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Dec 14, 2010 at 8:58 am
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Still, I think the most interesting thing is the related videos I got at the end. I learned:
It's never just HIV, it's HIV+
Old Spice
Daniel Radcliff
The 9/11 Attacks
Scary stuff indeed.
Get tested. Inform your partners of your status. Use protection while taking part in risky behaviors. If you don't, gay or straight, male or female, YOU'RE A DICK.
I think someone does need a little sense slapped into them. I don't think this ad will really be able to do it, but something has to change. It has to come from the ground up, nothing any of these major national organizations do is ever going to help that much.
No one wants to say it, but it may not be possible to reach some members of some communities - the DL folks, the closeted men who think they're "selective", whatever - those people are so in denial about the risks that they face that they aren't even going to pay attention to an ad they're comfortable with - why should they pay attention to an ad that tries to frighten them?
No, I'm not saying give up. But I think an ad that speaks directly to the target groups - openly, honestly, without accusation or prejudice or fear-mongering - is more likely to get them to pay attention.
So... scare tactics seem to work sometimes. And the smoking rate has come way, way down over the last 40 years, thanks to some pretty scary tactics, ads, warnings, etc.
Certainly different populations of people (out + affluent gay men, DL + closeted 'straight' men, etc.) are likely to respond to different types of messages, so there's probably more than one answer.
Something *should* change since the rates of new infection are waaay too high. And we can find out how to change things if we don't already know. It's an empirical question, not some big mystery.
At any rate, my boyfriend was watching it with me and pretty much said, 'anything milder is not going to work because men simply hate going to the doctor or doing anything proactive about their health.' If that's the case, maybe this tactic is less about gay men and more about men; if you don't scare the bejeezus out of them they won't do it.
A condom may make anal sex less deadly but is does not make it safe.
GMHC stopped being an organization run for and by "rich white men" a long, long time ago. For years now their client base has been overwhelming ethnic, poor and includes large numbers of heterosexual women of color.
The Dr. Hill quoted in the article is herself African American.
I'm not sure there's going to be any single approach. I can think of a number of ways to approach it, each of which will contribute something. First off the bat, real sex education, and sex education that includes LGBT issues (yes, I know, dream on) for kids. Then, different ways of targeting different populations, because there just isn't going to be a one size fits all for this.
Free condoms, free testing, free counseling, huge awareness campaigns & ads on all this. Funding all this is another problem.
As far as stigma goes, I have to say in my personal experience, the more we talk about something the more the stigma recedes. IT IS SILENCE THAT CREATES STIGMA AND SHAME.
wtf? ????? go fuck yourself in the ass with a lightbulb
what makes you think access to condoms is the problem?
what facts do you base your assertion on?
you made it up, didn't you....
plucked it right out of your ass?
perhaps Dan could do a series of YouTubes videos.
tearfully soliciting free condoms for homosexuals.
that would solve the problem totally, don't you think?
silly girl.
don't you realize christian hate and bigotry will melt your free condoms?
As a former occasional social smoker, the anti-smoking ads featuring real people with tracheotomies, etc. definitely got into my head.
The problem is a lack of any sort of initiative to seek or use condoms. Lowering the price to zero may not affect that very much, per se.
It's true though, that if you can give away enough condoms, and get people to take them, that there are some people who wouldn't have used condoms before who will. Whether they'll make a habit of it, or go out of their way to get more, is another question altogether. I'm not saying that giving them away is not worthwhile, just that educating and motivating people to actually use them, and reinforcing their use as a good thing, is more important.
you don't because you have unregistered comments off.
which is the same as (but easier on the neck than) keeping your head up your ass.....
well.
that would be safer than homosexual sex.
plus the bulb end is ribbed for maximum pleasure.
I feel like the fact that so many people see it as a "gay issue" leads to the general public not caring. I personally feel so uncomfortable with how heterosexuals don't see this as an issue.
Would it be more useful to promote this as issue that everyone needs be active in terms of participating in prevention? Or is best to focus solely on the communities that are at the highest risk?
I'm a heterosexual mixed race female, but I feel like if I wasn't passionate about sexual health education and promotion, this issue wouldnt even be on my radar. Its not on the radar for a lot of my peers.
Just a few thought, hmmmm....
I should also mention that I know of what I speak. Some of these same tactics are not and have not worked on members of my own family who continue to ignore or ignored the risks. They are paying or have paid the ultimate price for their unwillingness and/or inability to completely comprehend or properly consider the consequences of their actions.
I'll also climb out on a limb and suggest that AIDS service organizations, groups who's major efforts are centered around providing help and services to people already diagnosed are not necessarily the best arbiters of what sort prevention messages are effective.
For years groups like GMHC have insisted that prevention messages be processed through a filter based on the sensitivities of those who are already positive. This is understandable given their broad based mission to serve both the positive and the wider community. But much of the research that they cite is based on focus groups—which may tell you what a certain panel of people may like, but tells you little about what may in fact be effective in market.
I've attended HIV related focus groups and I can tell you that human nature being what it is, most people will say they don't like messages that are scary or lecturing, but that doesn't mean the message wouldn't be effective if used, it just means they'd rather not be exposed to it. Liking a message and being effected by a message are not the same thing. And when you're dealing with disease there's nothing much to like about the topic in first place. Trying to make the issue likable is a bit beside the point.
oh goody.
clueless 'never-blame-the-culprit-or-hold-responsible-parties-culpable' liberalsim....
"Would it be more useful to promote this as issue that everyone needs be active in terms of participating in prevention? Or is best to focus solely on the communities that are at the highest risk?"
are you mocking yourself?
we aren't sure.
how exactly do we effect "everyone" being "active" "in terms of participating" in prevention?
are you volunteering to apply condoms in the bath house?
Taking the focus outside the homosexual community could really be effective.
When grannies and 5 year olds are being stripsearched at airport security stalls they could also be given a severe tounge lashing about anal sex/anal cancer.
That should help reduce both terrorism and the AIDS rate equally effectively....
I'll probably never know, but I think maybe these kind of scare tactics might have a chance at getting through to some people.
I don't know about drug users and alcoholics, but actually, all the evidence shows that those graphic warnings on cigarette packages are absolutely working. And this ad is no different from those. It may not work for everyone but it will surely work for some; I see nothing wrong with it.
how about a super bowl ad with this bloody AIDs/anal cancer rectum vs a healthy one?
I think there were issues that could as well be covered that weren't: even with sero-sorting and only sleeping with other Poz men, one still runs the risk of contracting syphyilis, gonorrhea, shigella, and etc.-ad nauseum, all of which wreak greater havoc on immunsupressed bodies. Many of these STIs are not prevented with condom use and can be spread via physical contact during sex (shegellosis and HPV, for example. The message is and needs to continue to be: don't become infected with HIV in the first place.
That is exactly the kind of impact that needs to be made. Something visual, something heartbreaking, so tangible that many people can relate to it even if they themselves have not experienced the problem directly. Something to share with your children and family who can pass it on to their other family members and friends. Something that can be talked about, discussed openly and brought up at city council meetings. Something that the President and foreign dignitaries will feel a need to comment on. Something that will jump start it's own national awareness campaign.
Unfortunately great ideas that evoke change are few and far between. If only Dan could just pass the hero torch off to someone else. I'll be waiting and hoping.
What really worked for us at the beginning of the aids epidemic was seeing all our friends and acquaintances die. Since this no longer happens... we need to scare ourselves in other ways.
Because out gays only "occasionally" lose friends to aids, the don't see it as any worse than heart disease or cancer, or having a car accident, something that "can happen to anyone". We're back to the old "you gotta die from something" attitude. (Of course, if those who are poz told their friends about every little and not-so-little ailment they get, the other ones might be a bit more careful, but they don't because they wouldn't want to be ostracized for spoiling the party...)
As for the DL/closet crowd, even if one of their friends dies from aids, it's highly unlikely that his wife is going to go around telling everyone he had aids, because she's ashamed of having been married to a faggot and never having realized it. She's going to say he died from pneumonia or whatever the actual disease that killed him was. So there's not much awareness being raised there.
Besides, for many in the DL/closet crowd, buying or carrying condoms is like admitting to being gay (because everyone knows that aids only affects gays, right?). So they just won't. Denial is the default human attitude, not the exception.
We need scare tactics, and we need to scare absolutely everyone. Targeting ads at the out gay/bisexual population only means that all others will keep thinking it won't happen to them.
I'm out-gay, hippie-old, sex-active, and bug-negative...
Dies this mean we shouldn't get out the word that AIDS is a horrible disease? Of course not. I just wish that it could be dione without resorting to scare tactics about the worst that *could* happen. While I applaud the effort, I question the method.
Since in a gay male encounter you're upping the odds of that attitude by a multiple of two, it seems like an uphill battle. Yeah, yeah, there are women who won't get tested and who don't like it when a guy wears a condom, so maybe I'm being sexist. But I don't have much problem with extreme commercials if it gets the message across, especially as it's hitting pretty close to home lately, and one of my friends had a near miss. Heck, while you're at it, direct a few more of those extreme commercials at straight men (and women) because they're not really getting the message either. Besides, if you direct traumatizing commercials at a range of sexual orientations, it's not going to make gay teenaged boys feel singled out, which is often the last thing they need.
Still, i'm not going to watch that video, just based on the cauliflower dipped in blood. WTF? I don't even like cauliflower, but i'm worried the image might make me associate it with broccoli, which I love.
The thing is, the same could be said about any campaign that aims to stop people from engaging in dangerous behavior: They're never any good for the psyche of those for whom it's too late.
If fucking with a condom just "doesn't feel the same," how come guys—even guys who bitched about putting the condom on—never notice when a condom breaks mid-fuck? Shouldn't the sudden rush of intense, overwhelming sensation make the guy's face fall the fuck off? Shouldn't his head explode?
Ok, you're right to be some sort of... upset for this, but you have not seen HIV prevention campaigns here in Chile. Over the last decade, it's been a shame after another. In 2009. there was somewhat of a scandal because it openly showed two gay men through open TV at many hours, some of them when children are still awake. The conservatives (the majority) cried loud for weeks for this immorality, quite a disaster considering almost every mass media company here, is owned by a conservative related man, or group of men. This year, with the state in conservative's hands -more conservatives than before- it's been worse, with an idiotic caimpaign that seems like a joke. "¿Who's got AIDS?" it's the name of the campaign, just imagine the rest of it.
I would say that most people who say "condoms break" have never ever had a breakage, but use that argument as an excuse for not using them (probably the same idiots Dan refers to @ 50). Or else they put the condoms on incorrectly so that they will indeed break, and then the idiots will have a reason to say that they do. I'm also sure that if there's a survey, they'll overreport breakages (or make them up) so that they can later quote these skewed statistics to back up their claims.
It goes back to what I was saying @ 44 : Human beings generally don't do anything that they don't enjoy unless they absolutely have to.
In the end, the "condoms break" line is really only a test of the other person's gullibility and/or stupidity. Use good condoms. They don't break.
@Dan: It's very noticeable when condoms break. You can definitely feel a lot more sensation at that instant (though I have only experienced this in a vagina). If they break on you, you're probably using condoms that are too small; not using enough lube; not leaving enough of a space at the tip; or using Lifestyles condoms.
@7: I would bet most people have condoms, know how important it is to use them, and still don't. Not even because of sensation as much as all the other problems: they only work when you're hard, so you can't really get soft and hard again, you can't easily switch back and forth between intercourse and other acts, and you can't stay in your partner for a long time after you come. They require a pause and delay, artificially separating intercourse from other sex acts, and requiring you to make sure to stay hard at the crucial moment. They take away from the tastes and smells of sex, and they make your hands and body all uncomfortably goopy and sticky.
Obviously, HIV makes all that look like nothing, but people aren't good at long-term thinking in the excitement of sex. When you're in the moment, thinking about sex, it's easy to not care if you die tomorrow.
@55, it's complicated. See, I've told people for years that cauliflower looks like broccoli's undead twin after it got attacked by a (likely vegetarian) vampire and ... My brain makes some weird leaps, is really what it comes down to.
@55- Blackrose said it all as to why men don't/won't wear them. By the time they're on and lubed, the hardon is gone...back to foreplay...and repeat until one gives up.
Why are no (I mean ZERO) efforts being made to develop some type of disease prevention that's NOT a major hassle with the equipment? And don't tell me about female condoms and wrestling with *that* garbage bag in the middle of sex. There's got to be a better way.
Why don't you put the condom/lube on while you're giving oral sex? (After you've put on condoms a few times, you should be able to do it with your eyes closed). Your boner doesn't go down because you're doing something hot, and you can then seamlessly segue from oral to penetration. That simple.
@59: I believe you can insert a female condom a few hours ahead of time.
(Runs out to buy boxes of condoms, and chastity belt, and swears he'll never have sex with anyone again until he's seen years of consistently-negative HIV tests.)
@59: Ah! NOW I get it. You're not supposed to put a condom on in the middle of sex, you're supposed to put it on at the beginning of any sexual activity. That's the only way that it reaches maximum effectiveness for preventing transmission of infections; putting it on before any chance of one's penis encountering infection-carrying secretions. For pregnancy-prevention only, that's not as much of a concern I suppose. Are there really that many men out there who lose their erections in the 10-20 seconds necessary to grab the condom off the nightstand, open the package, pinch the tip, and roll it on? If you all are losing erections after just a few seconds without direct stimulation (focused or not), you might want to look at what else is going on, as this doesn't happen to everyone and it's causing a problem in your sex life.
@61 (and anyone else who says the claim that condoms change the sensation of fucking is bullshit): Of course condoms change the sensation, though not necessarily in a negative or all-negative fashion, and not necessarily to the extent that I think the protection they offer isn't worth the trade-off. "Completely changed the experience" is a bit of hyperbole, to be sure (for one thing, it implies the entire "experience" is constituted only by the sensations of fucking his penis into orifice X), but it very much does alter the sensation. Try slipping your finger into your vagina (when you're aroused, obviously) with a latex glove (or finger cot/finger condom) on and without one, then multiply the difference a couple times to account for how much more sensitive an erect penis is than a finger if you want some idea of how it changes.
Seriously, I wonder about my fellow men sometimes. Whinging about the sensation not being quite right, or having to pause for ten seconds to put a condom on. Do you know what really changes sensations, and potentially interrupts a sex life? STDs and unplanned pregnancies.
Man the fuck up, shut the fuck up, and put the condom on.
I know HIV is a much bigger problem than good sex (though I don't think any other STD is). But seriously, it's understandable if people knowingly, voluntarily accept the risk of STDs by not using condoms and taking other precautions instead. It's a personal choice, and this "STFU and wear it" nonsense doesn't really seem to respect that everyone can choose their own level of risk.
I totally understand that using a condom has an effect on what I can and can't do during sex. Lots of factors have that sort of effect - periods, head colds, herpes flare-ups. I am just saying that there are situations where it can be necessary to man up and deal with the restrictions because the alternative is an unacceptable level of risk to me and to my partner.
I completely agree that partners can negotiate an acceptable level of risk and determine what - if any - precautions they wish to take. My "STFU and wear it" wasn't aimed at those people. It was for the men who expose their casual partners - typically young, typically inexperienced sexually - to risks of STDs and pregnancies because they don't like sex with a condom. I'm talking to the boys who choose to expose their partners to a level of risk that those partners haven't chosen, because those partners aren't mature or confident enough yet to demand a say.
AIDS will still kill you. That's a fact that should never be swept under the rug, or even "softened", out of concern for some fragile flowers' self-esteem.
"BEFORE we have sex let's get tested TOGETHER
for A VARIETY of STDs."
Do sexual health checkups reduce the ambiguity and can they be
like anything else POTENTIAL sex partners do together?...
If you needed surgery would you want the surgeon to wash
before operating?...
If you needed a blood transfusion would you want the blood tested
before or after the transfusion?...
see also
http://notb4weknow.blogspot.com
http://continuedat.blogspot.com
"tested together" alerts
http://www.google.com/alerts
http://www.google.com/search?q=%22tested…
like anything else POTENTIAL sex partners do together?...
http://notb4weknow.blogspot.com
http://continuedat.blogspot.com
"tested together" alerts
http://www.google.com/alerts
http://www.google.com/search?q=%22tested…