AIDS Healthcare Foundation’s Michael Weinstein, a fierce proponent of condom usage in porn and the leading force behind ongoing efforts to make condom use mandatory in California porn, owns and operates nearly two dozen “Out of the Closet” stores, including the recently opened Wilton Manors, Florida location. In addition to used clothes and furniture, this store is also home to an ‘AHF Pharmacy.’ Also available at Michael Weinstein’s thrift store? Used bareback porn.
When the store opened in 2008, Weinstein announced that “Ninety-six cents of every dollar raised through the Wilton Manors store and through ‘AHF Pharmacy’ will benefit AIDS Healthcare Foundation’s HIV/AIDS prevention and education programs in Broward County and statewide,” so selling bareback movies in that same store would be an oddly counterintuitive move on the part of an organization whose sole objective is to prevent the spread of HIV. And yet, here they are.
The bareback movies currently on sale at Michael Weinstein’s Out of the Closet in Wilton Manors include Bareback Joy Riders, Bareback Sailor Pimp, and Cum Inside Me.
This photo of bareback porn currently on sale at Out of the Closet (note: customers have to ask a clerk to view the films, which are typically kept behind a counter) was taken by Out of the Closet employee Ryan Dixon (a.k.a. Kameron Scott), a former adult performer living with HIV. Dixon took issue with AHF/Out of the Closet selling the films, so he brought them–as well as the subject of bareback porn and bareback performers–to the attention of Out of the Closet’s district manager, Matt Lamariana, who rebuffed Dixon, allegedly telling him, “Who cares?”
Yesterday, Dixon quit his job at Out Of The Closet, citing the bareback titles and Lamariana’s attitude. Excerpts from Dixon’s letter of resignation:
This letter is being written to inform you that the weeks of April 10, 2011 and April 17, 2011 will be my final two weeks with the AIDS Healthcare Foundation as a cashier at Out of the Closet. I have made this decision based on my experiences working at your store, observations about operations I have made and personal beliefs which I cannot compromise.
[…]
Out of the Closet is supposed to be a fundraiser, but to sell bareback porn movies behind the counter just to make money makes me sick. I confronted a fellow employee about it, then the assistant manager, and finally my store manager about not feeling right about selling them because of what this company is supposed to be portraying. When Matt was asked about it, he looked at me, shrugged, and said, “Who cares? It’s been made and they’re probably already dead from whatever they caught.”
As a former adult model living with HIV, that comment was the last straw for me. Are we not the same company that protests studios that make videos without condoms, but yet it’s ok to sell their movies because it’s ‘already made’?
A press rep for AHF/Out of the Closet confirmed to The Sword that porn is sold in some store locations, but couldn’t comment on Dixon’s resignation or the sale of bareback porn. Additional calls to AHF/Out of the Closet in Florida have not been returned.
The Free Speech Coalition’s Diane Duke, a frequent opponent of Weinstein and AHF in the ongoing battle of condoms in porn, told me that AHF’s campaign against the porn industry has never been about the safety of adult performers.
“AHF’s activities have always been about gaining power, fame and fortune,” said Duke. “This is the kind of train wreck that happens when a nonprofit loses site of its mission and follows the money.”
More bareback porn and a shot of the pharmacy at Michael Weinstein’s Out of the Closet in Wilton Manors, Florida:
Footage of Michael Weinstein advocating mandatory condom use in porn at a press conference last year:
Make no mistake, Michael Weinstein and his unfortunately named “AIDS Healthcare Foundation” is by no means a friend of gays or people with HIV.
@EdWoody – I am extremely concerned about the issue of public health. I also care about the issue of free speech and freedom of expression, sexual or otherwise. Pornography, like public health, is a place where ethics and economics collide.
I find it hypocritical for AHF to sell bareback porn when THE VERY BASIS for Weinstein’s disapproval of bareback porn is that such porn sends “the wrong message.” Setting aside the fact that this is the WORST basis for the government action he is seeking (i.e., the CONTENT of the message is something that they don’t like), I think it is hypocritical and serves to demonstrate the point made above that Weinstein is a self-aggrandizing hypocrite.
So, none of you people actually care about the issue, then? You’re all bitching about this Weinstein guy, who I don’t know enough about to say one way or other other. But does that mean you think it’s right for these stores to be selling bareback porn, aka “let’s all jerk off to people infecting each other with deadly diseases” ? Because I am definitely with Dixon on this one – that ain’t right.
The thing to remember about AHF, just like the other anti-porn groups, is, as Orwell put it, that “the war is not meant to be won. The war is meant to be continuous.” These groups do not champion the actual improvement of any real person’s actual life. Actual people are a disposable resource to them. They champion a cause but not the victims. The actual victims, of which Derrick Burts is just the latest figurehead, are either used as publicity props or ignored. The person who was quoted above revealed the organization’s real attitude about the victims.
The irony is that these people champion causes for the sake of mistreating the target group in the very way they claim to oppose. You will find no more misogynistic person on this planet than Gail Dines, who claims to champion women’s rights. You will find no person more un-Christlike than Shelley Lubben. You will find no person more bigoted then Diana Boston. And you will find no person less concerned with the well being of the HIV+ than Michael Weinstein.
A short primer on Mr. Weinstein and his tactics: “AHF: Follow The Money” http://youtu.be/I9MOWF94_II?hd=1
Weinstein has even partnered up with a fundie homophobe named Shelley Lubben who believes that gays need to be “cured” or “healed” of their homosexuality:
Here’s a quote from Lubben, not included in the videos above: “I want people to know that Jesus saves prostitutes, porn stars, alcoholics, drug addicts, child molesters, homosexuals, wife beaters, drug dealers… I could go on and on about all the different ‘types’ of people that Jesus saves.”
Regardless of where a person stands regarding bb porn it is just not right for Mr. Weinsteins store to sell it when he is so obsessed with banning porn. What a hypocrite! He must be Republican.
Wait, wut? Derrick Burts is an example of how AIM succeeds as an institution. Sure, it’s sad that he was infected, but AIM caught the infection before he could work with any talent in the condomless straight sector.