Study: Women judged for carrying condoms, men called ‘prepared’
A new national study of Australian women has found a stark double standard in how condom-carrying is judged by gender.
When women were asked what it means when another woman carries condoms, the two most common answers were about her sexual conduct: 45.4% said she is planning to have sex, and 38.6% said she sleeps around. The most common answer about a man carrying condoms? “Is prepared” — at 43.9%.
The findings come from the 2026 Moments Sexual Wellness Study, which surveyed 1,111 Australian women aged 18–45.
The stigma moved indoors
Sex educator Eleanor Hadley said the problem has shifted rather than disappeared.
“The stigma [around condoms] didn’t dissolve. It relocated,” Hadley said. “We’ve spent a decade making the public part of this easier – better shelf placement, self-checkouts, more open conversation – and by our own tracking, buying condoms has genuinely got easier. But nobody was working on the private part. That’s where it has settled, and that’s where women are now paying for it.”
The study found that while more women felt comfortable buying condoms than 10 years ago, feelings of judgement for carrying them have gotten worse.
Women hide, disguise or abandon purchases
Three in four Australian women have hidden, disguised or abandoned a condom purchase. The study found that “Other respondents had waited until a shop was quiet, bought online to avoid buying in person, asked somebody else to buy, or gone somewhere they were less likely to be known.”
Some women have abandoned the purchase altogether. This has prompted condom brands like Moments Wellness to offer discreet condom deliveries and subscriptions.
Two-thirds of Australian women have gone without a condom because neither person had one.
How the judgement breaks down
| What carrying condoms signals | About women | About men |
|---|---|---|
| Planning to have sex | 45.4% | not reported |
| Sleeps around | 38.6% | not reported |
| Is prepared | not reported | 43.9% |
The contrast is stark. A woman with a condom is read as sexually active or promiscuous; a man with one is read as sensible.
“The stigma [around condoms] didn’t dissolve. It relocated.”
The private part
The study found that Australian women aged 18–45 are still uncomfortable buying or carrying condoms. Even throwing a pack into regular groceries carries an overwhelming feeling of judgement.
Women typically respond by hiding condoms via self-checkout, disguising them within other items, or buying at quiet times and unfamiliar shops.
Moments Wellness frames the goal plainly: “A condom should be able to sit beside coffee, deodorant or lip balm without recruiting the rest of the basket as cover.”
The study notes that carrying behaviour, partner response and responsibility were measured for the first time in 2026, so there is no prior comparison for those metrics. The 2026 wave was also fielded by a different provider than the 2017 and 2021 waves.
The hope, as the study’s backers put it, is that projects like the Moments Sexual Health Study can help normalise being assertive with one’s own sexual health — for women as much as men.
The stigma didn’t dissolve. It just found a new place to live.
Source: mashable.com
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