In this video, Mike Domitrz answers a university student’s question about whether a partner’s removal of a condom during intercourse constitutes assault. He explains that consent is act‑specific: agreeing to protected sex does not automatically include consent to unprotected sex. Removing the condom without the other person’s agreement changes the parameters of the encounter, making it non‑consensual and, under most legal definitions, a form of sexual assault. Mike emphasizes the importance of teaching consent as a mutual, ongoing agreement about the exact nature of the sexual act, and notes that while legal outcomes can vary, lack of consent should be treated as assault. He also references Kate Villa’s expertise, acknowledges legal uncertainty, and promotes the Date Safe Project’s ongoing “Students’ Questions” video series aimed at educating the public on consent.
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The question we are going to answer today is, Mike, if I'm in the middle of sex with a guy and he takes his condom off, is that assault? So the students at our Can I Kiss You shows can text in— actually what they're doing is they're on their phone, they can ask questions of me. that I can then see and be able to answer, and that's what we're making the videos out of here. This is from an actual student at the university level. The question we are going to answer today is, Mike, if I'm in the middle of sex with a guy and he takes his condom off, is that assault? Now, for those of you watching, I want you to think about this, and I'd love you to put your comments down there. Once again, the question is, if I'm in the middle of sex with a guy And he takes off his condom, is that assault? This is a very interesting question and it's one that has been asked lately in the last few years more often than past years because people are starting to realize what consent means. See, if I consent to a certain sexual act under certain circumstances, that doesn't mean I consent for other sexual acts or a different version of that sexual act. It means that I consent for that sexual act. And therefore, if you consented to have sex with this person with the understanding they would be wearing a condom, that was part of the consent. Like, yes, I agree to protective sex with you. But then they take the condom off and it's not protective sex anymore. That was not what you consented to. So this is absolutely a problem. This is why consent needs to be taught. I on such more of a thorough way than it is currently. People nowadays mistakenly think, hey, once they say yes, I can do whatever I want and I've got consent. No, that's not the idea of what consent means. Consent means that you mutually want to experience this. You both agree to this. Therefore, if somebody changes the parameters of the agreement, then we do not have the same consensual agreement. And this is really important for people to understand. And I love that we have so many people jumping in on this. For those of you just jumping in, the question the student asked was, if I'm having sex with a guy and he takes off his condom, is it assault? Now, you notice I have not said if it's assault or not assault. What I've been referring to is the consensual side of this. And if you don't have consent, then that would be a form of sexual violence. As Kate Villa said there, by description it sounds like assault. Because you did not consent to that. You consented to protected sex. Now, some of you are going, Mike, isn't that almost getting too pickier? No. Let me explain. If you said, I consent to sexual intercourse, and then the person tries anal sex on you, that's— everybody knows that's not okay. They're like, wait, you did not consent to anal sex. You consented to sexual intercourse. So, if you consent to protected sex, That doesn't mean you consent to unprotected sex with the same person at all. So this is really important to teach, that consent means you two agree to specifically what is happening. That's critically important. And to know that when you agree to what's critically— to what's actually happening, what's detailed in what we're doing, they don't have the right to change the parameters without you agreeing to it. Agreement needs to be mutual. This is super important in teaching consent. So, I'm so glad this student asked about that. If you agree to protected sex, in other words, you agree to have sex with this person wearing a condom and they take the condom off during sex, you didn't agree to that. And so, that is not consensual because you didn't agree to that, right? Mutual agreement. I'm going to stress that phrase again, mutual agreement. So if you have thoughts on this, put this in the comments because we'll keep this conversation going for a few minutes. We saw Kate V jump in right away and say this is assault, and Kate V works in this area for the U.S. military, so I appreciate that perspective. And I'm more so than focusing on whether it's assault or not, and the reason some of you might be wondering, Mike, why aren't you talking more about the word assault versus consent, was because unfortunately I can't guarantee you Legally, how some people in the legal community will treat this. It's been treated differently, unfortunately. I can't promise you how a judge would treat this, how a jury would treat this, but I can talk about what it means to consent with this exact situation of somebody removing the condom after you consented to protected sex, and then they suddenly remove the condom. That's all about a lack of consent, and legally, lack of consent should absolutely mean that if something occurred without consent, you have sexual assault. That's what we're describing here, and that's what the student asked in this question. So let's really make sure that we're teaching everybody consent means that you agree to what is exactly taking place, not other versions of it, not actually the opposite, right? Protected sex and unprotected sex is very opposite in agreement. Hey, I agree to you wearing a condom and us doing this. The key there was a condom was involved. If the condom's not involved, I wouldn't have agreed. Therefore, this is not consensual. So that is today's question. We're going to be trying to bring you questions throughout every week for the next couple of months. We're going to try to give you a different question of maybe up to 3 to 5 times a week. So I hope you keep tuning in, watching these questions. We're also going to have this as a series on our YouTube page. In fact, this video will soon be on YouTube within probably a half hour, and you're going to see a series there. Called Students' Questions. Our YouTube page is youtube.com/datesafeproject. We'd love for you to subscribe to that page because then every time I make one of these videos, you'll be notified and you can see the video. Once again, I'm going to answer actual questions every time I do one of these videos from students. We get just multitudes of questions after each presentation. So that's what we're going to do, and we're going to turn this into a video series so you can share this with others And help others get these answers. This was an important question that we start off with that this student asked.
