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Anal and Identity
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Anal and Identity
Anal and Identity
9-11-2003
In 1997, the prestigious Center for AIDS Prevention Studies (CAPS) at UCSF issued a report stating that gay men bareback and are otherwise anally promiscuous in order to secure their gay identity.
Today the Reuters news agency carried a report titled "Gay Men Flouting Safe Sex in Search of Identity."
This is not news, though it appears to be to some researcher named Parker in the UK.
Fact is that everyone knows that gay = anal.
Bravo knows it, HBO knows it, the Supreme Court of the United States knows it, and now Reuters' readers do too.
But the solution is not, as Reuters says, "reinforcing the call for safe sex" -- that is to say, more of the same tired "safer sex" strategies which have been failing for years.
The solution is to change the definition of gay.
If gay does NOT = anal, the prevalence of anal will decline, and with it the prevalence of HIV.
Fortunately there's a highly and mutually pleasurable alternative available to men who have sex with men, and it's HIV-risk-free.
That HOT alternative is called FROT, and this site exists to tell the world the truth about anal, FROT, and men who love men.
I've asked the men who visit this site to help spread the word about FROT by donating.
So far, too few of you have, suggesting that many of you think that HIV isn't important, and that it doesn't matter how many men acquire that virus by getting fucked up the ass.
You're wrong.
The AIDS pandemic has touched the lives of everyone on earth, and it has poisoned the lives of men who have sex with men.
Yet that epidemic can be stopped, and the next one prevented, if you'll help.
The safer-sex boyz don't have the answer.
We have the answer.
Most of the gay men working in the safer-sex establishment are themselves HIV poz.
As Chuck Tarver says, "If someone needs a math tutor, you don't send him to someone who FAILED the exam. Yet that's exactly what we've been doing with HIV/AIDS prevention."
Chuck's exactly right.
The true experts in AIDS prevention are the men on this site, many of us "out" for three decades or more, who are HIV negative.
We're just as gay as any barebacker on the planet.
Our erotic feelings for men are just as strong as theirs -- arguably, stronger, since we seek to connect sexually with other men, not with proxies for/ ersatz women.
We have the solution.
Join us in telling all those others about it.
Do so, and you'll earn the world's respect.
Fail to do so -- keep silent about this literally life-saving truth -- and you'll garner nothing but shame.
Then and Now
THEN:
Excerpt from the 1997 CAPS study, called "Qualitative Interview Study II," or QIS II:
"...among gay men high numbers of sexual partners, active engagement in anal sex, and sexual exploration are perceived as norms that legitimize an individual's gay identity. QIS II participants voiced concerns that on many levels, HIV prevention messages collided with these norms by asking men to question and possibly change practices that are part of the foundation of gay male identity....
"In QIS II, individual formulation of gay male identity and self-worth to a significant degree was based on adherence to specific sexual performance standards and practices within gay male culture. Men in QIS II frequently described anal sex, and particularly anal sex without condoms, as a means to affirm their gay identity, experience intimacy, and feel a broader social and cultural connection."
[emphases mine]
NOW:
Gay Men Flouting Safe Sex in Search of Identity
Tue Sep 9, 2003
MANCHESTER (Reuters) - Thousands of young gay British men are courting death in the hedonistic and newly promiscuous 21st century, flouting safe sex and actively trying to catch HIV (news - web sites) in their search for identity, a researcher aid on Tuesday.
Melissa Parker of Brunel University said the gay sex pub, club and sauna scene in London was booming and had been growing steadily since the mid-1990s, with unprotected sex with multiple partners the rule rather than the exception.
Catching the AIDS precursor HIV was not just a risk, it was a goal, she told reporters at the annual meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science (news - web sites).
"Being diagnosed with HIV is a badge of recognition of being truly gay," she said. "There is a sizeable number of young gay men new to the gay scene, exploring their sexuality but wanting to belong. HIV is seen as a bonus."
People diagnosed with HIV were not only admired for championing the cause, but were seen as being pampered by society with better social support, health care and even standard of living.
The combinations of therapies now available for people with HIV might even have exacerbated the problem.
"They have made HIV less frightening," Parker said.
She said some gay sex clubs, pubs and saunas had a throughput of up to 500 people a day with some men managing 30 to 40 sexual partners a visit.
Admitting that she had no figures to support her claim, she said her research consisted of a series of interviews over several years with a large number of sexually active gay men whose stories corroborated each other.
"They are all talking about it and they are all very concerned," Parker said.
She urged the authorities to tackle the issue urgently, reinforcing the call for safe sex and if necessary closing down some of the venues.
"Many lives will be unnecessarily destroyed if this advice is ignored" she said.
Bill Weintraub:
I hate to disappoint Dr. Parker, but "reinforcing the call for safe sex" is not going to solve the problem.
The fact is that those young gay Brits have been inundated with safer-sex messages all their lives.
Do the math:
Today's 18-year-old barebacking gay boyz were born in 1985 -- the same year as "safer sex."
They've literally grown up with safer-sex, and the one thing they don't need is more messages about condoms.
I'll say it again: They don't need more condom campaigns.
What they need is an anti-anal message.
A message that debunks anal and attacks its mystique while offering men who have sex with men a hot, masculine, more pleasurable and mutually pleasurable alternative.
Absent that message, the epidemic will continue.
I repeat: those gay boyz know about condoms.
Nothing Dr. Parker can tell them will be news.
What they don't know about is FROT.
What they don't know is that there are literally millions of gay, bi, and straight-identified men who have sex with men who never go near anal.
And they don't know it because their AIDS Service Organizations aren't telling them.
GayHealth-dot-com isn't telling them.
PlanetOut isn't telling them.
And neither is the religious right.
Only you -- that's right, bro -- YOU -- only you can tell them the truth about anal and FROT.
Donate, dude.
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