Barebacking.
Skin-on-skin.
Doing it raw.

Do I have your attention?
These euphemisms for unpro-
tected sex are some of the most
charged phrases circulating in
the gay community today.
While a significant percentage
of gay men engage in unpro-
tected sex, you can bet that al-
most anybody you ask, gay or
straight, will vehemently con-
demn the activity as irrespon-
sible, foolish and downright
wicked.

Rubbish. The American
public has been misled, once
again, by hysterics, opportun-
ists and the desire for easy an-
swers.

Allow me to make myself
perfectly clear: I am for safe
sex. Whether you are HIV-
positive or negative, you have
a responsibility to discuss your
health status with your sexual
partners and to proceed ac-
cording to mutual consent. If
you are HIV—negative, no mat-
ter how much you love the feel
of skin—on—skin sex, you should
use rubbers every time. Being
HIV-positive is a bigger pain in
the ass than you can imagine.
But I can't tell you what to do.
Nobody can. Sex and risk are,
and have always been, bedfel-
lows. The balance that you
strike between them is your
decision alone. It is private. So
long as you don't put others in
danger, your sexual decisions
are your business and nobody
else’s. ~

’ My mother, of all people,

 

 

"Es 

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made this point to me most ef-
fectively. I was driving from
Washington to New York City
with her shortly after I had
tested positive for HIV. I was
straining to explain how I had
become infected. I wanted her
to know that being exposed to
HIV was a consequence of a
very confused and unhappy
time in my life, when I had
been grappling with a host of
serious issues: depression,
loneliness, addiction, profes-
sional disillusionment. Sex
was my only connection to
happiness for quite some time,
and I rationalized tremendous
risks in order to attain it.

To my surprise, my 68
year old mother looked at me
calmly and said, ”Dear, that's
nothing new. I understand.”
She went on to explain that
when she was a young
woman, living alone in New
York City, she too had to weigh
sexual pleasure against dire
consequences. It was a serious

situation for a single woman to‘

become pregnant in those
days. Abortion was at best a
risky and clandestine proce-
dure. Carrying an illegitimate
child to term was all but a
recipe for ruin. Mom managed
not to conceive until she was
married, but she had faced the
risks of having a sexual life as
a single woman, and she un-
derstood, better than any

medical professional I've‘

talked to recently, how I could
have let the grim specter of
AIDS into my life.

So let's get back to bare-
back sex and put the issue in
its proper context. The reckless
element aside (and, like it or
not, there will always be a reck-

 

Y 0 II anna
less element), barebacking is
becoming increasingly popu-

' lar between HIV— positive men.

It is also becoming increasingly
popular in the medical estab-
lishment to condemn bareback
sex between HIV-positive part-
ners. This condemnation is
based on the theory of reinfec-
tion, which speculates that it is
possible for an HIV-positive
person to become exposed,
through unprotected sex, to
new variations of the virus. In
this way, the theory goes, a
person may contract strains of
HIV that have already devel-
oped resistance to medications
he or she has not yet used,
thereby reducing that
individual’s options for de-
fense.

However, there are no
documented cases of reinfec-
tion to date. I don't say this in
the interest of encouraging
HIV-positive people to have
unprotected sex. I am merely
correcting misinformation that
the gay press (notably Larry
Kramer and Michelangelo
Signorile) and local HIV ser-
vice providers are fobbing off
as fact on a populationthat has
enough problems already. At
my first visit to the Compre-
hensive Care Clinic, I was
warned by the staff against
having unprotected sex and
told that doing so would only
make their jobs harder.

It annoys me that HIV-
positive people are being bur-
dened with a speculative
moral responsibility that effec-
tively prevents them from en-
joying what is, for many, the
only up-side of their condition.
Condemning the activity
smacks of a quarantine sensi-
bility. The only sure way to
avoid sexual transmission of
HIV is to abstain from sex en-
tirely, and even safe sex is a
calculated risk. Unprotected
sex between HIV-positive part-
ners is also a calculated risk,
and it is all the more important
that those considering it be
presented with accurate infor-
mation. Members of the media
and the medical establishment
who willfully misrepresent the
facts are not only doing the
HIV- positive community a
disservice, they are compro-
mising their own credibility.

An interesting analogy to
consider is that of open homo-
sexuality. Think of how many
people have proclaimed their
homosexuality publicly over
the ages, despite the real pos-
sibility of discrimination,
physical abuse and even death.
They were not behaving badly,
they were not putting anyone

BAREBACKING, p24

 

 
 

  
  
 

 

OUT IN THE MOUNTAINS — MARCH 1998 — 21

 

Susan McKenzie MS.

Licensed Psychologist—Master

Experienced therapist specializing in the individual and

relationship issues of Lesbian Women and Gay Men
Montpelier Norwich

802 295-5533

Insurance Accepted—Sliding Fee Scale

Quechee

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GYNECOLOGIC ASSOCIATES

23 Mansfield Avenue,
Burlington, Vermont 05401
802-863-9001
Fax;802-863-4951

Cheryl A. Gibson M.D.
Susan F. Smith M.D.

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Mara Vijups, M.D.
Family Practice Specialist
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Enosburg Swanton East Fairfield
933-5831 827-3032

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specializing in adolescent and pediatric medical care

PCB 806. 184 Rt. 7 South
Milton, VT 05468
(888) 527-8189
rrecchio@together.net

 

  
  

Queer History of White River Junction

continued from page fifteen

time sharing computer in an American university or college
at Dartmouth in the late 1960s. This enabled immediate com-

munication throughout ”Big Green.” It also had an unex-

pected benefit; anonymous messages could be sent and ren-
dezvous arran ed. While threats of ex ulsion and loss of one’s
8 P

job — even a tenured position — hung in the air, this was a
less threatening amorous avenue to pursue, prefiguring
today's internet chat rooms.

,1" his story focuses on, needless to say, only one aspect of the

queer community in the Upper Valley — and perhaps the most

vocal and nefarious one. As a queer history of White River ]ct.,
Vermont, this small eflort is very much a work—in—progress and can
be seen as a kind of antidote to the kind of sanitized ”get—married-
and-join-the-military—just-like—norrnalfolks” mentality that appears
to he defining the character of this decade. One can only imagine
the kind of wonderful and strange tales a queer history project for
the entire state would unearth. Places for interested researchers to
begin are towns that have seen some type of queer activity — Bel-
lows Falls,_Brattleboro, Rutland, and of course Burlington. ”Dyke
reunion,” OITM, Dec., 1997, is an admirable and recent attempt
in this direction. The 1970s and 805 are, after all, History. (Olestra
is shocked.) If enough of us collect lavender memories the compila-
tion would resemble a kind of Vermont ”Before Stonewall” and could
he a satisfying addition to Gay Studies in our region. Anyone with
memories of gay Vermont life from any era, should feelfree to con-
tact the author, c/o The Main Street Museum, Box 378, Hartford,_
- VT 05047 c