According to Obama, if a behavior is socially stigmatized, you get more of it. If a behavior is accepted and approved by society, you get less of it.
In a statement reflecting on the 35th anniversary of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s “report on what would later be understood as the first documented case of AIDS,” President Barack Obama said Sunday that “stigma and silence” “foster transmission” of the virus, which is most often spread through men having sex with men, according to the CDC.
“We’ve learned that stigma and silence don’t just fuel ignorance, they foster transmission and give life to a plague,” Obama said. “We’ve seen that testing, treatment, education, and acceptance can not only save and extend lives, but fight the discrimination that halted progress for too long.
I am just barely old enough to remember at the start of the AIDS epidemic when WFB suggested that people who have AIDS should be marked as a warning to potential partners. He was attacked as a bigot. Fast-Forward to the 2010’s and hiv positive gay men proudly sport biohazard tattoos to strut their status, and there are entire websites devoted to celebrating and promoting HIV transmission.
Does this sound like “stigma” to you?
The whole “bug-chasing” thing is kind of fascinating if you’re into deviant psychology. I feel like it all started because HIV positive men still wanted to get laid, so they created this whole thing about how sexy and authentically ghey it was to have HIV.
Think of it as analogous to the seen in ‘Billy Madison’ where Adam Sandler wets his pants and tells all the kids, ‘It’s the coolest!’ Originally, he does it to take away the stigma of pants-wetting so that a kid who wet his pants doesn’t feel bad about it. The result is that all the kids then wet their pants because Adam Sandler convinced them that it’s cool.
And, of course, there’s this whole “Domination/Submission” dynamic that a lot of gays find erotic. Not to mention, becoming HIV positive makes one an instant “Victim-Hero” in a culture that celebrates self-inflicted victimhood.
Dinesh D’ Souza wrote of his early years on the campus of Dartmouth, which was the breeding ground for today’s conservatism (The Dartmouth Review). Speaking of the politically incorrect atmosphere and a professor (Hart) he had, and a contest:
“In part because of his political incorrectness, Hart was one of the few people I have met whose jokes made people laugh out loud. His sense of humor can be illustrated by a contest that National Review privately held among its editors following the publication of the controversial Bill Buckley column on the issue of AIDS. People were debating whether AIDS victims should be quarantined as syphilis victims had in the past. Buckley said no: The solution was to have a small tattoo on their rear ends to warn potential partners. Buckley’s suggestion caused a bit of a public stir, but the folks at national Review were animated by a different question: What should the tattoo say? A contest was held, and when the entries were reviewed, the winner by unanimous consent was Hart. He suggested the lines emblazoned on the gates to Dante’s Inferno: ‘Abandon all hope, ye who enter here’.” (Letters to a Young Conservative, Dinesh D’ Souza).
More people are having unsafe sex because of the drugs that are available (Prep, etc). On one hand, these advances have benefits, but on the other, they also portray a false sense of security and contribute to more careless behaviours. People in their 20s can’t remember when HIV/AIDS was a death sentence, so as a society we start to revert back to the mentality before it first hit.
The only winners in this are the pharmaceutical companies.
As well as your pals on the Islamic terrorist front, since both AIDS and Islam are both designed to kill gays.
*Drops mic*
Regards,
Peter H.
Don’t let the mic fall on your head.
Or maybe it already has.
Another martini?
Thank you for sharing a link to this hour long grilling of Mr. Ralph Nader. Although we have much differences and disagreements with Mr. Nader, politically, he is well respected here. And I listened as he was courteously grilled for answers to things that are way more important today then the Corvair. TA…thanks again.
Really, Cinesnatch – what in the hell are you talking about?
Regards,
Peter H.
Straight liberal men don’t usually understand the in’s/out’s of “gay culture”, which can’t be seen as being either liberal or conservative. I’ve always found it to be half & half, in that reckless sexual behavior is accepted by some & not by others. As far as HIV is concerned, there have always been, since the 80’s, those that willfully ignore the dangers & those that put others at risk. There can be & are, as you’ve informed, sites that promote pride in being infected as if HIV is something that joyfully is embraced as a component of identity with some gays. This would be just a new tactic by those that put others at risk. A rationalization. There is indeed the other side of the coin, where those that put others at risk are risking intense personal harm &/or legal indictment. All of which the Liberal establishment is blind too as they make sucking sounds in agreement with Leftist gays.
Tattoos that represent living with HIV are one way that some people living with the virus have chosen to identify one another and find self-acceptance, CNN reports. Tattooing HIV/AIDS-related symbols, such as the biohazard symbol and the AIDS ribbon, is more common among men who have sex with men (MSM). In 2009, MSM accounted for 61 percent of new HIV cases. HIV/AIDS-related tattoos, which perhaps first emerged as an act of defiance against conservative figures advocating that all people diagnosed with HIV be branded with visible tattoos, today can signal HIV status to potential partners or might provide a signal of solidarity with others living with HIV.
https://www.poz.com/article/tattoos-HIV-acceptance-20982-7286
“becoming HIV positive makes one an instant “Victim-Hero” in a culture that celebrates self-inflicted victimhood.’
Yup, yup and yup… Liberals call me names because I refuse to be a victim.
I graduated from HS in 1979.. I was out and about when AIDS first hit. I changed my behavior even before they knew what was causing it. It really didn’t take too much “thinking” to realize that sexual behavior could be one of the sources, a big could be. Most of those “forward thinking” gay men that were part of my social circle at the time REFUSED to stop their behaviors. Most of them died.
I was fortunate enough to meet the man of my dreams in 1982. Shortly before I met him, I visited a friend who had moved to DC. He thought it would be fun to take me to a leather bar with a very active backroom. There was not a condom in sight. I was appalled. On my trip back home (to Maine), I knew that I had to leave that lifestyle behind me.
It wasn’t stigma (or lack of it) that made me change my lifestyle. It was the taking responsibility for my own life that allowed me to change. 34 years later, I am with the same guy.
Unfortunately, with the rise of PrEP, many gay men think it’s a magic pill that will keep them from being infected no matter what they do, in much the same way that women think a birth control pill will always keep them from getting pregnant.
I am a year older than you TNN. Early on I think in 1982 my uncle, who at the time was chief of staff at a local hospital here in New Orleans, took me aside and told me that he was quite confident AIDS (which I think was called GRID at that time) would be found to be transmitted by bodily fluids. There were no known cases in New Orleans at that time, but I believed my uncle. I repeated his theory at a meeting of the gay group at my university which met with mixed reactions. Anyway, owing to my uncle’s dire warnings, I became practically celibate until I too met the man of my dreams. It was 1984 and he was completing his residency here. We have been together 31 years and God willing hope to have many more.
When testing became available I, by the grace of God, was negative. Many friends died, most having been infected before they even knew there was a virus called HIV. In 1982 this was unknown to my uncle as well, but his words chill me still to this day. He said “DAVY, IF YOU GET THIS, YOU WILL DIE”.
Today, there is no excuse for new HIV infections particularly in gay men. All the facts are out there.
Thanks Rusty.
Keep up, you’re sounding like an old codger. And, we know you’re not old.
I may not be old, but you sure are senile, Cinesnatch.
Regards,
Peter H.
Good, then keep up.
Well, that’s one thing wrong with health insurance – contracting an infection deliberately and then passing the cost of the meds along to other policy holders.
I have no idea how many bug chasers there are but they should, at least, pay for their own pills.
They can also collect social security disability and lay about all day while you work.
What I think is even crazier is TRUVADA Prep being used to replace condoms while it is hard on the kidneys/liver and doesn’t prevent anything other than aids. There is resistant gonorrhea going around. Prep costs $1500+ per person picked up by taxpayers or other peoples insurance premiums. In a decade we will see a bunch of queens with kidney/liver failure.
There is also a significant risk of gays becoming spreaders of ZIKA, & lets not forget the Post Hurricane Sandy gay Meningitis outbreak tracked back to one NYC bathhouse. Chagas is called Mexican AIDS and we are going to have to deal with it if we don’t close the border. Last week a Honduran woman flew into the US to squat out a ZIKA anchor baby to be on the taxpayers expense for life, she knew before she left about cranial deformities and now the US taxpayer will care for it .
” The solution was to have a small tattoo on their rear ends to warn potential partners”
Actually that could have saved a bunch of lives if it happened. I knew guys who had visited boyfriends at the hospital on protective isolation for their low T count but the BFs still lied to them about why they were there.
“Today, there is no excuse for new HIV infections particularly in gay men. All the facts are out there.”
Yup.. Yup and yup.
Another issue that hasn’t been touched on: Ask any “HIV educator” why some gay men engage in promiscuous barebacking, and you’ll get a standard boilerplate response: It’s because of low self-esteem caused by HOMOPHOBIA!! Or it’s because of “bad decision making” as a result of being drunk or high. Or it’s “condom fatigue.” Or it’s “survivor guilt.”
The factor that doesn’t get much discussion: Lots of video pr0n depicts either actual bareback sex, or “simulated” barebacking (the performers in fact use condoms, but careful editing and camera angles help to sell the idea that they’re having “spontaneous” sex without condoms — never mind the reality that the “spontaneous” sex was preceded by several off-camera enemas).
And lots of written erotica tells gay men that you can TOTALLY feel a stud’s hot creamy load gushing inside you like a volcanic eruption, even though we’re generally talking about less than 2 teaspoons of body-temperature fluid with lower “muzzle velocity” than a dollar-store squirtgun.
In short, gay men MARKET high-risk sex to other gay men. But the conventional wisdom is that even though cigarette smoking or homophobic jokes in Hollywood films are apt to cause “imitative behavior,” the Monkey See Monkey Do principle somehow doesn’t apply if two good-looking muscular men are having sex without a condom.
R20, HIV would be a particular risk for gay men whether some were especially promiscuous or not. Most gay men have protected sex most of the time, more than straights do. But it’s just a fact that anal sex is a lot more transmissive, because the epithelial walls of the rectum are thinner and tear easier than the walls of the vagina. In order to be as low risk for HIV transmission as straights, gay men would need to be VASTLY more careful in having safe sex as straights. It’s unfair to assign a moral blame for stuff that’s down to the basic biology of the situation.
Now, back in the 70’s and 80’s, there was a lot of really promiscuous behavior. These days, surveys like OKCupid’s have found most gays aren’t much different from straights in their number of partners.
There’s also no evidence, as far as I know, that laws saying porn has to have condoms in have had any effects on sexual behavior.
“And lots of written erotica tells gay men that you can TOTALLY feel a stud’s hot creamy load gushing inside you like a volcanic eruption”
You should go into writing gay erotica!
And R1, that’s the sickest thing I’ve read all day, but really, it should’ve been a contest for what they should’ve had tattooed on their dicks, not their asses. As everyone knows, bottoming is what puts you at particular risk, not topping.
LOL. This is what has made a lot of gay male erotica seem totally unbelievable to me, and therefore often unreadable. Then there’s all the guys who’ve read this drivel who place ads and profiles saying how they want to be a bottom because they want to have this exact experience.
Oh, Gorblimey.
Look, gay anal sex and straight anal sex present the same biological risk, obviously. But I “assign a moral blame” to gay culture for perpetuating the idea that Anal Sex is more or less the gay equivalent of Vaginal Sex. That is PERFECTLY FAIR. I also assign blame to gay culture for perpetuating two contrary ideas:
(1) That as long as you use a condom — or are taking Truvada — having anal sex on the first date is no more a Big Deal, in terms of personal responsibility, than swapping handjobs on the first date, BUT…
(2) Anal sex is much more I-N-T-I-M-A-T-E.
They want anal sex to be “special” in terms of the meaning assigned to the act, but want to deny that there is a “special” degree of risk compared to other modes of sex between men.
Your ball, frizzled. Go ahead and refute.
I don’t even see an argument here.
Anal sex is more or less the gay version of straight vaginal sex, in terms of full body contact, intimacy, having a cock inside you, stimulation of g-spot, etc. That isn’t a recent invention. As long as men have wanted to have sex (ie, all of human history), they’ve been having anal sex.
I don’t see a contradiction either. Gay men aren’t monolithic, but we generally recognize anal sex does have a special degree of risk, which is why we have more protected sex than straight people. So that does speak to the responsibility and awareness gay men have over the risks of anal sex. Not everyone fucks on a first date, and if you’re claiming they do, you’d better have some well sourced figures.
The fact we still get HIV at a higher rate is down to how extraordinarily transmissive anal sex can be. You can’t argue with the basic point: the biological facts on the ground means that if you’re gay and have receptive anal sex, you’re much more vulnerable to HIV than straights are, and it’s unfair to set out moral judgement on gays for the outcome of an unfair set of circumstances.
While I find anal sex intimate (as any sexual act), I find there are varying degrees of intimacy. For instance, I find someone putting their d1ck in my @ss (or vice verse) intimate. However, my mouth going on their d1ck or my tongue going up their @sshole is much more familiar and personal. While I wouldn’t just do anal with anyone, I would do those other two activities with even fewer people.
While being the recipient of anal from someone who says they recently tested negative and has their d1ck wrapped while you are both are on Truvada certainly isn’t as safe as giving them a handjob, sometimes it’s easier to lie there like a starfish and go for a ride.
*cue ND30 to chime in here with falsehoods about my personal life*
*i think I just learned thanks to Throbert that my version of “vaginal sex” is rimmming.
See? I knew I visit this blog for a reason!
(I have never actually rimmed someone before. Does that mean I’m still a virgin? J/k)
Only in the same sense that a “straight” guy who’s an exclusive top doesn’t see himself as anything other than straight because he never gets penetrated.
Any attempt to place sole moral responsibility on gay men for having higher HIV rates must address the following facts that are beyond our control:
1. Gay men do not have vaginas. We do not have an alternative to anal sex if we want a cock up us.
2. Gay men who receive anal sex can also give anal sex. This fact alone means that even if straights just had anal sex, it would not be as transmissive of HIV as gay anal sex is, from an epidemiological point of view.
3. Men probably have a higher innate sex drive than women. Polygamy is common, polyandry is rare. Gay men cruise and have sex in public, lesbians don’t.
4. Socially, gay monogamy is stigmatized by the wider community, was legally discriminated against until very recently in the US, etc.
I don’t believe in ANY moral responsibility, personally. It isn’t compatible with a deterministic universe governed by physical laws. It makes more sense to think of stimulus, incentives and response. Instead of blaming gay men for an outcome they can’t control, why not discuss how to create incentives that make everyone better off.
“I don’t believe in any moral responsibility”, says a lot about you
R31, it says I’m a strict physical materialist, nothing more or less. I don’t believe in free will, so I don’t believe in moral responsibility. There’s no other reasonable way to deal with a strictly physical universe.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ca7i-D4ddaw
No. Insofar as “straight vaginal sex” means Genital To Genital contact, the nearest lesbian version is “tribadism” (aka “scissoring” or “clit-bumping”), while the nearest gay male version is rubbing penis against penis and balls against balls — a practice variously known as “frot” or “swordfighting” or “cockknocking,” etc.
With the exception of the “scissoring” position, all of these practices are very conducive to full body contact intimacy — putting the two partners genital-to-genital, torso-to-torso, face-to-face, and lips-to-lips.
Neither lesbians nor straight guys consider this necessary for sexual pleasure –but if that’s what you want, might I point out that the LIPS AND TONGUE are more flexible and prehensile than the anal sphincters, are better able to detect subtle differences in the penis’s skin temperature and texture, and are able to sense flavor (no one has taste buds in their rectum). On top of all that, the risks of HIV and certain other STDs are dramatically lower with oral sex than with anal sex. Plus, if the guy gets too rough, you’ve get teeth for self-defense.
In short, if you want to experience a cock inside you, I recommend the FRONT end of the alimentary canal as much superior in every respect.
Countless gay and straight male teenagers have figured out that they can “stimulate the g-spot” by straddling the arm of a sofa while they wank — thereby putting pressure against the perineum (aka the “taint” between the scrotum and the anus), which transfers indirect pressure to the prostate gland WITHOUT PENETRATION.
Yes, because tops wanted to stick their dicks in something, and the castrated male eunuch-whores they were penetrating didn’t have much say in the matter. As long as men have been having anal sex with other men, the bottoms were nearly always in a socially inferior position, across societies. The notion of “egalitarian” anal sex and “controlling bottoms” is, in fact, a very recent invention.
From personal experience, stimulating my own G-spot works best with an extremely dextrous 3 – 4 inch digit (or tongue). Otherwise, it just doesn’t come (so to speak) anywhere near to doing the job.
“Not everyone f–ks on a first date, and if you’re claiming they do, you’d better have some well sourced figures.”
No they f–k before the first date by using GRINDR. I had an ex that had took advantage of STR8 drunk boys down by the train tracks as my source.
I don’t believe in free will, is usually said by people who can’t help themselves from sucking 2 dozen dicks while their boyfriend is at work.
While I think there is some truth to determinism, it’s also a dangerous concept.
For someone like myself, I’m probably better off believing in free-will.