It's only the quarrelsome and ill-informed Europeans that are arguing for greater government intervention. I take anything that comes from the people who gave us the Verdun, Stalingrad, and the Holocaust with a grain of salt.
What I'm harping on is for a little consciousness raising ; which is to say, when you know how Jimmy Dean sausage is made, or what the risks of ATP are, you might you might decided you want to eat somethign else, or jerk off to something else.
Similarly, a meaningful comparison if HIV risks in porn vs. the sexual realities that most of us live in (though I'm quite certain some of ADT most prolific posters are denizens of the bathhouse) can only lead to a better informed viewer, which (hopefully) will lead to more humanely produced pornography.
I've already pledged, for a variety of reasons, to support only porn which demonstrates safer sex practices. (My most recent review contains an example under the heading "Condom Use.")
Is there something more that I could be doing to be helpful? I ask this with complete sincerity—it's a matter that really does concern me greatly, and that sometimes weighs quite heavily on my mind.
I cross-posted with you, Tony, because it takes me so long to think my posts through.
I'm not opposed to government regulation when it's beneficial. I'm very European in my outlook, even though I've never been there. Under the current U.S. administration, however, I must admit that any positive outcomes would have to happen almost by accident.
I do agree that consciousness raising beats regulation any day.
"3 infections/~208 male*/8 year = ~180/100:000/year.
3 infections/~625 female*/8 year = ~60/100:000/year.
Does that look about right?
*Average talent pool achieved using 80,000 tests administered monthly for 8 years."
Sure it looks right if you adjust the size of the sample disproportionately. That's why I prefer absolute numbers to precentages. What you leave out here are the unique circumstances of the positives we've turned up in the industry. Of the three male positives, two had been out of work for some time and were trying to reenter the industry. Because they were detected on the way in, they didn't pass their infections to anyone else.
All three of the female infections took place in a single month, originating from a single source.
This makes any attempt to establish a constant rate of infection statistically meaningless. For 6 of the 8 years we've been testing, the positivity rate has, in fact, been zero. During two of those years, the incidences were 2 and five respectively. Obviously, last year's rate was alarmingly high, but was it truly indicative, or anomalous? Likewise, during the six years when we detected no cases, was the zero rate indicative or anomalous?
The problem is that the numbers are so small you can't extrapolate accurately from the sample available. Which returns us to the matter of what we can measure - the number of cases we've detected v. the number of tests done. That number remains quite small, any way you slice it. We have the most frequently tested study samplling in the world, all of them sexually active at a level that most likely exceeds that of the "bathhouse crowd," as you like to call them. Still a total of 7 positives in 8 years, resulting in a total of four transmissions. Allowing for the number of potential exposures involved, I continue to maintain that those are very low numbers.
This doesn't make them any less disasterous for the individuals involved or lessen our moral responsibility to try to do better, but it does provide a more accurate perspective on our particular situation in porn than a dubious apples-and-oranges comparison with the entire population of the U.S.
For instance, you pull out of the sky a theoretical number of "straight, non-IV drug using, sexually active population at 150,000,000." We don't have any way of knowing, but it seems reasonable to assume that a vast percentage of that number would be monogamously partnered and at zero risk. Even the singles would have far fewer contacts than anyone working in porn. Is that a realistic metric for comparison with our subject population? I've already acknowledged what everybody understands, which is that performers are a higher-than-average-risk population.
Based on our particular circumstances, I would continue to argue that our constantly tested population has fewer HIV cases than might reasonably be expected, and mainly for two reasons: testing and non-internal ejaculations.
If you don't take into account co-risk factors and risk reducing factors, you don't get an accurate picture of the population you're evaluating. This is a somewhat Un-PC lesson that epidemeologists studying HIV transmission have had to accept over the years. Aggregate numbers just don't tell the whole story.
For example, based on presumed behavior, the HIV infection rate among lesbians should be near zero. Actually, it's a bit higher then among straight women, according to the stats kept by APLA. Now why would that be? Is it possible that some self-idenitifed lesbians are actually bi and have sex with gay men on the down-low?
What I'm getting at here is that defining risks is more about behavior than it is about numerical data. Those who engage only in low risk behavior are going to have fewer infections than those who engage in high risk behavior. No dispute there. However, when quantifiying risk v. resulting infection, you still come up with what I regard as surprisingly low infection rates among what is clearly an at-risk population in porn.
Again, this is no cause for complacency, but it is evidence that the current system, for all its weaknesses, has done a better job of protectiing performers than might reasonably have been expected.
I'll make you a completely unscientific bet that if the industry went all-condom tomorrow, we would still have occasional transmissions at a rate not much lower than what we have now. There would be some reduction, but we would not achieve zero risk.
Far more significant would be changes in industry practices that mulitply risks, ranging from internal ejaculations to allowing performers who are clearly bleeding from rectal tearing to complete their scenes. I would argue that the highest risks in the industry result not from the lack of condoms, but rather from specific unsafe practices. As I pointed out earlier, the only first generation contacts resulting in transmissions last spring involved internal ejaculations. Four primary contacts who did not do creampies did not contract the virus, even though they were exposed without condoms.
Oversimplifying a complex situation to a numbers game really doesn't present us with a very good means of evaluating and minimizing risks.
Now a word to YogaDame. What we need are a few million more consumers like you. Your efforts at consciouness raising, which Tony and I agree is the most important factor in reducing risk, are right on target. I can't think of a thing you could do that would be more important. Your efforts are commendable in every way and very much to be appreciated.
If you believe this to be the case, then might it be more intellectually rigorous for you/AIM to refrain from making any sort of numerical/stasticical arguments regarding the efficacy of your work, whether that be comparing your results to the bathhouses, or to the population at large?
Otherwise you're just cherry-picking the data, and we all know how that goes. The next thing you know you'll be spearheading a tank column into Tehran.
"Otherwise you're just cherry-picking the data, and we all know how that goes. The next thing you know you'll be spearheading a tank column into Tehran."
I can see that my efforts to keep this discussion civil aren't working too well. I suspect you'd be tempermentally better suited to leading tank columns than I would.
More to the point, this:
ernestgreene wrote:
This makes any attempt to establish a constant rate of infection statistically meaningless.
"If you believe this to be the case, then might it be more intellectually rigorous for you/AIM to refrain from making any sort of numerical/stasticical arguments regarding the efficacy of your work, whether that be comparing your results to the bathhouses, or to the population at large?"
First of all, there is an important distinction to be made between arguments based on statistical analysis and those based on numerical data. The former are extrapolated and the latter are demonstrated. Sometimes the specifics of the latter render the assumptions of the former hopelessly ambiguous. It is a basic priniciple of such analysis that the smaller the sampling and the lower the incidence of whatever is being measured, the greater the margin of error and the lower the predictive accuracy become.
Because the tiny number (single-digit numbers are generally considered tiny in statistical terms) of HIV+s we turn up are immediately locked out of the talent pool, it's not reliably possible to calculate a constant rate of infection. If I really wanted to cherry-pick data, I'd just say the constant rate in the porn talent pool is zero and leave it at that. However, in the interest of intellectual rigor, I can't absolutely assert that there are no undetected sleeper cases at this moment or any other, so I can't really make such a claim.
However, it's not unreasonable to make a favorable comparison to a general population or any sub-set thereof in which some infectious presence of HIV is at all times a given. If our situation were even remotely similar, as I've already pointed out, we would have a steady stream of new infections turning up at AIM every month, instead of a case or two every couple of years, all but the last four of which were completely unrelated.
By comparing percentages with much larger populations, you inflate the perception of risk, which is just as dangerous as understating that risk in that both make accurate information appear less credible. Part of the general complacency toward HIV I see in the society overall I regard as a result of hysterical early reporting by the mass media in the initial phases of the epidemic. When it turned out not to be the killer plague wiping out a third of the population that some were predicting at the time, those who continued to sound the alarm about the genuine dangers still at large were made to look like a bunch of Chicken Littles.
So why don't we just quit wrangling over theoretical numbers and concede what we both know to be true. As of now, HIV is, in fact, rare among porn performers. However, that could change in a matter of days or weeks if a perfect storm situation like last spring's were to arise again. We've seen categorical proof that an infectious male performer engaging in high risk practices can do a lot of damage in a short time. This argues in favor of stringent testing requirements, cessation of risk-enhancing behaviors and the regular use of condoms in combination.
If you've ever looked at an AIM test report, you will notice that a negative result on the PCR-DNA test does not state that the individual doesn't have HIV. It says that the virus was not detected in the sample given, period. That ought to give anyone pause, as it does me every time I see it.
When AIM was taking heavy fire for not preventing the transmissions earlier in the year, I had to explain over and over again to people who really should have known better that tests don't prevent infections, they merely detect them, and sometimes they don't do so quickly enough to stop them from spreading. Our efforts are only as effective as the manner in which they are applied. Performers and producers who choose to go by test results alone undoubtedly put themselves and others at greater risk than they would if additional precautions were taken.
At this point, I really don't see what we're arguing about.
I don't understand what Tony's point is either. I just had the exact discussion with him in the ADT chat. But of course I don't have the numbers and statistics Ernest can work with. Yes, performers are at a certain risk, higher than a person that only has protected sex with a single partner or does not exchange bodily fluids with others at all. But I do believe that the regular testing makes porn a much safer place for all of us working in this business. I agree with Ernest that the few HIV infections we had in the last couple of years are a very low number compared to the number of unprotected contacts each year. Also I would like to suggest not to transform the porn statistics into the civilian population. Why would you even want to do that? Look at the number of tests AIM does in a year, number of scenes shoot and number of infection and make up your mind.
For once, a short answer: denial. Performers wish they could be made 100% safe by a piece of paper, but unless they use it to cover their genitals, this is not possible. We tell everybody this when they come in for their first tests, and we repeat it every chance we get, but in the day to day life of a performer, there is a natural tendency to deny the darker prospects that might occur.
This is especially true when the worst happens infrequently. After uncounted numbers of sex scenes without dire consequences, it's only natural to assume that those consequences will never happen, at least not to oneself.
I see no conscious conspiracy to decieve, if that's what your question implies. The same denial afflicts producers and directors as well as performers. They're all playing the odds, even though the risks aren't equally distributed. Nobody expects to draw the ace of spades.
The best analogy I ever read for this is that it's like playing russian roulet with a revolver that has a 1000 chambers. After a while you start to thing the reason you haven't blown your head off is because of some special skill. Then after a while longer you start to forget there's any risk at all.
Of course when/if your number comes up, it wipes out all your winnings and then some.
The metaphor was first used to describe financial scenarios with small but catastrophic downsides. I don't think anyone was ever shot or infected with HIV for doubling down on a shakey derivative.
I don't think the dangers are directly comparable among any of these activities, but like I said, the mental processes regarding repeated exposure to risk to some extent are. You could say the same of robbing banks, dealing dope or doing a high-wire act. In any risky trade, familiarity breeds complacency, and complacency is always dangerous.
Having slept on this, I've come to the conclusion that we're unlikely to resolves our differences on our respective assessment of threat that HIV poses to adult performers (or less PC, to women adult performers.)
Before I let it go completely, let me offer the following:
My own educational background gives a somewhat better than average facility for working with numbers in a scientific context. More to the point, in the course of my work, I have been come friends with two doctors, both epidemiologist, both working for the CDC, and both working in the field of HIV/AIDS prevention. Their answer to the paucity of data argument is simple: one shouldn't cite a scarcity of data to argue for rosier conclusion, and in matters of life and death, one should be cautiously guided by whatever data one has. In other words , one might adjust infection rates down as each year without new infections passes, but writing off data because it's a one-time event in support of the conclusion one hopes for is neither scientific nor prudent.
If it seem particularly piqued at you, perhaps it's because of your repeated use of the phrase "perfect storm" to describe the coincidence of conditions that led to an HIV-infected male performer being active long enough to infect three of his scene partners before his infection was detected. I don't know if you're a weather-watcher, but I am an enthusiastic one. The confluence of meteorological events that Sebastian Junger dubbed "The Perfect Storm" were a once-in-a-lifetime event that produced 100-year sea conditions. Given the number of scenes male talent shoot between test cycles, unless the next perform who brings HIV into the talent pool has the courtesy to becoming infected 7-10 days before his next test, then refrains from performing until his infection is detected, it's a virtual certainty that the next active male performer who becomes infected with HIV will expose, and perhaps infect his scene partners with HIV. This is easily modeled, whether the window period is 7 days or 7 minutes. This scenario does not have the statistical makings of a hundred-year event.
The above reflects my understanding of the risks of a post-HIV/AIDS world, and my production approach reflects what I believe is an cautious response to those risks. We seem to have exhausted debate as to what the risk is, or how one might access that risk, so no matter how provocative I may personally find this issue, I will refrain from further discussion of it, at least with you.
I would like to continue to discus an area where we seem to be in complete agreement
I would offer that this same denial extends to many fans as well; that this denial is an impediment the million-Yogadame audience you've wished for; and it's my belief that this denial ultimately acts to the detriment of both the art and business of pornography. Has any thought been given as to what further efforts AIM, or any other organ within the adult industry might make to combat this denial; whether it be in producers, performers or viewers?
Lastly, on cherry picking, conspiracy theory and jack boots:
I've realized (again too late) that by conjuring an image of a panzer column, I've stepped into DAC's and other's less than charitable characterization of your manner of dress. That was not my intention.
The venom and vigor of your attacks on opponents ("chokes on her own vomit") sometimes strikes me (rather ironically) as being not unlike the current administration ("There's an enemy that lurks..."). Their (mis?)interpretation of data sent an armored column into Baghdad. At best the barb was oblique. More likely it was simply not funny. Whatever the case, it was most certainly not related to your footwear preferences.
As far as a "conspiracy to deceive", I'm of the opinion that if in the attempt to explain a gap in human understanding, the choice is between willful ignorance (aka denial) and conspiracy, ignorance is the safe bet. Let's hope that in the New Year a few more producers, performers and fans follow Yogadames's example and choose to educate themselves, and then act accordingly.
Let me start out by saying I appreciate the less combative tone of your most recent post. As I've said all along, we agree about more things than not. We both have strongly held opinions. However, I do think we're basically on the same side and want the same outcomes. Differences over methodology can spark some heated arguments, but I'm perfectly happy to let this one cool down.
You then go on to raise a point or two I do think need answering:
"in matters of life and death, one should be cautiously guided by whatever data one has. In other words , one might adjust infection rates down as each year without new infections passes, but writing off data because it's a one-time event in support of the conclusion one hopes for is neither scientific nor prudent."
Just so. That's why I used this analysis as a negative example. I want to make it clear that I don't think this is either a scientific or prudent way of evaluating the risks in question. Where we disagree is on what the data we do have indicates. You're quite right that we don't agree on the level of HIV transmission risk under the current system, but I would ask you if you have an explanation of your own to offer as to why transmissions remain so infrequent if my reading of the situation is so far off.
What happened last spring may not have been a one-time event (sadly), but it was a first-time event since regular testing began. It may not be a hundred-year event, but it was, metaphorically, a perfect storm from our point of view, in that it happened as a result of what our own experience shows to be an extraordinary confluence of events.
Without naming names, which I don't do for legal reasons, I think it's safe to say that we have a pretty good working theory of how it happened, and the conditions that produced it were highly unusual. A male performer appears to have contracted HIV in a Third-World country, in part due to lowered immune resistance resulting from a poisonous insect bite, returns to the states and tests the day after he gets back, managing by trying to behave responsibly to put himself in the most dangerous part of the PCR-DNA's brief (and I think even you concede that seven days is, indeed, brief) window period, then does a series of particularly high-risk scenes involving internal pop-shots in a very short time.
Anything that has happened once can happen again, but I think even you would admit that the probabilities for this particular chain of events was pretty low. Nonetheless, it did happen and anyone who takes comfort in its relative peculiarities clearly has that denial thing going. We may differ on the levels of risk porn performers (and yes, I am well aware that the risk is far greater for women) face on the job, but neither of us denies that the risks are there.
While I hope we never witness another event like this year's, I've already said - and more than once - that sooner or later we'll be confronted with something similar. For as long as HIV exists in society, it will occasionally break through into the porn community and we should be doing everything possible to delay the next incident, even if we'll never be able to completely prevent it.
"I would offer that this same denial extends to many fans as well; that this denial is an impediment the million-Yogadame audience you've wished for; and it's my belief that this denial ultimately acts to the detriment of both the art and business of pornography. Has any thought been given as to what further efforts AIM, or any other organ within the adult industry might make to combat this denial; whether it be in producers, performers or viewers?"
With you on this all the way, and yes, we combat it consantly by heckling everybody in the industry and making everybody mad at us for either a) making too much of it; or b) not making enough of it. I was at the clinic yesterday, once again watching a first-time testing client sit through the Porn 101 tape before her first draw. I have no idea how much of the message was getting through, but we certainly deliver it in the starkest terms.
We rumble with producers, directors and performers in person and by phone about the lack of concern for risk everyday. At every public gathering where AIM representatives speak, we advocate condom use in the strongest language (and evidently you find my use of language, at least, pretty strong).
Our problem is that outside the industry, which is to say among consumers, we don't have much of a voice. I daresay most consumers don't even know we exist, and wouldn't necessarily pay attention to what we said if they did. To guys who hate condoms -and whether we like it or not they are probably a majority among porn buyers - we're just a bunch of meddlesome do-gooders.
For all their mawkish "affections" for porn performers, they'd rather see them take risks than see them work with condoms. This is going to be a very high wall to get over, but the demand side is every bit as important as the supply side. When companies like Video Team attempt to institute condoms and are punished with sales hits so hard they nearly go out of business, other producers, particularly the smaller shops that make the hardest material, aren't much inspired to do the right thing.
You can't compare the situations of Vivid, Wicked or Adam&Eve to those of non-feature companies that don't have cable sales to offset whatever losses they sustain as a result of condom-only policies. Home video sales for condom-only companies are distressingly weak. Unless you have strong soft-core, condoms definitely cost producers sales, and that's what producers are about.
What we're really left with is consumer education, and if I had a means of making it more effective, I wouldn't keep it a secret. For what it's worth, I do think a younger generation of viewers for whom condoms have always been part of their own sex lives will prove less resistant to seeing them onscreen, and I commend yourself and other picture-makers doing everything possible to build an audience in that demographic.
I think that is our best hope, but it won't happen overnight, as it more or less did on the gay side. Remember that the gay market's acceptance of condoms was to a great extent conditioned by personal experience. Gay men came to understand that unprotected sex was a direct threat to them and their friends. The perception of risk is far more remote for the straight viewer, making that viewer less amenable to the desired adaptations. For as long as I continue to see condom use cited as a negative in video reviews and in commmentaries from viewers, I don't expect much support from out there in wanker land.
In the meantime, my advice is to keep on doing what you're doing, as I have, which is to make hot pictures with condoms in them that consumers like well enough to buy in spite of, as opposed to because of, the presence of condoms. We've spent thirty years creating a market for bareback and I wouldn't underestimate the difficulty of changing opinions on this subject. It's in part going to be up to the creative energy and committment of porn shooters to win over that market with products that are both hot and safe. That's a better prospect than trying to influence their choices by moral suasion.
If it's any comfort, the instructional Nina and I did on mutual masturbation - an entirely safe-sex product - got rave reviews and continues to be among the best sellers in our line. Our best solutions to this vexing consciousness-raising problem may lie with artistic creativity in our own efforts. If we can prove to producers that condom shows can compete, there will be more of them, more buyers for them and wider acceptance of them.
"I've realized (again too late) that by conjuring an image of a panzer column, I've stepped into DAC's and other's less than charitable characterization of your manner of dress. That was not my intention.
The venom and vigor of your attacks on opponents ("chokes on her own vomit") sometimes strikes me (rather ironically) as being not unlike the current administration ("There's an enemy that lurks..."). Their (mis?)interpretation of data sent an armored column into Baghdad. At best the barb was oblique. More likely it was simply not funny. Whatever the case, it was most certainly not related to your footwear preferences."
This starts out as some kind of apology, I guess, but ends up a worse insult. i frankly don't care much what people think of my fashion sense, based on what they see of it in bondage videos, but I don't think of myself as venomous (I don't recall any reference to anyone choking on his or her own vomit in any post of mine, though I suppose it's not impossible).
I do vigorously and sometimes angrily defend my beliefs on certain very important topics because they matter greatly to me and, frankly, because a lot of the bullshit thrown in my direction as a result is so ugly, lame and ignorant I find it difficult to respond to it in a calm, polite manner. In other words, I'm human and I am capable of throwing a hard counterpunch.
However, comparing my defense of my views to the deliberate, mendacious deceptions of the Bush administration and their policy of trying to personally discredit everyone who challenges them is both wrong and hurtful. No indeed, it wasn't funny. Think what you wish of my choice of footwear, but do not imply that I am a cynical, conscienceless, totalitarian bully if you don't want to rumble instead of converse.
I've never said one critical word about you personally, and have repeatedly stated my respect for your point of view and for your approach to making pictures. I hardly think that warrants caustic, personal rebuttals from you of this type. There is no more bitter opponent of the aims and tactics of W. and his pals anywhere and being compared them is just about the worst thing you could say to me.
"As far as a "conspiracy to deceive", I'm of the opinion that if in the attempt to explain a gap in human understanding, the choice is between willful ignorance (aka denial) and conspiracy, ignorance is the safe bet. Let's hope that in the New Year a few more producers, performers and fans follow Yogadames's example and choose to educate themselves, and then act accordingly."
So let's just end on this positive note. I support your goals here entirely and hope to see them realized, the sooner the better.
First, please do not infer any opinions (and certainly not negative ones) about your footwear on the basis of my comments.
Secondly, if what comparing your (what often reads to me as scorched earth) rhetoric to the Bush administration is hurtful, I apologize. And I was mistaken, it was "vomit from their own hypocrisy".
Brief in relation to what?
If you could please explain, in simple mathmatical language, the probabalistic interaction of a seven day "window-period" on the ability of test (which window-period excepted, is regarded at 95% reliable) on the number of days an HIV postive individual might remain unidentified and active as a performer, when such a test is adminstered on a 30 day cycle. In light of such a calculus, I might have an opinion about the brevity of such a window-period.
For myself, long ago I chose to perform a similar calculation, but treated the window period as zero.
I believe this does matter. Furthermore, I believe that the importance of outreach and good sex education for adolescents can not be overstated.
I'm not terribly young (I turn 37 this winter), so I can recall the early AIDS stories when they first hit the national news. This would've been around 1983. I was 14 and attending a public junior high school. I remember a health unit where two educators from the community spoke to us about birth control and STDs. They passed around a condom, which I'd never seen before. After I'd briefly held one in my hands, they were no longer mysterious and intimidating.
All of this had an enormous impact on my thinking. When I finally had sex at the age of 21, I did insist on a condom. I'm still with that first lover 16 years later (very happily married to him in fact), and we still occasionally use condoms for extra birth control insurance during my body's fertile peaks. For me, they have only positive associations—the fact that he cared enough about me to wear one at my request, the fact that a freshly unwrapped condom is associated with intensely pleasurable sensations which immediately follow, and so on.
I wouldn't say I fetishize condoms, but their presence of in a porn scene only makes it a bit sexier in my mind. I have tried to understand the opposite viewpoint, and I admit that I just don't get it. The sexual experiences of fans who demand condomless porn must be quite different from mine.
More over, sex is a tremendously repetative act, with some fundemental, but not insoluable cinematic obsticle. Condoms – the finding, unwrapping, and donning – provide both transistion and relief to the often boring action of in out in out in out in out.
This is not just film school theory. (Not that I went to filmschool) As I cut, I though the condom donning sequence in my latest film was extra hot, and this has been confirmed by unsolicited feedback on advance screeners.
I guess it kills the fantasy of perfect sex in a perfectly disease free fantasy world. I don't mind condoms in my porn. For safety reasons I prefer it. But I can see their point. Indeed, for purely visual reasons I'd rather not have condoms for fellatio in porn. Nor would I want dental dams for cunnilingus.
However, in real life I don't care either way if a woman prefers me to wear a condom during a BJ too. That's entirely up to her preference. I don't think I'd like a dental dam for eating pussy though. It's never come up.
Porn movies are fantasy, like a Hollywood action movie. I'm watching "James Bond: Thunderball" while writing this. Pure escapism. Mmm, Connery just sucked poison from Claudine Auger's pretty feet.
Yes, the safety on a 007 production is at another level than what is found on a porn set. But some customers don't care. When the porn performers themselves don't seem to care, it's not always easy to argue why the viewers should. After all, when it's perfectly legal and the performers do it of their own free will, why should customers worry? (whoops, there's that communist Euro attitude again)
If you could please explain, in simple mathmatical language, the probabalistic interaction of a seven day "window-period" on the ability of test (which window-period excepted, is regarded at 95% reliable) on the number of days an HIV postive individual might remain unidentified and active as a performer, when such a test is adminstered on a 30 day cycle. In light of such a calculus, I might have an opinion about the brevity of such a window-period."
Brief in relation to any other test we have available. I understand there is research in progress that may yield a more reactive test that shows HIV proteins even sooner, but until that happens, seven days is as brief as we're getting.
As to your statement that follows, again, I can't disagree with your arithmetic. We've already seen what can happen when a performer erroneously tests negative in the window-period and goes on to work for another three weeks. You make the odds of this happening higher than I do. My view is based less on theoretical mathematics than practical experience. If the risk is as common as you suggest, I'm still puzzled as to why we haven't seen more new infections, or for that matter, detected more positives in regular screening due to outside contacts.
Epidemiology, as I'm sure you're doctor friends have told you, is both a medical and a social science and I wonder how significant social and behavioral factors - such as the fact that, while some performers do have active and perhaps reckless sex lives outside of porn, many have hardly any non-working sexual contacts at all - may be in the relative safety we've enjoyed. Strong circumstantial evidence suggests that external pop shots have also played an important role. All the transmissions we've seen have been from internal ejaculations, which is certainly a relevant area of speculation.
None of this undercuts your fundamental argument that testing alone does not guarantee immunity from infection. I think we've covered that one pretty well.
And as for this:
"Secondly, if what comparing your (what often reads to me as scorched earth) rhetoric to the Bush administration is hurtful, I apologize. And I was mistaken, it was "vomit from their own hypocrisy".
Well, I just can't resist:
"Clearly there are some viewers who while demand risky acts, and no efforts at "consciousness raising" will have an effect on them. Indeed, the only difference between their pathology and the pathology of a pedophile is that the images that feed their sickness are legal."
Comparing porn fans who don't like condoms or who do like creampies to pedophiles might be considered scorched-earth rhetoric as well, might it not?
But my real favorite is this one:
"It's only the quarrelsome and ill-informed Europeans that are arguing for greater government intervention. I take anything that comes from the people who gave us the Verdun, Stalingrad, and the Holocaust with a grain of salt."
Gee, was that Bush or Rumsfeld talking? Freedom Fries anybody?
Anyway, I'm glad you have no negative opinion of my choice of footwear. It's a great comfort to me.
BTW, KPERV, the level of safety on Hollywood sets isn't necessarily higher than that on porn sets, although both union rules and producer liability concerns certainly try to make it that way. There are one or two deaths a year among professional stunt players in mainstream film and television, a price that both the industry and society at large seems to find acceptable for popular entertainment.
If we had as much as one actual fatality on a porn set ever, I'm sure the howling to shut down the entire business would be deafening. No trade is risk-free and there always has been and will always be some cost-benefit analysis involved in setting acceptable levels of risk v. cost-effectiveness of hazard reduction strategies.
The Cal-OHSA blood-born pathogen standard would undoubtedly make the risk of infection on porn sets essentially nil, but would also make porn production impossible.
At the end of the day, there will be compromises between safety and practicality, and we'll all make them according to our own perceptions of risk, as producers, performers and consumers.
Obviously, the consequences would be similar. Viral loads spike right after infection, so an HIV+ performer would pose the greatest danger to others during that time.
Again, there is no disagreement here. Whether an infection goes undetected because of the window period or because it happened between tests, the relative danger it would pose would depend on the performers rate of sero-conversion, which would vary depending on the state of his or her immune system. Either way, no test would make it safe to work with an infected partner at any time. In my view, neither would a condom. I would consider barrier protections with HIV+ players closer to Russian roulette than what we have now.
If there's something new in this, I'm not getting it.
Really? Hollywood studio and US network TV productions? I'm somewhat surprised I've never heard that statistic. Have any high profile franchises comparable to the James Bond or Harry Potter movies had a fatality in the past, say, fifteen years?
Well, if that's how it is in popular mainstream entertainment, it makes it even harder to argue that porn consumers should show more care about the health of performers in their particular corner of the entertainment industry, than those same performers do themselves and the community at large sees fit not to legislate against.
And no, I don't think this argues in favor of consumer indifference to the health and safety of porn performers. Professional stunt players enjoy a much higher standard of protection than porn performers. They are highly trained professionals and accidents occur despite rigorous efforts to prevent them.
If I understand everything you've said about the HIV detections AIM has made, the only one of these that was an outside infection in a currently active player was the male detection in the Spring of 2004. As matter of practical experience, the 30 day regime is oh for one in detecting an outside HIV in an active player before he could infect other people.
But if all these experienced professionals let a production manager overrule their reservations at a movie shoot, how is an inexperienced, cash-strapped newcomer supposed to stand up to a director (who is often also the other performer)? It seems many 'agents' are not particularly helpful in this regard either.
Also, while fatalities in mainstream productions may not provide an ethically valid excuse for consumers to ignore health issues in porn, they're hardly helpful in persuading said consumers to 'see the light'.
If legislation is out of the question, what other courses are left? Industry wide self-imposed restraint on the side of the producers does not seem likely. It doesn't appear feasible to organise the talent (I hesitate to use the word 'union' in a US forum ). Can your education of the performers be very effective without such a combined front? Changing the attitude of the consumer is, IMHO, a pipedream without some form of legislation. I'd love to be wrong in this, of course. But I'm not hopeful.
Life is fraught with risk, accidents happen, people die.
I'd strangle a dozen pornstars with my barehands if that's what it took to make the erotic equivelent of Ben Hur . But I don't see anything in Donkey Punch , Pirates or even my beloved Marie and Jack: A Hardcore Love Story that would make it worth living with the knowledge that as a producer I set in motion the events that led to one person infecting another person with HIV.
Maybe someday there'll be something want badly enough to take that chance, but not so far.
So then what is? King crab? Spreading democracy? Falling timber? Putting a man on the moon?
At a certain point, the ability to minimize risk reaches a limit, and the only way to balance the scales is turn our attention to the benefit side of the equation.
"If I understand everything you've said about the HIV detections AIM has made, the only one of these that was an outside infection in a currently active player was the male detection in the Spring of 2004. As matter of practical experience, the 30 day regime is oh for one in detecting an outside HIV in an active player before he could infect other people."
As a matter of practical experience, testing failed to detect HIV in an active male player one time in eight years. What followed from that was completely predictable and entirely disasterous, as we've been telling people it would be all along.
Nevertheless, the fact that it happened only one time in eight years and tens of thousands of tests returns us to the circular argument over how likely the recurrance of such an event would be.
The truth is that neither you nor I know how likely it would be. Precedent suggests that it would be unlikely. Statistical probabilities of the sort you seem to prefer suggest it might be slightly more likely. On the basis of a single occurence, there isn't enough data to predict anything with any degree of confidence.
One more time, I will ask you to answer this question: If testing on a thirty-day rotation is essentially useless and HIV is significantly prevalent in the community from which the talent pool is drawn, why has there been only one such episode in AIM's eight year history?
I'll at least admit that I can't answer that question. Can you?
If so, then let us both refrain from referencing this single occurrence as evidence of any efficacy or the lack there of.
******
I don't think anyone on this thread, and certainly not me, has suggested that the 30 day regime is without value. It has most certainly proved it's value in containing the 2004 outbreak, and has also served to prevent talent who became infected with HIV while on "hiatus" from re-entering the pool. I would expect it would also be useful in screen HIV+ newcomers.
What I have suggested mathematically, and you have suggested anecdotally (anger at AIM in 2004 and ongoing denial in the form of continued ultra risky sex acts) and is that people have a terrible and potentially fatal misunderstanding of what the test can and cannot do with regard to detecting infections among active players and removing them before they can pass HIV to colleagues.
God bless the three men who got HIV while on hiatus for having the courtesy to do so while they were not "active players". But in my opinion it strains credulity to think that if they had not become infected while on hiatus, gone on to pass their tests and entered the talent pool, that they would have suddenly decided to refrain from what ever risky behavior they had been engaging in while on hiatus. And my somewhat better than lay-person's (BS with a minor in mathematics) analysis of the 30 day regime's capacity for early detection of HIV infections in what you call "active players" leave me positively queasy. If there has only been a "single occurrence" in eight years, then the industry owes these men a huge debt of gratitude for becoming infected when they did.
Please consider, mine are not the rantings of an anti-porn activist or publicity hungry public official. I have been making sexual explicit images for over 20 years, and making money at it for over 15. I've worked under the long shadow of the Meese commission, and I've seen how porn "grew and flourished" in the nourishing light of Clinton's laissez-faire. I've devoted a significant part of my adult life to the exploration of the erotic image, and in response to the "consciousness raising" that I experienced a result of the Wallace outbreak, I completely re-thought how I would make pornography, and what risks I would ask people to take in front of my camera.
The numbers I've presented on this thread have been developed according to best statistical practices as I understand them, and in consultation with experts in the field with whom I have been lucky enough to become acquainted with in the course of my work. They are not presented to discredit you Ernest, or AIM, or pornography, but in the hope that producers, performers, and most of all fans, might have a better understanding of what risks are undertaken to produce depictions of actual sexual intercourse, and that a better understanding might ultimately lead to more compassionately and humanely produced pornography.
If your response is simply "there's not enough data", or "we've only had one incident" well then so be it. My concerns, and the resulting approach were considered anomalous in 1999, they are considered anomalous here at the end 2005. The only difference is that I'm in a slightly better position to make my concerns known. Let's all hope that in the fullness of time, I am proved wrong.
"If your response is simply "there's not enough data", or "we've only had one incident" well then so be it. My concerns, and the resulting approach were considered anomalous in 1999, they are considered anomalous here at the end 2005. The only difference is that I'm in a slightly better position to make my concerns known. Let's all hope that in the fullness of time, I am proved wrong."
I can't help hearing an ironic echo in this statement of words I said, with more nerve than common sense, to the annual meeting of the Free Speech Coalition in 1993, after the industry had its first real HIV scare (which fortunately did not result in any transmissions). "If we do nothing more or less than what we've been doing," I warned an extremely unfriendly group of producers, "the only thing I can promise with any certainty is that we will all be back in this room dealing with this problem under worse circumstances sooner or later."
I too said I hoped I would be proved wrong (and was bitterly sorry that I wasn't in the long run).
I then declared that I would never make another non-condom picture, which proved a rather costly decison on my part. I didn't shoot another BG scene until after the Marc Wallice episode, when my services suddenly became marketable again. Fancy that. I of all people have no illusions about the callousness, short-sightedness and inhumanity of which this business is capable.
This is not in any way to say that I question your competence or authority to read the evidence since as you choose and make wise decisions accordingly. I unequivocally support what you're doing. I'm glad it works for you commercially and I hope others follow your example.
And I hope that's adequate to persuade you that I'm not trying to put something over on you or anyone else when I say that we really don't have the hard facts we need to explain why HIV hasn't spread like wildfire through an industry in which thousands of people engage in non-barrier-protected acts of intercourse thousands of times with multiple partners every year. I think that's a fascinating puzzle with some potentially explosive political implications, which is one reason many people don't care to address it directly.
A background in mathematics, or even a medical degree, doesn't magically confer an ability to analyze a complex situation and come up with a credible explanation for it. I don't claim to have that explanation myself.
However, the fact that in all this time since the Wallice case and the subsequent instantiation of the testing regimen there has been only one episode of industry-related HIV transmission is not an irrelevant statistical curiousity. It's a very important emperical fact that begs for serious examination. I notice that you made no attempt to speculate on this matter yourself, and that may be the better part of wisdom for you.
You seem to want to ascribe this to pure luck as much as anything else, and that is a possibility. But chance doesn't usually favor recklessness and if the industry's current approach were as reckless as you make it out to be, I would have expected worse consequences by now.
Unless and until some solid explanation emerges for this phenomenon, I'll readily accede to your suggestion that we "both refrain from referencing this single occurrence as evidence of any efficacy or the lack there of." I think intellectual integrity demands no less.
Granted also that, despite all efforts to persuade them to the contrary, "people have a terrible and potentially fatal misunderstanding of what the test can and cannot do with regard to detecting infections among active players and removing them before they can pass HIV to colleagues." Testing is a safety-net of sorts, but like any net, it is porous and things can slip through.
When it comes to this business in general, I think there is a tendency to underestimate that possibility and when it comes to the public, politicians and some members of our particular community, there is a tendency to overestimate it, but that is my opinion, nothing more. It's not AIM's official position. It has no force of law. It isn't backed by any specialized scientific knowledge. It's just my impression that the sex we do in porn is neither as dangerous as it looks nor as safe as some of us would like to believe.
I would like to see us err more on the side of caution, but I don't see a clear road from here to there. And I do see a clear and present danger if we fail to do so. One thing that last spring's events did do was put this issue on the political radar screen - the very thing I warned of back in 1993.
Considering the tremendous controversy that arose out of the most recent episode, I don't doubt for a minute that any repetition would bring tremendous legal and political consequences down on all of us, whatever our culpability or lack of same.
It would seem to me that enlightened self-interest would dictate a more prudent course than the one being taken by a large precentage of porn producers at present, but enlightenment is hard to come by in this line of work, as it is in many other industries.
However, so far neither appeals to the better angels of our nature nor threats of dire retribution have produced significant changes in the way porn is made. I don't know and don't like to think about what it would require for those changes to occur. Whatever it is, by the time it happens, I very much fear it will be too late to prevent the destruction of a creative art form that obviously means a great deal to the both of us.
I must therefore join you in your hope that you, unlike me, will be proved wrong as you suggest. I really don't know what else to do.
That's what I keep telling people and I guess it's not what they want to hear. If I find a magic wand to wave over this situation, believe me, I won't keep it to myself.
I'm a little confused by this page at the AIM website, which states that a diaphragm with nonoxynol-9 jelly is "an important addition to the safe sex arsenal."
I was under the impression that current research suggests that N-9 not only fails to prevent HIV transmission, but might actually facilitate it, especially if used frequently (or rectally). Am I mistaken?
Looks to me like that page could use an update. We've ditched all N-9 products from AIM's clinic over a year ago and now advise against using it, as it can be an irritant that ulcerates mucous membranes and actually facilitates infection.
Thanks for the good catch. I'll call in the morning and get this sorted out.
You can't label this "phenomenon" relevant or irrelevent whenever it does or does not suit your argument. If you think it's relevant, then accept that the infection rates suggested by this "phenomenon" are, at best, worrisome. Otherwise let it go. Anything less is low sophistry.
Thanks, Ernest. Good to hear that AIM no longer dispenses N-9 and now counsels against its use. I know the info on N-9 is relatively new. I greatly appreciate that you're taking care of this.
You might also have them look at the "Why Condoms Don't Work" page (I wasn't sure I liked that title, but after I read a little further, I decided it's a neat way to catch people's attention). It says in part: "If ejaculation has occurred... Consider immediately inserting a spermicide with 3% or more nonoxynol-9."
This page also mentions N-9, but the discussion about the risks is a bit better here.
I'm sure the staff is busy with other priorities at the clinic, but whenever there's time, someone with good copyediting eyes should perhaps examine that whole condom section of the website. Some of it is quite informative (the "How Can a Person Learn to Enjoy Condoms?" page is pretty cool!), but some of it seems a little surreal.
Is condom usage not negotiated ahead of the scene? Or perhaps the above passage was just borrowed from a safer sex guide for civilians? That sounds like great general advice, but some of it doesn't read like it was written for the needs of the adult industry.
However, the fact that in all this time since the Wallice case and the subsequent instantiation of the testing regimen there has been only one episode of industry-related HIV transmission is not an irrelevant statistical curiousity. It's a very important emperical fact that begs for serious examination. I notice that you made no attempt to speculate on this matter yourself, and that may be the better part of wisdom for you.
You seem to want to ascribe this to pure luck as much as anything else, and that is a possibility. But chance doesn't usually favor recklessness and if the industry's current approach were as reckless as you make it out to be, I would have expected worse consequences by now.
Unless and until some solid explanation emerges for this phenomenon, I'll readily accede to your suggestion that we "both refrain from referencing this single occurrence as evidence of any efficacy or the lack there of." I think intellectual integrity demands no less.
"You can't label this "phenomenon" relevant or irrelevent whenever it does or does not suit your argument. If you think it's relevant, then accept that the infection rates suggested by this "phenomenon" are, at best, worrisome. Otherwise let it go. Anything less is low sophistry."
And just when I thought we'd politely agreed to disagree, I find myself accused of low sophistry. Let's return to the original statement with which I concurred:
ernestgreene wrote:
On the basis of a single occurence, there isn't enough data to predict anything with any degree of confidence.
"If so, then let us both refrain from referencing this single occurrence as evidence of any efficacy or the lack there of."
To concede that this one situation doesn't constitute "evidence" of any efficacy or the lack thereof (referring to the 30-day testing cycle)" is not to say it is irrelevant. It is to acknowledge the obvious, that it isn't adequate by itself to measure the effectiveness of the entire system.
That doesn't make it entirely meaningless or unworthy of further investigation or discussion. I've already said I think it's implications are worrisome and then some. I still maintain that it raises some provocative questions that haven't been answered to my satisfaction (and evidently you still don't care to try and answer them yourself).
Admitting that something might be relevant doesn't necessarily establish it as an indicator. I only proposed that it remained open to interpretation. That doesn't seem to be good enough for you. Either we just don't mention it at all, I see it your way, or I'm engaged in sophistry.
The facts of this case, which is the only one of its kind we have to go on, (and i hope it stays that way) remain relevant to this or any other discussion of risk in porn production. They will continue to be discussed for a long time to come.
Neither one of us can just take them off the table because they don't clearly support either of our points of view. Now that would be sophistry.
YogaDame:
------------------------------------------------------------------------ "Thanks, Ernest. Good to hear that AIM no longer dispenses N-9 and now counsels against its use. I know the info on N-9 is relatively new. I greatly appreciate that you're taking care of this.
You might also have them look at the "Why Condoms Don't Work" page (I wasn't sure I liked that title, but after I read a little further, I decided it's a neat way to catch people's attention). It says in part: "If ejaculation has occurred... Consider immediately inserting a spermicide with 3% or more nonoxynol-9."
This page also mentions N-9, but the discussion about the risks is a bit better here.
I'm sure the staff is busy with other priorities at the clinic, but whenever there's time, someone with good copyediting eyes should perhaps examine that whole condom section of the website. Some of it is quite informative (the "How Can a Person Learn to Enjoy Condoms?" page is pretty cool!), but some of it seems a little surreal.
The "How to Tell Them You Want to Use a Condom" offers this advice, for example:
------------------------------------------------------------------------ Nonverbal communication is easier or more fun for some people. You might put condoms near the place you have sex. Or you could simply pull one out and put it on when the right time comes around. As with other nonverbal sexual communication, it's pretty easy to tell if the other person is turned on or off. If turned on, go ahead. If turned off, you can usually smooth things over by laying the condoms aside and continuing with low risk activities.
...If a partner refuses to use condoms, don't fight it—do thing that are low risk or let them go. ------------------------------------------------------------------------
Is condom usage not negotiated ahead of the scene? Or perhaps the above passage was just borrowed from a safer sex guide for civilians? That sounds like great general advice, but some of it doesn't read like it was written for the needs of the adult industry."
The use of N-9 as an emergency measure to counteract a possible exposure immediately after the fact remains open to consideraton, though its usefulness for this purpose hasn't been clearly established.
It's the long-term or frequent use of N-9 that some researchers now consider a possible co-risk factor and that we no longer recommend.
And I think you're quite right that the latter passage is really meant for civilians and for performers' personal encounters. On sets, condom use should always be negotiated up front, and usually is, although certainly under some circumstances this discussion is deferred, whether by calculation or simple forgetfulness, until the scene is in progress.
Some unscrupulous directors will try and talk talent off condoms at the last minute and some performers will forget to mention their condom standards right up to the point where the condoms need to come out. Competent, honest directors and production managers discuss condom preferences with performers at the time they're cast, long before they ever get to the set.
Lots to talk about on the phone today. Thanks again.
Perhaps that's because I'm not trying to win an argument. I am simply offering the following opinions:
1) There is a wide gap of knowledge among performers, producers, and fans as to what the 30 day regime can and cannot do, and that it is most acutely vulnerable to infections arising in active male talent. (Again, this is easily modeled by anyone with a high school or better understanding of mathematics.)
2) Anecdotal accounts of off set behavior and AIM's own data suggests that male talent contracts HIV at a significantly higher rate than the sexually active population at large, and this will continue to pose the threat of on-set HIV transmissions at a rate that is significantly higher than found the sexual active population at large, and what limited data there is regarding on-set transmission does not contradict this prediction.
As I mentioned earlier, this was in evidence to me in 1999 and it was still in evidence to me in February of 2004, when a person would have been able to say in all truthfulness, "But in 6 years of testing, we've never had an on-set transmission."
You have repeatedly rejected mathematical reasoning in favor of forensics (indeed your love of words is richly in evidence with nearly every post you make) and empirical observation.
Each of these intellectual tools has strengths and weakness. Let's hope that each of us, given our respective tasks and responsibilities, has chosen the correct tools for the job.
Ernest, I appreciate the clarification about N-9 (i.e., the main concern arises with long-term usage, not with infrequent emergency measures). Looking at it from that angle, the text is probably fine as it stands. Although perhaps it wouldn't hurt to add a precautionary sentence to the effect that N-9 should not be relied upon habitually as an HIV preventative. I'm thinking aloud, and I hope you'll forgive me if I'm only confusing the issue further.
I knew almost nothing about you, Ernest, until I read your comments on these threads. (I have seen two of your movies, The Ultimate Guides to Anal Sex for Women, and liked them.) I'm completely out of my league when it comes to debates about statistics and forensics (if that's even what this is), so I'll let you and Tony wrestle that out to your hearts' content.
I just wanted to tell you that it feels good to discover that the chairman of AIM's board has such a deep, compassionate interest in these issues and a long history in thinking them through. I am sorry that you lost work due to your condom-only declaration after that first scare. That is a significant sacrifice to make.
For whatever it's worth, you have earned my respect.
ETA: Tony has made sacrifices, too. It looks to me like you're both doing the best job humanly possible from the positions you're in. I don't even understand what the two of you are quibbling about, to be honest. I mean, I see the differences in perspective, but they strike me as complimentary visions, not contradictory. I think the two of you should be friends. And fortunately, I have to go back to work now, so I have to leave this discussion, hopefully before I've made a complete ass of myself.
Given that he and I share similar goals, I suspect that Ernest is similarly puzzled. I will try to be succinct.
Comparisons continue to made between the prevalence and/or incidence of HIV infection in porn vs. prevalence and/or incidence of HIV infection the "civilian" population.
I believe that the comparisons being made are the wrong comparisons, leading producers, performers, and fans to the wrong inferences about the human cost of producing pornography in a world that features an incurable and fatal sexually transmitted disease.
I believe these erroneous conclusions ultimately work at cross-purposes to a goal that Ernest and I share – the production of pornography in a way that is safe, sane, and celebratory of the human sexual experience.
This, of course, is only my opinion. In support of my opinion I've offered some few statistical predictions, and the choices I've made in the belief that the consequences of ignoring these predictions are dire. Valid or not, my opinion is offered in sincerity. Do with it what you will.
Thanks for the kind words. Your respect, and that of others who share your concerns, means a great deal to me.
Being one of the two public faces of AIM (Sharon Mitchell is, of course, the other) isn't just a thankless job, it makes you a lightningrod for every kind of conflict surrounding issues of performer health and safety. I knew this would be the case going in and I'm still willing to accept it as a condition of doing something I consider important and that gives me much satisfaction in being of service to a community that has been generous to me in many ways. It's been more than worth the price.
And Tony, whatever our disagreements may be, I hope we've come to share some mutual respect in this long colloquy. We'll probably never see eye to eye on certain points, but we both care very passionately about the issues we're discussing here and we do seek the same end - a safer and more humane environment in which to realize our own visions of sexuality.
I hear your points and I think they're well taken. I don't think there's anybody in this business who wouldn't benefit from looking at the questions we've both raised seriously and in depth before making decisions that affect not only their own futures, or those of the people with whom they work, but all of of ours.
With that, I think I'll sign off and go back to trying to make a living. There's still lots of good porn to be made out there.
Well, I made my maître en droit in France and helped(?) one of my exes through the first semesters in med school (I always had to query her scientific vocabulary and identify body parts Though I admit, I still have no answer why all hot girls have thyroid problems). I work as a music producer, so the only truly professional advise I can offer would fall into this métier, just did the other stuff cuz my father threatened to cut me off with a shilling should I not learn at least one "reasonable" job (of course that was before I decided to catch my favorite "hermit crab" ).
Oh, and although I nearly burnt down a kindergarten in my youth and love to tie up corset laces I'm not really into BDSM. I guess I'm more into extreme cuddling, kissing and long sleeping hours. If it was after me I wouldn't post here anymore, but since it seems I have no say at home (not even on holiday....aaaargh) I do what I can (and enjoyed the discussion with you so far).
You always assume mandatory condoms go hand in hand with no testing as if it was written in stone. Ernest, you have made some good and some not so good arguments to defend the currently established system, however by constantly wording the problems which may arise with a lawful approach with a simplicity like this you leave little room to discuss new ideas which take a much needed amendment before making a switch to condoms into account. You already indicated interest in discussing other approaches, so I take it as your way to word things so that non lawyers can understand them and draw the best conclusions for their own good therefrom (to your best knowledge) rather than a try to test my patience.We only heard one opinion (thanks!) on that topic yet, to substantiate a conclusion here, Imho one would need to hear the legal opinion of at least two independent lawyers together with an outlook on the success rates of challenging CAL-OHSA in court (both, before and after a legislation amendment). This can't be done in two sentences (like so and so said it is like that), you'd need a full legal estimate. Would I be some law professor at an American university, this would be my next winter holiday exam for the students (yes, I think they would like me for that ).
Also from where I am right now I am not able to verify the likeliness of the Californian government to invent an official testing agency without adjusting employment regulations for sex-workers accordingly, as much as I believe Ernest has nothing but good intentions, I wouldn't take such a thing for a fact. I understand that there are forces who'd like to drive the porn business out of California, however I can hardly imagine everyone who'd work on an amendment to make HIV testing for performers transparent would belong to this group.
Once again, would the possibility arrise to change the currently voluntary testing towards a MANDATORY testing and MANDATORY condom regulation, it would be a win win situation to the advantage of the performers. I agree with Ernest that an approach which comes with the possibility to achieve "less" than legally unchallengeable testing and mandatory condoms is not desirable and moreover dangerous. However mandated ELISA/PCR & mandatory condoms would outclass the protection offered with the current system. I still think a non-profit organization like AIM could financially survive offering voluntary PCR-DNA tests. To date, with the information I have, I can not tell if it can or can't be done under the Californian gov (I am surprised others can with ease); and given the far-fetched legal construct used to separate prostitution from porn in California I'm also not sure yet if the total legalization of prostitution would be required or just "helpful" to do so. I think it's about time to bow out of this discussion until I have the information I need.
In response to your nonsense, I am European, but thanks for the "quarrelsome and ill-informed" anyway. I tried my best to learn a bit more about the legal system in America and think about ways out of this deadlock. Your argument is extremely clumsy, implying that the most unspeakable crimes some Germans did before I was even born has some inexplicable bearing on the arguments and questions that I have put forward. Even more so as my grandma is of Jewish origin. Today my registered residence is France while our main studio is located in South Germany. There is just about no way I take someone spitting out such resentments serious as a dicussion partner. You're not serious, are you? If you are I am sorry.
Besides I do not think that some, even funded, statistics which might display a more alarming result would be enough to change the behaviour of most producers, talent, distributors or consumers. As already pointed out earlier in this thread, while these porn addicted 'raincoaters' are a minority they are a very vocal, stubborn and active one, buying and reviewing a lot of product and creating a demand therefore. I agree on 'consciousness raising' on side of the performers though, as we have seen some few to change their minds after reevaluating the risks.
However, no members in this community but maybe the cougar and Lee O with their "anal creampie banlist" presented genuine offers to de-eroticize high-risk behavior. What we have at current state is a recipe for stillstand at best and the attempt of producers (those posting in this thread excluded) to profit at the risk of the health and safety of performers. A2P, creampies and agents putting talent on antibiotics screaming: "NONE of my girls will ever work with condoms!".
You draw an arguable analogy to the sickness of child molesters and the selfishness of so called 'porn fans' crying for the latest high-risk kink, still you want to shake hands and party with these people at the next ADT meet'n greet? Remember we are NOT talking about those fans dabbling with porn and too uninformed to know about risks and stuff but about those who know about the high risk acts and still demand such acts, thinking their personal pleasure justifies putting performers there since things are "consensual" and people get paid. Pressure from fans, pressure from producers, pressure from agents and often brittle personal surroundings make this sometimes more than just consent contra bonos but rather exploitation of financial or mental distress. To point at other high-risk jobs doesn't abdicate responsibility and it has nothing to do with feminism, stardom, polemic or religious zealots either.
And why not start with the 'consciousness raising' right here? Why not ban all series specifically dedicated to internal ejaculations from the ADT price rotation, or is that too much to ask? Last year the webmaster Steph pointed out she would like to see more distributors giving safer-sex product like yours or Ernest's stuff more promotion, so maybe the time is just about right to turn tables and take a look at the advert carousel for bakery products your friends have created. And before you answer, if you answer, don't tell me ADT could not afford to ban such product or it would be too much work, like as you told Tricia she can't pay her med bills if Evil Angel goes condom.
Contrary to some, I think most performers do not live in denial over the health risks but they rather accepted them as working risks not to be challenged , sometimes in danger of developing a tractable mindset, risks that were ruled out first suddenly become acceptable, be it to wave the wish to work with condoms goodbye, to shoot creampies against one's conscience with a new partner or just the belief that there will never be something like a performers union or even mandated condoms. I wish all those who care about the health and safety values espoused here would stand up and show it by calling down the many vocal members at ADT who don't.
We wish those fans who care and all performers a happy new year!
As usual, you have many thought-provoking things to say, and I agree with most of them, but I do need to make clear, evidently, why I am making such a big deal of the law that forbids employment discrimination due to HIV status. From the comment below, you seem to imply that this really is just my opinion, or a local situation in Calfiornia:
"You always assume mandatory condoms go hand in hand with no testing as if it was written in stone. Ernest, you have made some good and some not so good arguments to defend the currently established system, however by constantly wording the problems which may arise with a lawful approach with a simplicity like this you leave little room to discuss new ideas which take a much needed amendment before making a switch to condoms into account. You already indicated interest in discussing other approaches, so I take it as your way to word things so that non lawyers can understand them and draw the best conclusions for their own good therefrom (to your best knowledge) rather than a try to test my patience. "
I'm certainly not attempting to try anyone's patience here, though I've undoubtedly done so and had my own tried in return, however the legal restrictions preventing discrimination against anyone with HIV when it comes to employment is settled law throughout the nation. There were a series of very high profile litigations regarding this problem all over the country during the height of the HIV/AIDS epidemic and the findings were the same everywhere. Court tests all the way up through the federal level have consistently upheld state statutes banning such discrimination and no challenge to such statutes has ever been successful in a single court in the US. I am not a lawyer, but I do read this particular situation very closely for obvious reasons.
So I'm not just being stubborn here or talking about what may happen if an attempt to mandate HIV testing as a condition of employment in porn is made. I'm talking about what has already happend and is the law throughout the US. If you think some amendment or exception will be made for porn in Calfiornia, when it has already been made clear neither state agencies nor private advocacy groups can or will support such an exception, you're certain to be disappointed.
If in the name of an industry it scarcely acknowledges as legal this state were to take it upon itself to rewrite law for the whole country, a federal court would be very quick to make clear just how far out of line California had stepped. You talk about doing this as if it were some small bureaucratic regulation that could be handily set aside by a few guys on a committee somewhere. However much you might wish that, you're really hoping for a massive realignment of legal precedent on a national scale after literally decades of legislation and litigation establishing the current laws.
If the healthcare industry, which is one of the largest in this country and had a powerful interest in getting an exemption from the mandatory-testing-for-employment ban (the fear of litigation by patients claimng to have been infected by medical personal) couldn't change get the laws adjusted to their particular needs, what makes you think the weak, divided and unpopular porn industry could?
It still comes down to this harsh truth: mandatory condoms could be written into law, but not mandatory testing. Talk to all the lawyers you want. If they know American law, they'll have to agree.
Now, there is some room for debate over whether or not voluntary testing would survive. Certainly, smart porn people would want it to, but again, if voluntary testing resulted in loss of employment, the courts would still favor a discrimination claim based on misuse of the tests, which could rightly be said to have been, de facto, involuntary conditions of employment no matter how they were described. Alas, in its thoroughness, the anti-discrimination precedent closes up loopholes of that kind as well.
This is the heart of the real problem with the whole government regulation approach. Untll this problem is somehow solved - and I have no clue how that could be done - we're better off with what we've got now, which is mandatory testing enforced by industry standards and condoms as a matter of choice.
My response to you is that we can and should do a better job of selling the idea of safer-sex porn to the industry and consumers because that's the only part of the system we can realistically hope to influence. We need to invest our efforts there and try to take care of our own problems rather than expecting the government to do it for us, because they won't.
Don't take my word for it. Read up on the past history of health laws related to HIV in the workplace in the US and see if you don't end up agreeing with me, even if it's not what you would prefer.
