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Written by paul
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Wednesday, 15 July 2009 14:29 |
 In a surprising move that the bareback porn star and producer Owen Hawk calls "complete idiocy," International Mr. Leather announced today an outright ban on bareback porn vendors and merchandisers from participating in its popular annual Leather Market.
UPDATED: Read IML Founder Chuck Renslow's response here.
The unexpected letter states that the ban is "effective immediately" and condemns a wide swath of companies and materials, from film vendors to product merchandisers to "gifts, post cards or any other information tending to promote or advocate barebacking." The letter states that HIV infections are on the rise and goes on to say:
Too many in our community believe HIV/AIDS is curable or manageable. Too few understand that HIV/AIDS infections dominate life. ... Several years ago when “Meth” was the scourge of our community, IML drew a line in the sand and raised awareness and used all our influence to try and stop this addictive madness. As is the case with HIV/AIDS, we believe it is our further obligation to do everything in our power to prevent future infections.
Unapologetic barebackers are livid, naturally. The former studio porn star and current bareback fuck-stud producer Owen Hawk attacks IML organizers for drawing a connection between bareback porn and rising infections. He writes:
The fact of the matter is that if you are HIV negative and want to stay that way, you are not going to go to a sex party sponsored by Treasure Island Media and sit with your ass in air and a bottle of poppers. You’re far more likely to get infected by trusting that guy on manhunt who has negative in his status and swears that he was tested two weeks ago. Now there are not going to be any more parties sponsored by TIM and all those guys are gonna be on manhunt, so please don’t be an idiot.
While the infection goodie bags at IML contain more than just HIV, there is no telling what the future holds for the sex police there. To wit, upon returning fom Chicago IML this year, the bareback blogger Raw Top wrote:
It happened last year, it happened this year - brought something home from IML. But it’s not surprising: I mean I fucked about 19 different guys and got blowjobs from a few more, and some of those guys had been fucked over 100 times.
And yes -- in case you were wondering, Raw Top is pissed about this. We're sure the "Hot BB btm" from last year's IML Chicago isn't all that happy either:
RELATED:
Tim & Roma (and Wolf Hudson's Testicles) at The 2009 Grabby Awards
They Can Treat That Right?: The 2008 Grabby-IML Weekend In Review
The Sword Guide to Bareback Sex Blogs
New 'Sex Positive' Documentary Reminds Us That We're Filthy Sluts
IML Bans Bareback Companies, Ignores Reality (Dark Alley blog)
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Comments
Bareback vendors and people who want to support their businesses can have their own events in their own locations with their own money. If they're as successful as they say they are, they can afford to do so.
IML donates large sums of money to HIV / AIDS prevention charities. It's been glaringly hypocritical of them to allow businesses that advocate high-risk behavior to benefit by participating in their vendor market.
As an owner of a business that continues to promote safer sex, I applaud Chuck's admission that IML can no longer ignore the obvious conflict of interest.
Brian Mills
TITAN MEDIA
In this situation the best prevention would be to create spaces where men that are already poz or don't care can play with each other, thereby "sorting" the risk pool as much as possible, and distribute Harm Reduction materials to those at high risk. Well guess what... who was already organizing these sex parties? Who has access to this population to distribute materials? Those same companies that have just been banned, and who is going to organize them now? No one as far as I know.
Its like this, you have these companies that have not only access to high risk populations, but also the trust of those populations -- and if you have worked in Harm Reduction you know how important both access and trust are. But instead of going to these companies and saying "hey we want to work in an innovative and non judgmental way to do some Harm Reduction work" they just want to shut out and alienate these companies, losing a huge opportunity to forward their stated goals.
In other words you have a situation where people say they want to do "everything in their power" to help the problem, except they can't get over their moral aggrandizing and address the situation in a pragmatic and effective way. They think, foolishly in my opinion, that blacklisting, alienating, and trying to censor or otherwise sanction bareback porn that they are going to effect people's behavior. Really what they are doing is losing a potential allies because they cannot get over their morality-based judgments of other people's consensual sexual preferences.
But yeah, it's their event and they can do whatever they want, however foolish I think they are being.
Owen Hawk
Dark Alley Media
Leather88, I really think this is something that should eventually be address industry wide, even by condom-only producers who often pair HIV poz men with HIV negative men without thinking they have any responsibility to disclose that information because they use rubbers. Remember, I was a model for all of these companies for years before starting Dark Alley, I know they had at the time 0 protocols in place to protect models beyond the condoms. Would I be happy to be part of a conversation about how to address this industry-wide? Of course. But Its nearly impossible to have a discussion when the other party starts out with the assumption that you are evil and immoral.
Because of high amount of HIV poz models in gay porn, I don't think a mandatory testing and quarantine policy, like the straight industry, would be workable. But there are other options that are possible that are not too invasive of models privacy. There should definitely be training offered to producers to learn how to speak to models about this -- most don't even know how to bring up the subject, as it is a difficult thing to communicate about. I also don't think porn companies should administer tests themselves, certainly not without protocols for dealing with delivering potential positive results.
And I have no interest in being a spokesperson for anyone other than myself.
Owen
This is about the commercial exploitation of high risk sex, not about personal and private behavior. No one’s freedom of speech is being taken away. You can still do whatever you want personally and you can still make and sell all the bareback content you want…you just can’t sell it at IML anymore. It’s a matter of principle for Chuck and he’s standing up and saying what he believes. And guess what…it’s his event so he gets to make the decisions.
oh hang on, one of those is already taken...
This is a serious issue. I believe this is only the tip of the iceberg, IML sets the standard for the entire leather community and I think we will see a lot of other voices stand up to do what is right by not promoting and glamorizing a sexual behavior that has deadly consequences. Unless all the bareback companies want to provide the - BILLION dollars for treating HIV/AIDS I don't think there should be any choice in the matter or room for anyone to talk. If we are going to accept that it is a "right to bareback" and/or your "personal choice" then I guess all of us raising money and funding organizations and programs helping gay men with HIV/AIDS maybe should rethink supporting these efforts if it is in vain.
Cancer, diabetes and a multitude of other diseases are largely the result of genetics combined with environmental factors, though not 100% exclusively. HIV/Hep C are the result of sexual behavior, something that CAN BE CONTROLLED by the simple act of putting on a condom each and every time you have sex., As I stated earlier, the facts are for every 2 people receiving treatment for HIV/AIDS there are 5 new infections. Worldwide right now fifty billion dollars is spent on HIV/AIDS, at the growing pace of infections it is estimated that ninety billion dollars will need to be spent. Funding is simply unsustainable at these rates. Countries have put a stop to things such as smoking because of the toll it is taking on the health care system, obesity I guarantee you will be next in line. Why should HIV be any different when it is 100% preventable??? The solution is simple in order to reverse these trends: put on a condom every time you have sex or find a monogamous relationship.
Back to the point of this news article: The end of this story may be near anyhow as HIV/AIDS organizations are suing OSHA in the state of California to MANDATE that all adult movies require condom use 100% of the time because they are not following guidelines established for body fluids and how they are handled. That will put an end to this story and debate once and for all, as it should.