This Valentine’s Day, Whitman wasn’t just being safe in the bedroom, but out in the environment. Condom Bouquets, paper flowers, adorned with condoms and dental dams and crafted with meticulous care by Planned Parenthood Generation Action club, are to thank.

However, not everyone understands the environmental importance of this effort. To the people who hear the word “condom” and panic, you must not only have a distaste for safe sex, but a hatred for the environment … and the bees. 

Think about those innocent striped pollinators whose survival depends on flowers. Yet, here you are, ripping flowers out of the ground, wrapping them in cellophane and chucking them into a glass vase. Now, look what you did – the bees are dying … and marine life.

Think about all the plastic wrapping being tossed into the ocean from the cellophane trapping the bouquet of flowers you bought at Safeway. Think about how effortless you left them on the street, practically handing them off to the wind to be carried into the sea to suffocate innocent sea creatures. 

Condoms, on the hand, have practically no risk of being littered because people don’t want to be caught with them. Thanks to the societal expectations of shaming people for talking, thinking or engaging in sexual discourse, people take meticulous care of throwing away their condoms

Finally, there’s climate change. If you bought Condom Bouquets this year, you are personally responsible for being a hero of climate change, of supporting a process that emits fewer greenhouse gasses than the process of making traditional bouquets of flowers. This is especially true because more condoms result in fewer pregnancies, and therefore, less people leave carbon footprints.

To the Condom Bouquet haters out there, it’s time to shift that perspective and recognize that protecting oneself and the planet can go hand in hand, or rather, hand in … well, you get the idea.

Editor’s Note: Meghan Kearney do be the PPGA Co-president <3