…and Advice to Squeaky Clean Whores!
Many gay men with HIV are fed up with people’s profiles on dating websites who blatantly stigmatise and discriminate by posting references like ‘clean, you be too’ or ‘disease free, you be too’. Some men are now choosing to reclaim the word ‘clean’ by refusing to buy into this display of ignorance and bigotry.
Communities have a history of reclaiming words that have been used to stigmatise and discriminate. The gay community itself has reclaimed many words, for example ‘queer’, ‘faggot’, ‘slut’, and most recently ‘ho’. None of these words hold the same power to cut and intimidate with self righteous moral authority as they once did.
In a time where everyone it seems participates in the formation of culture and its propagation through social media, communities living with HIV are giving a clear signal that ‘enuf is enuf’ (www.enuf.org.au), a reference to the anti stigma and discrimination campaign orchestrated by Living Positive Victoria.
Late last year, NAPWHA in collaboration with the National Centre in HIV Social Research produced a timely report titled The HIV Stigma Audit Community Report (2012). It found that sex partners were by far the leading cause of HIV stigma when measuring feelings of being avoided, rejected or excluded.
Some people who struggle with their HIV diagnosis sometimes describe feelings of being ‘dirty’ and not being able to get ‘clean’, which is compounded by the fact that HIV is not currently curable (although we’re getting much closer). So in the context of dating websites, someone reading ‘clean, you be too’ is read like a social obituary from which there is no escape or redemption.
In times past, some people with HIV would have died carrying the burden of disempowering labels like ‘dirty’, ‘unclean’ or ‘toxic’. Now that life expectancy is approaching normal (and may well already be there for most), do you really think confident, empowered people with HIV are going to put up with stigmatising crapola for 40 plus years? I think not!
Who can really make any claim to be ‘clean’ when the Human Papillomvirus (Genital warts) or Genital Herpes are both endemic within our communities?
Real life scares from Avian to Swine flu have catapulted many of us into an infection conscious world, were anti-bacterial hand washes are now becoming disturbingly common place
(how did we ever survive!). Looking through your laundry cupboards, you may find a substantial arsenal of chemicals weapons ready for deployment. The warfare against germs is never ending. However, sex can be filthy and you can fully protect yourself without blaming, shaming, avoiding or rejecting people that have a virus.
When it comes to HIV there are easy sensible things you can do. Be open, accepting and inclusive, so people who have HIV feel comfortable letting you know and you can choose more easily the horny sex you can have together without angst or harm. Many argue that the safest sex you can have is with someone who knows their HIV status, as they demonstrate a capacity for self responsibility and care for others. If your play mate is fucking around bareback like you are (untested, or not often enough), probably best to still use a condom, or get some HIV medication from your doctor/emergency department, Post Exposure Prophylaxis (PEP) to prevent/reduce the likelihood of HIV acquisition. Do it fast within 72 hours or don’t bother (the effectiveness of treatment diminishes every hour you wait).
So how can you be a squeaky clean whore year in year out? Many believe posting the demand on your profile that you will only meet other similar squeaky clean whores is worthwhile. The same people also believe that requests to not have people; wink at you, or not contact you without a photo, not have any baggage, be hung, fit and be between a certain age range, works brilliantly …not!
After everyone has meticulously read your profile and complied with your instructions and self selected out if appropriate (who are you kidding?). You can be sure many will assume, that no symptoms right now equals squeaky clean (some STI’s can be asymptomatic but active), after all Sydney last weekend doesn’t count because memory gets hazy very quickly, including recalling how much bareback sex you may have had in between tests .
Be real, can you really claim to be ‘clean’ after any bareback sex? When did your play mate last get tested for HIV? Or are you assuming that he’s ‘clean’ because he only plays with other ‘clean’ guys? Most regular HIV tests actually test for antibodies to HIV (which can take three months to be detectable after a potential exposure), meaning that your partner could have HIV and not know it. Condoms, as HIV prevention still easily trumps regular testing regimes, or unaware and not ‘fully honest’ hot horny men.
Starting 2013 I reflected on how do we make being gay better? Reclaiming ‘marriage’ is another step forward in this direction. Part of the solution may also lie in dropping the labelling of same sex as dirty, or that people with HIV are dirty, or the person that has more sex than you is dirty. As people with HIV reclaim ‘clean’, we do it not only for ourselves but for everyone who has ever experienced prejudice of this kind.
Cipriano Martinez
Cipriano is a board member of the NAPWHA, read more of his writing at positiveadvocate.com
