, and they're on a conveyor belt. Dip
it into the bat, get it, turn it and circle
to get a nice even coating and dry it out,
and then maybe a second or third dip to make

(22:26):
sure it's thick enough right, and then it's into the
tunnel oven for vulcanization. It has all of those, um,
those the zinc oxide and the sulfur in it to
help it vulcanize, so when it's exposed to heat, it
becomes stronger, that's right, right. Um. And then after that
I found this a little unsettling, Yeah, because I just
always thought of condoms is like untouched. It's like a

(22:48):
brand new newspaper, like you could deliver a baby with it,
you know. Um. But apparently after vulcanizing, the condoms are
taken off of the formers, right, um, and they are washed. Yeah,
you're so the condom you're you're you're using has been
washed before. I just to find the odd I guess
probably mechanically washed, right Yeah. It says a washing machine, um,

(23:10):
and invest to remove odor, pathogens and allergen. So it's
good that they're doing this, But I agree with you.
I kind of thought it was just like, you know,
it was made and packaged immediately, and then it goes
on your body, right exactly, Not quite so you you
wash it. And then there's quality testing, which is a
lot of pretty cool stuff. There's some there's some cool

(23:32):
quality tests. If you ask me, well, let's get into it.
Then well, there's a standard called zipping, popping, rolling, and
other condom testing. Yeah, what you're testing for is you
want to prevent three things that make a condom uh ineffective.
Breaking the condom not good, slipping off definitely not good,

(23:53):
and leaking. None of these are good because they are
uh you know, they're not preventing the one thing or
two things that you're trying to do, which is either
pregnancy or some sort of socially transmitted infection. Not You
notice that she's not STD anymore. It's s T I right,
I didn't know that. When did that happen? Maybe she

(24:14):
just made the change herself, you think, No, I think
I think it's I don't know because it maybe disease
doesn't quite scientifically capture all. I'm sure that's it. So yeah,
I don't know when that happened, but I'll bet it
was fairly recent. Um. So one of the two tests
that they're really looking at is you don't want it

(24:35):
to break and you don't want it to leak. Right, Yeah,
So they test the condoms tensile strength. Basically, they just
get a bunch of third graders in there and blow
the condoms up and see how much volume it holds
until it breaks. Right. Yeah, they're not third graders, but
that's pretty much the long and short of it. They
inflate them, they stretch them, um, they fill them with
water and hang them up. Yeah, I guess these are

(24:57):
they're testing um, either whole bad ches or selected condoms
from the batch. And yeah, they hold fill the water
and look at it. That's the that's the utter test.
Is that what it's called. Okay, I just made it up,
but I think it's good. I bet you. That's what
they call it on the line, and they're literally look
at it. Or else, if they want to be slightly
more scientific, they'll roll it along like water absorbent paper

(25:19):
and see if there's any water um and there shouldn't be.
Remember again, late text condoms don't have any kind of
pores um. And then there's another leaked test, which is
a lot more scientific or at least it's probably fun
or to do. I wonder how many factories use this
method if it's such supermodern or or what and it's

(25:40):
sartisfactories soon this there's also like third party companies that
like make their money by testing condoms for factories or
maybe as watched all groups. That's true. So how does
the electricity work? So there's a couple of different ones.
There's one where they take condoms and they they they
put them a top metal rods that have been dipped

(26:00):
in conductive solution, and then they run a current through
these metal rods and the the condoms being rubber, shouldn't
be conductive. But if there's holes or tears or anything,
and I'm like, the current will run through the condom
and then they have a computer watch to see, you know,
if any had a current run through. Then the other

(26:22):
one is where they turn the voltage up dry. Yeah,
this is a dry test um and they basically like
run a current again through a bunch of condoms and
if there's any holes or whatever, those condoms will like
burn or melt. It stinks, yeah, burn, Rubber doesn't smell good. Um.
So those are the main ways that they will test

(26:44):
condoms to make sure that you're all good to go
when it's go time. You know what I'm saying. Uh. Slippage, however,
something they cannot test for because slippage, my friend, is
up to you. How you properly or improperly used the
condom slippages user error. Yeah, and I'm ashamed to say that.
And we're about to go over the tin steps and

(27:06):
how to properly use a condom. I didn't know about
one of them, the circumcised step. Not well, I didn't
know about that. Well, what is it? Well, we'll get
to it. Um. So, Tracy says, a storage is where
it starts. You got up to store it properly. So, uh,
heat and light is not good. Wallets, pockets and glove compartments.

(27:28):
In other words, everywhere teenage boys forced to store their
condoms is not where you should store condom. You know,
it's all bad. You want to keep it in a
dry um just sort of room temperature like atmosphere, and
not at the roller rink. Look at number two. You
look at the package, make sure it's all you know, intact,

(27:50):
it's not opened, and it has the expiration date. You
know you're within that range. Yeah, and when you do
open it, you want to open it carefully. You want
to tear along the one side. Sometimes it's a notch.
Tracy points out that you don't want to open it
with your teeth or pointy fingernails. Yeah, you don't wanna
open your teeth for a couple of reasons, but one
of them is you don't want to break it right, Um,

(28:11):
you want to make sure the condom is right side up.
This is the one I didn't know. I didn't know
there was the right side sure, I didn't know that.
Oh well, Um, I saw almost forty two years old,
and I had no idea that there was an up
and a down. I know you're talking about, but there
is a way to tell, um what's up and what's down,
and the tip the reservoir should be pointing up unimpeded.

(28:34):
I had no idea that's the that's the top, right.
I'm just learning this. So you take that reservoir right
and you um, squeeze the air out of it, hold
it shut, class bit shot with your fingers, and put
it over the tip of the penis. We're doing this.
You realize this. We've suddenly become a sex side podcast.

(28:55):
Yeah you you miss though. If you are uncircumcised, you
want to gently pull your foreskin back to really of
the glands, right, okay, which is the tip of the penis.
Right okay, So you put the tip of the put
the condom over the tip of the penis. With the
reservoir squeezed shut and then you start to unroll it.
Take a chuck. That's number six. Um. She also pointed

(29:15):
out if you don't have it right side up, it
won't unroll correctly. That's why there is a top side
and the downside, which now explains a lot um unroll
the condom down. The length of the penis all the
way to the base. You gotta take it to the base.
You want it. You want full protection here. Um. Otherwise
because if you look, if you use a condom perfectly,

(29:36):
then we'll find out your chances of disease and pregnancy
are virtually nil. Yeah. Problems arises when you you know
you may be not roll it all the way down
or will accidentally get a testicle caught in there. Um.
If you need lube, UM, use a water based lube.
You don't want to make the mistake of using like vassiline.

(29:57):
I guess I should say petroleum jelly or baby oil
or lotions or anything like that, anything that could have patrol. Yeah,
that's all oil based and that's gonna not do you
any favors in the reliability department. Right, you want it
to be water based. Lubricant. That's right, But she also
points out that you using extra lubricant is effective in

(30:19):
preventing breakage during um anal penetration, but in vaginal penetration
it can actually increase the likelihood of breakage of the condom.
I did not know that. I did not know that either.
So we're learning right along with you people. Yeah, I'm
so glad to want to you sees anymore? Being married
is great. Uh So after the male ejaculates, this is

(30:42):
post coital ejaculation, you hope. Yeah, that's true. Um, you
want to hold the rim of the condom to keep
it from slipping off when you um exit the vagina
and withdraw the penis. Uh And and before the erection
is law Right, you don't want to have the condom

(31:03):
on lose your erection while you're still in mid penetration. Uh.
And then you want to run outdoors to begin the
disposal process, which, as we said, ends in the yard. Right.
That's right. Remove the condom, wrap it in a tissue,
put it in a garbage can, and don't reuse it.
No matter what your friend says, don't reuse it and

(31:23):
don't wear two of them. Yeah, a lot of people
have latex allergies, and of late condoms are latex. So
some people say, well, late text works the best. I'll
just use um a sheep skin membrane condom over my
penis and then put a latex one over that. Apparently
that is basically just really upping the risk of breakage

(31:45):
of both. Yeah. Or if you think you know two
is better than one, I don't know where this person
has been. That's just not smart. You should probably not
be with that person. If you're thinking about were two condoms,
just block away from the bowling alley and go home
or the roller rink again. Uh. And Tracy also points
out for our younger listeners, condoms break more often if

(32:08):
they're blown up or filled with water before use, So
don't use it as a toy and then use it
as a you know, disease preventer, right and if it breaks,
stop what you're doing, get a new one. Yeah. Yeah,
that's a that's a big one, because you don't want
to be like, oh, well I went through the first

(32:28):
couple of steps doing it. It was fine. Yeah, And
you know, if you're serious about this, then what you're
trying to do is prevent pregnancy or infection. You're gonna
want to replace it like it's worth if you used
it in the first place, then you might as well
stop for a second shot another one. All right, Um,
don't be a jerk, I guess is what you're saying. Seriously,

(32:48):
you're trying to prevent, like you said, pregnancy. Most people
are when they use condoms or um more than thirty
types of viruses or bacterial infections or parasites. Right, Yeah,
sex is dirty business. It certainly can be. I think
this proves that, um, there is a god. All right.

(33:10):
So you know all those diseases in bacteria for the
most part, do we need to go over those? Sure? Chlamydia, UH,
genital herpes, genital warts, gnarrhea, hepatitis B, HIV of course,
pubic lice, um, syphilis, trick omniasis. Yeah, yeast infections, these

(33:30):
and many more can all be yours if you don't
use a condom and you sleep with somebody who has
any of them. Yes, and genital warts and herpes and
pubic lice and a few other s. T i s
can still be yours even if you do use a condom,
because they are not passed through the fluids. They are
passed through skin and hair and other stuff down there

(33:51):
in that area. Um, so chuck, how effective our condoms,
like you said, when when you use them correctly, they work,
like they've been proven to work. Like we have come
to the pinnacle of mail um prophylaxis with the latex condom,

(34:14):
Like it totally works. If you use it correctly and
you use it every time, you're going to be fine. Uh.
And they know this by um by doing studies of
specifically sero discordant um couples, which means one couple as
HIV and weren't one person in the couple as HIV
the other partner doesn't. And they found that people who

(34:36):
used the condom correctly every time they had sex had
pretty much a nil chance or z chance of UM
contracting HIV by the end of this study. Yeah, that's
a two year period of these couples, so that there's
you know, a lot of sex going on. It wasn't
just like hey, you had sex one time and you
didn't get HIV. That's great, right, So good good study

(34:57):
from UNAIDS or un AIDS, right, which that makes sense. UNAIDS,
like they're fighting AIDS, they should be called un AIDS
is this United nation though, Um. And they found though
that couples that that didn't use them all the time,
just kind of here, they're at a fourteen to twenty
one percent chance of um contracting HIV during the study. Yeah,

(35:18):
and pregnancy prevention is pretty similar, um, over the course
of the year. And of course I don't see any
ages or anything like that, yere, It just says a woman.
But a woman using a condom over the course of
a year, who uses it perfectly for every act of
sexual intercourse with a man has only a three percent
chance of becoming pregnant. So nine effective. That's pretty good. Sure. Um,

(35:41):
if you use a condom typically, which is apparently not
that great, not that well, Um, and you're a woman,
you have twelve percent chance of an unplanned pregnancy. But
both of those beat not using anything at all, which
leads to an eight percent chance of getting pregnant over
the course of a year just by having sex. And

(36:03):
you mean, it doesn't say how many men or anything
like that, not many trips to the roller rink this entails,
So what year is it? So there's a lot of
roller rink sex going on. What got me started was
the idea of like a condom like in your pocket,
remember the condom ring in the genes or in your
wallet or whatever. Just associate that with the roller rink

(36:26):
and like kids with like half mustaches and like mullets
and stuff like that. So that's that's where the roller
rink reference came from. All right. So, um, some folks
say that, you know what, if you make condoms available
to my teenager, it's going to encourage them to have sex.
Um studies suggests that that is not the case. Um.

(36:46):
This one study observed over four thousand teenagers over an
eight year period, which is a pretty good study if
you ask me. By the end of the study, all
of the participants were sexually active, and the teenager who
use condoms during their first sexual encounter were not more
likely to have more partners than those who did not.

(37:07):
But the condom using teens were less likely to have
been diagnosed with gnorette or chlamydia. So this study at
least points out that it's not gonna encourage promiscuity, but
it will keep you from getting pregnant in disease. I think, um,
being in your teens encourages promiscuity. Yeah, you know, yeah,

(37:28):
And that's kind of the whole argument. It's like, are
they going to do it anyway? And if they are,
then make sure they have plenty of condoms. And other
people say, well, now they're not gonna do it anyway,
they just need to abstain, and condoms are like the
devil's temptation. I'm ready for for humanity to evolve more
in that realm. Like it made sense for for eighteen

(37:48):
year old males to be at like their peak of
sexual prowess and girls being able to get pregnant when
they were fourteen, you know, three years ago, when we
were living to thirty years old, it made sense. These days,
it's just like a cruel joke. Well, you know what's
interesting is we're actually going the other direction, like puberty
coming younger and younger. The average boy enters puberty and

(38:11):
I don't that this doesn't mean sexual maturation, but begins
puberty at like age seven or eight. Now that's crazy.
And see nowadays people are getting I'm not everyone, but
people are waiting longer in general to get married and
have a family, and it's getting harder and harder, uh,
for older people to get pregnant much less the man
who was, you know, starts the decline after eighteen years old.

(38:34):
You get married in your mid thirties, it's like, sorry,
you know, my best days were We're wasted right well,
which is ironic because by that time you can grow
a decent mustache, I know, you know, all right, So, um,
there's this whole thing associated with condoms. They are a
unique breed of product. You know, if you look at

(38:56):
them as a commodity, as a retail product, uh, then
they should be the same as candy or a toy
or you know, what have you. But something that these um,
these other products lack is what's called social marketing, which
is what makes condoms virtually unique. There is a there's
a great public interest in condoms being purchased and distributed

(39:20):
and easily gotten by everybody in the world, whether it's
for population control which is pretty sinister sounding um or
through disease prevention. But governments around the world invest heavily
in condoms, and by doing that, they basically just buy
a bunch of condoms and turn around and selimented discount. Yeah,

(39:42):
it's called social marketing. And the ideas that if they
don't want to make them free, although you know there
are plenty of places that give out condoms, um, but
they want to make them very cheap for those who
can't afford them, because the idea is that if you
pay for something, you're more likely to use it. Uh,
sort of like the co ed model. These kids who
pay for their textbooks instead of just giving them textbooks,

(40:05):
they're more likely to ease it. So I don't know
why I made that connection, but the same thing, well
it is, it's the exact same principle. You, Um, you
have some sort of ownership over something you've paid for. Yeah.
And Tracy said the rule of thumb is that a
year supply of condoms should cost no more than one
percent of the target countries per capita gross national product.
And I don't think that's just Tracy saying that either. Well,
now she didn't make that up. So um, there's uh,

(40:29):
the other aspect of it. There's buy part of one
part of social marketing is buying condoms and distributing them
for cheap um. And this is like federal government, national
government level stuff. Uh. And then the other side of
it is educating the public. Yeah, you got to wear them, yeah,
and you have to know how to wear them. We
could probably get some federal funding for this episode. If

(40:50):
you ask about little kickback. You have to know how
to wear them, You have to know what they do,
you have to know why to wear it, why you
should wear them. Um, you should be able to explain
it in plain simple terms to anybody who who who
is riding a bus that if they don't wear a condom,
they can die, or their junk can fall off, or
there's all sorts of terrible stuff that can happen to
you if you don't wear a condom. Right, Yeah, And

(41:13):
it's been pretty successful in countries like Thailand where they
have a big commercial sex industry. UM. In nineteen eighty
nine they started a campaign for commercial sex workers to
use condoms of the time, always use them and pretty
amazing results. UM. In nineteen eighty nine, before the campaign,

(41:33):
fourteen percent of the sex workers had consistently used condoms.
By just five years later used condoms and uh not. Coincidentally, UM,
s t I cases diagnosed among sex workers fell from
four over four hundred thousand per year to just under
thirty thousand per year. That's a huge, huge drop off. Yeah,

(41:57):
just use the condom. That's all you gotta do. And
the rest of the world watched Thailand, their jaws fell open,
so they started buying condoms like crazy. So like in
two thousand, for example, UM, South Africa bought two d
and fifty million condoms to million condoms Botswana perchas twelve million,

(42:18):
UM four hundred and fifty million condoms in India. UM.

(42:48):
So this is um, this is a ton of condoms
we're talking about. That was just two thousand, right, many
tons of condoms. Right. Apparently the condom industry, which is
just love and this social marketing stuff UM, is producing
between eight and twelve billion condoms a year, right, Apparently

(43:08):
we would need fifteen billion to effectively cover everybody for
a year. Yea, every everybody is sexually active, you would
need fifteen billion condoms. So they're close but not close enough. Right.
That means everybody in the world does it more than
twice a year, because there's like six billion people on

(43:32):
the planet. Right. Uh well yeah, I mean if you
want to average out like that, right, I think a
lot of people aren't a lot of people are doing
it more, right, but sure if you want to throw
an average on it. Um. The thing is is, so
we're we're short of condoms, which is mind boggling. There's
only sixty factories on the planet making condoms for the
whole world, So when you look at it like that,
it's pretty impressive. But apparently the condom industry is stepping

(43:54):
up the call and by is projected to have to
produce twenty five billion condoms. There you go. Uh, first,
that's a six billion dollar industry. That's good, But what's crazy?
That's a six billion dollar industry. Los Angeles County from
porn makes one six of the equivalent of the entire
condom industries money in porn, in just porn. Yeah, in

(44:17):
just that one county. Yeah. See how everything is connected?
I do. Uh. So here in the United States, Uh,
the f d A controls something called good manufacturing practices,
uh rules and standards for making drugs and things like condoms.
So the f d A is is has standards. There

(44:39):
are also international standards, the International Organization for Standardization. UM,
they have their own standards that covered these medical devices,
and they have silly numbers attached to them, but that
really means nothing to anyone, does it. Well, In case
you ever wanted to know, I s O four oh
seven four colon two zero zero two is the international

(45:00):
standard for condom manufacture and distribution. That's right, And we're
talking about standards. We're talking about acceptable levels of condoms
that are defective per batch UM credit. I would imagine
the average consumers like zero. That'd be nice um accreditation.
For labs that test these procedures material shelf life stability,

(45:25):
they're just making sure all that is up to snuff UM.
And again, as we said, they're the the standards are
in this manual called zapping, popping, rolling, and other condom
testing tools that bear repeating um. Condoms used to be
they're a little more acceptable to buy these days. Shouldn't
be embarrassed to walk into your grocery store by condoms,

(45:48):
said the forty one year old, exactly. But it's not
in that way for everyone. It's not in that way
for every group because they are taboo UM. In some
religions UM. Catholicism uh fame Slee does not allow the
use of contraception. Orthodox Judaism, apparently Islam does allow it
if you are married heterosexuals, hed heterosexuals, and you have

(46:15):
reason to prevent pregnancy, and then UM. Conservative Christian groups
have long promoted abstinence rather than the use of condoms,
and sometimes even fought the education and distribution of condoms
for reasons we said earlier, like they think it makes
their children promiscuous and they will want to have sex
because they now have this condom. That is the key

(46:38):
to them wanting to have sex. And it's not to
the government to carry out population control exactly. UM In
Nevada has been mandatory to use condoms if you are
in a brothel, so highly regulated UM sex industry there, Nevada, Nevada, Nevada.
Excuse me, so Josh who uses condoms? Uh, everybody who

(47:03):
can get their hands on them apparently uses condoms. Um.
The u N says that two thirds of the world
has already and available access ready and easy access to condoms, right,
and they actually created a definition. You have to I'd
love the u N. You know, ready and easy access
to condoms mean you have to spend less than two

(47:24):
hours a month buying condoms. So I guess like taking
a bus in a town or something like that. If
you live in the middle of nowhere and Africa, it
might take a while to get a condom. So this
distribution net of condoms needs to be pretty uh, pretty wide,
pretty um woven well woven. Yeah, and then UM, you

(47:45):
also don't want to pay more than one percent of
a person's monthly take home pay wherever they live. That's right.
So when the U n is in the world is
trying to distribute these and make them available, those are
the criteria they look for, or as far as like
what they're going to charge people maybe in one of
these less developed countries, right, Um, And they we found

(48:07):
that because of efforts like this, condom use around the
world has increased. Apparently, prior to the eighties, UM, evaluations
of condom usage has just been like married couples. I
don't understand why. Um, Apparently things were there was maybe
tawdry or something, who knows, but Um. The Brits went

(48:29):
ahead and did a survey in nineteen fifty and found
that UM for their first sexual encounter of men and
women used a condom by about sixty did right, So
there's definite increasing condoms condom usage. Um. They found that
people who live with their partners typically use condoms less

(48:52):
Um people who makes sense. I guess the older you are,
the less you would be, the less likely you would
be to use condoms, probably because you're in a long
term monogamous relationship, right. Uh. And then um, people with
latex allergies tend to not use condoms. Yeah. And these
were studies from Europe mainly, but I imagine it's pretty

(49:14):
similar in other parts of the world. Yeah, but hearteningly
people UM in Netherlands, France, Belgium, and Britain. They found
that the more partners of person had, the more likely
they were to use condoms. To use a Jimmy hat
a French letter, French letter. I don't even know if
that one is all right. There are female condoms um
that are fairly new, um when when they come around Switzerland,

(49:42):
approved here in the United States. And and uh it
is a um paul yourthane sheath sort of like the
male condom, except it's just it's got two rings, one
on either end, one a little smaller on one end,
and that it fits in the woman's vagina, and it
sort of is just like a reverse of what the

(50:02):
male condom is. Um. They some of the benefits as
a woman can put this in um beforehand, whereas a
man obviously has has to be go time, has to
have the erect penis, right exactly like the woman can
insert this anytime anytime. UM. Well, I'm sure they are,
you know, recommendations for how long that you use this

(50:23):
thing as well. Um. But it is another barrier method
that protects against HIV and pregnancy and they tend to
be reusable yep. Because it's poly erethane, you can use
oil based lubricants. Yep. Um. And also in places where
it's difficult or impossible because of social norms for a
woman to insist that the guy wear a condom. Um,

(50:48):
this is very useful because it's it's given control of
who uses the condom win to the woman. Um. It
is more expensive, which is one of the disadvantages and
um that could lead some people in developing nations to
wash it and reuse it, which is not recommended. Um.
And apparently in in trials clinical trials, it's slightly less

(51:11):
effective at preventing pregnancy and s t i S than
male condoms. But it's way way, way better than nothing obviously. Um.
What else do we have? We have? Uh, spray on condoms? Yeah,
sort of, not yet, they're in they're still being toyed
with apparently. Yeah. This guy named I can't remember his

(51:36):
first name. His last name is Kraus. He's a sex
educator from Germany. Um and he apparently had trouble finding
condoms that fit him when he was younger, a younger man.
He's thirty. Now, I get the idea that he was small. Oh,
I got the idea the opposite idea. I don't know,
because later in the article he talked about being small

(51:57):
and like, I want to make condoms for smaller guy?
Is because oh I missed that part. Yeah, um, well,
it's funny new ideas to have a range of sizes,
like six sizes. The markets wide open for small condoms.
Apparently traj And tried it a few years ago and
like this continued him almost immediately because they didn't sell
any condoms for the smaller man or something. Right, Yeah,

(52:18):
although magnum condoms like have seventent of the market share,
they're like fifteen percent bigger than normal condoms. Yeah, and
and Cross's uh, his theory is that guys that are
smaller don't want to walk into a store and buy
the small condoms, so he wants to. I mean, he's
he's working on the spray on condom, but he's also
working on different sizes that I think are a little

(52:39):
more Um, the packaging is a little less obvious, you know,
it's not like you don't walk up and by like
the teeny leany Well, he originally, you know, I think
he wants to make it a little more clandestine. He
originally set up this website, which is pretty cool, um,
where you can download this measuring tape that you print
out news and then you enter in your dimensions in

(53:03):
the website and it brings up all of the condoms
for sail in Germany that are likeliest to fit you best.
This is pretty cool. Yeah. But now he's created the
spray on condom. Yeah, here's how this thing works. You
put your penis in a tube and its sprays from
many different directions the condom latex onto your penis, your

(53:26):
erect penis and um. Then it has to dry, which
is one of the problems that it hisses when it sprays,
So some dudes are worried that might ruin the mood. Um.
Some guys were a little worried about putting their penis
in this tube. Period and then um liquid latex takes
about two to three minutes to vulcanize and in order

(53:47):
for people to buy these things. He thinks it's gonna
have to be ready in like five to ten seconds.
So because it's like you better learn how to juggle
or something to like keep the interest going for those
couple of minutes. Is that what does it juggling? Juggling
or I don't know, maybe making an omelet. And then
there are the anti rape condoms, which are controversial to

(54:09):
say the least. A South African doctor came up with these,
and they are like the female condom, but it's also like, um,
I hate to say it, but like the closest analogy
is like a Chinese finger trap. Yeah, like that, once
the totalist goes in, there's these plastic teeth that hold
it in place, and only a doctor can remove this

(54:32):
basically giant female condom that's now attached to your penis.
And the reason she came up with this was because
rape in South Africa is um out of control. Some
survey from two thousand nine found that one in four
South African men admit to raping a woman and that
they think possibly one point four million women are raped
in South Africa every year. That's the population of Phoenix.

(54:55):
So this woman came up with this. It's basically like
the female condom that will immediately inflict pain on the rapist.
The woman can, I guess, get away, but the man
stuck with this on right, and he has to go
to the emergency room where hopefully the police will be
there to arrest him. Well, the woman doesn't necessarily get away,

(55:16):
which is one of the pitfalls that she admits to.
It could encourage a violence against the woman in the
moment um and another person from the c D c
UH says that it's also a form of enslavement. It's
um a constant reminder of a woman's vulnerability, um, and

(55:37):
it gives them also a false sense of security. But
the psychological trauma of the rape is still there. But
at least you're going to catch the guy. Is just
their rationale. And um, when people say that have told
her this is a medieval thing that you're coming up with,
she says, so is rape. So put that in your
pipe and smoke it. Yeah, and that thing is called

(55:59):
the rape act. Are a p hyphen a x E.
And I believe it's right backs dot com maybe or
something that takes you to the website. But if you
type in rate backs into your search browser. That's gonna
bring that up. Great, what else, Chuck, I don't have
anything else. You don't want to talk about the goat condom?

(56:19):
That's population control man, all right, let's talk about it
like we are goats. To some people. There's a something
called an oh lore that. Um it's basically this impediment
that hangs from the abdomen of a male goat that
keeps him from um, it's a barrier to prevent him
from penetrating the female during intercourse, right, And they use

(56:41):
this to control goat populations so that they don't starve.
And it's not a you know, it's not something that
goes on the penis. I think it's just a physical barrier,
right that just like a male goat chastity belt that
the goat knocks into called an olar. So thanks, thank

(57:01):
God for that. Yeah, it's good though I'm crack wise,
but better than starving goats. That is condoms. Well done,
well done to YouTube, not much giggling. I wonder how
many times we said penis paenis a bunch more than
we ever have in a conversation. I would say I

(57:24):
would say that's probably fairly accurate. I wonder if we
topped that Sara Lives gets use of penis remember at
the Nudist Camp. Oh yeah, with Kevin Nelon and Mike Myers.
And that's great. Uh, let's see. If you want to
know more about condoms, you can find this very thorough
comprehensive article on the subject. By typing condom into the
search bar how stuff works dot Com. You can also

(57:47):
type in sex and reproduction and it'll bring up a
lot of really good, well written, well researched articles that
will probably answer a lot of questions you might have
about that kind of thing. Yeah, I think we should
start peppering these throughout. Do a little more sex ed
here and there. Okay, it's good. Um you well, since
we said sex said, since Chuck said sex said, you

(58:08):
know what that means. You know what that means. It's
time for listener mail. All right. UM, I'm gonna call
this music experiment. Um, you guys are awesome. Been listening
since about two thousand ten. Just listen to why does
music provoke emotion? I thought I would share an experiment
that I did a few years ago. I came up
with the idea of listening to my music in sequential

(58:28):
order by year of release. Remember this guy, Yeah, it's
pretty cool. I don't have his name now I feel awful. Um.
I started dividing it up by five years, and each
five year period took about one and a half to
two weeks. So he's basically only listening to that era
in order, one at a time. So like the fifth
week of September ninety two, which never existed like that,

(58:54):
you well, just in order, like I'm listening to the
nineteen fifties music for this week. So the whole thing,
uh ended up taking about three and a half months,
which is much longer than I planned. I'm a big
music guy, and I started at around pre nineteen fifties.
I should note that while I did this, I did
my best to isolate myself musically. What is listening to
anything else that wasn't from that period that I was

(59:16):
in that week? It's kind of cool. I ended up
being one of the most rewarding experience I've had in
a long time. Aside from noticing many new things and
songs that I had listened to countless times before, I
feel like I began forming a connection with the time
period of the music I was listening to. Even when
I was wearing right now. At times, I could almost
feel the angst or even excitement of events long past,

(59:39):
as if I had lived them, events that weren't necessarily
mentioned or addressed in the songs themselves. By the time
I was done, I felt like I had traveled through time.
I had a strange connection with events I had never experienced,
except through the music that was popular at the time
of those events. Many things that didn't make much sense
to me musically, all of a sudden had a different significance.

(01:00:00):
So thanks for the work guys. Definitely makes my drive
to work a much more enjoyable. Thanks again, And I
wish I had your name. Well, we'll read it if
you send it in nice Okay, Yeah, so sorry Gary
or Billy or Johnny or fred cole cole Um. Let's see,
we don't want people's condom stories too, Yeah do we?

(01:00:20):
Of course we do. It seems like a bad idea.
I think it's a great idea. Well then you guys
for guys, we want your condom stories. Ladies, we want
your condom stories. Okay, if you live in New York
City and you can explain that's a good one of
the condoms on the street inside walk, Although what's there
to explain really well, I mean where they come from.
Maybe they're coming up from the sewer when Oh, that's

(01:00:40):
a good idea. Maybe they are, or or maybe they're
being tossed out of cabs. Maybe they're from the roller rink. Anyway,
if you want to get in touch with us, you
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(01:01:05):
other topics, visit how Stuff Works dot com. H