Tyranny and despotism can be exercised by many, more rigorously, more vigorously, and more severely, than by one. – Andrew Johnson
One year ago today I published the first of a number of columns about the efforts of the so-called “AIDS Healthcare Foundation”, a group of rubber fetishists funded by the condom industry who have been trying to drive the porn industry out of California by forcing the California workplace safety authorities (Cal/OSHA) to impose “barrier restrictions” designed for the medical field (condoms, dental dams, goggles, face shields) during sex scenes. Since the porn industry discovered during the AIDS scare of the ‘80s that virtually nobody will watch heterosexual porn in which the performers use condoms, if AHF is successful in its sleazy game it would force the porn industry to leave California in order to create a viable product – which may even be what they’re after. For those unfamiliar with the development of this campaign to “rescue” porn performers
from their own informed choices, you may wish to read the column of last September 1st and also those from October 15th, December 9th, December 13th, January 12th, March 7th and April 8th before proceeding with this article from the August 17th San Francisco Chronicle:
Los Angeles voters could cast ballots deciding whether porn producers have to require use of condoms on shoots as a condition of getting a filming permit if a health advocacy group succeeds in a new ballot initiative. AIDS Healthcare Foundation President Michael Weinstein announced Tuesday that his group needs 41,138 valid city voter signatures in the next four months to get the issue on the June ballot. “As a citizen of Los Angeles, I have a responsibility in my own hometown to make sure we limit the spread of disease, but also to ensure the safety of performers in this industry,” said Weinstein, who says his group has hired a firm to gather the signatures.
The proposed ordinance would apply to commercial filming of adult films, and would call on the city to charge adult film producers a “fee sufficient to pay for periodic inspections” for enforcement. The ballot box query is the latest move in the AIDS Healthcare Foundation’s long-standing campaign to require safe sex in pornography. The group has had three unsuccessful attempts to find a lawmaker to back statewide legislation to mandate condoms in porn. A lawsuit asking a judge to mandate local health officials to crack down on unprotected sex was also unsuccessful. Acting in response to an AHF complaint, state workplace safety officials are already working to clarify an existing regulation, which directs nurses and medical professionals to wear gloves at work, to specify condom use in porn, too.
The majority of American commercial porn films are shot in the city’s San Fernando Valley, where the multibillion-dollar industry has long resisted the AIDS Healthcare Foundation’s attempts to require safe sex for its performers. The exact number of productions that occur without permits is unknown, but about 200 permits a month are issued. In Los Angeles, officials have largely resisted enforcing or strengthening any safe sex mandates on the industry. Last year, Los Angeles County public health director Dr. Jonathan Fielding said regulating condom use on porn sets is nearly impossible.
Since Weinstein and his fellow perverts have been unable to find a politician, judge or bureaucrat willing to destroy a lucrative industry by denying adult video performers the right to make their own decisions, they now hope to recruit the masses to collectively do the job. I suspect that this latest effort, like the others, is doomed to fail; though I’m sure there are as many control freaks who derive twisted pleasure from telling adults what to do in Los Angeles as there are anywhere else, I’m sure there are also an awful lot of porn watchers there and as I said, they’re not interested in seeing condom-fetish porn. On top of that, the adult film industry has deep pockets and if Weinstein
succeeds in getting this on the ballot you can bet their ads will cover not only the adult choice issue and the consumer preference angle, but also point out that if this busybody campaign were to succeed, it would almost certainly cost the almost-entirely-broke state yet another lucrative industry.
Not that any of that matters to Weinstein, whose self-appointed “responsibility” to make other adults’ decisions for them results in his descending like a hyena every time a story like this one (from the August 29th Los Angeles Times) appears:
An adult film performer has tested HIV positive, prompting a temporary shutdown Monday of adult film productions across Los Angeles until further testing can confirm the result…”Until we know for sure, we’ve asked the industry to have a moratorium on production,” said Diane Duke, executive director of the Free Speech Coalition, a Canoga Park-based porn industry trade group [which]…became aware of the possible HIV case Saturday…[Duke] said she notified adult film production companies across the San Fernando Valley on Monday morning that a performer had tested positive and urged them to temporarily halt productions until further tests were completed…she could not release the performer’s name, age or gender. Further testing will likely be completed within a week, she added. Her group will notify performers who had sex with the potentially infected person so they can get tested…Los Angeles County health officials and state health regulators, who have been involved with such testing in the past, were not notified of the test because it was performed out of state, Duke said.
…Last month, Duke’s group launched a new testing database for porn performers, the Adult Performer Health and Safety Services, designed to provide producers and agents with access to results from numerous testing centers. Duke said it will be at least another month before testing is complete and the database is fully functional. Adult film performers must be tested every 30 days and show proof of a clean test before they perform, according to voluntary industry standards. AIM Medical Associates had been operating the industry’s database of test results before it closed in May while fighting a lawsuit that alleged it revealed performers’ private medical information. The new database will tell producers and agents only whether performers are available for work, not their specific test results as AIM had done, Duke said.
…Michael Weinstein, president of the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, said the latest possible HIV infection showed an “outrageous disregard for the health and safety of performers and the community at large” and demonstrates why testing is not an adequate substitute for condoms. He called on L.A. city officials to pull all adult film permits until condoms are mandated. “How many performers must become infected with HIV and other serious STDs before the industry will clean up its act and government will do the right thing?” he said.
Of course for fanatics, the “right thing” is always whatever they declare it is, implemented by force.
Among other little issues that amaze me, is this AIDS -Condom matter. Condoms, dental dams, raincoats and Hazmat suits do not offer total protection. The fanatics have made the tacit promise that this 100% safe measure is here and needs to be used. When the first publicly announced case of herpes transmission in a porn studio is announced these fanatics will insist on safe measures including being wrapped in a Saran wrap in another room…in another state. But these same people remain quiet about sports efforts when it is obvious the name of the game is to rip the limbs from opposing players. Why can’t they just leave this sexual segment of the market alone. If the content is that repulsive to the public, the market will handle it. Furthermore, this in your face ” we know better and will protect you” is just plain stupid. And just for the record a diagnosis of AIDS is no longer a ‘death sentence” Unfortunately stupidity and the penchant to run others lives seems to be a chronic infectious problem
Lol
thats funny, another state.. skype porn in saran wrap. Sounds like a new fetish… All they need is to add the robo women as performers and then we can say that we have truly lost our fucking minds.
Literally, if you add Virtual Reality to the mix. 😉
LOL and toasters, don’t forget the toasters!
But only really, insanely beautiful toasters!
Insanely beautiful toasters that can be loved and protected and engage in real one-on-one relationships. 😀
Reminds me of the sex scene in Demolition Man…..
Funny you should mention that movie…
“You mean… fluid transfer? eww”
“I mean sex, huxley! You know, the boney, the wild mambo, the hunkachunka. Sex”
“You are a savage animal, John Spartan, and I want you to leave my domicile this instant!”
The awesomeness of Sy Stallone and Sandra Bullock. 😆
I know the state of Louisiana has a program to attract film production to the state. If the pron folks get thrown out of Cali – they can come down here to the swamps!
I wonder if Bobby Jindal would take much exception to that? 😛
And besides – we are a “work friendly” state! No danger of face shields mucking up sex scenes down here … no siree!
This made me giggle.
Then again, a vital pron industry in NOLA might help to stem the tide of cultural sterilization and conformity that has been going on since Katrina.
Weinstein is hysterical. The performer who came down with HIV contracted it in Brazil during bisexual sex (I don’t believe it was filmed). The California branch of the industry has never had an outbreak of STD’s. Those performers are careful about who they have sex with.
There’s always someone who can’t mind his own business. What sane consenting adults do as long as it harms noone who did not consent should be noone else’s business. The professional porn industry although still strong is not as strong as it used to be say a decade ago. Internet porn is fast cheap and often free. An increasing amount of porn is amatuer porn. Requiring condoms for professional porn or driving the professional porn industry out of California will hurt it even more.
I guess the thing that has me scratching my head is how condom use in porn detracts from the video.
AIDS and some of these other STD’s are nasty things (ask anyone whose seen a military lecture on STD prevention or as I call it, the Rocky Horror Picture Show). The dangers of contraction should not be taken lightly. Condom use is a highly effective tool in preventing the spread of such diseases.
Between the advances in condoms and the limitless advancements in video technology to change things in the editing rooms to obtain the desired visual, why not at least look into required use of condoms in the porn industry ?
In America, we say you have the freedom to do whatever you want to do, so long as it does not interfere with someone else’s rights to live as they please. This one strikes me as one of those real grey areas but I think is a good opportunity to look into the question.
I’m not wanting to have the law force my ideas of morality on others. I’m not wanting to take away people’s rights to do what they want to do. My concern is for the sex workers and what is in their best interests. We’re talking about people’s lives. So given the incident, I’m all for people pausing to say “can we find a way to do things better and safer ?”.
Maybe it would kill off the industry, maybe it would result in a significantly safer working environment ? All I’m saying is lets take a serious look into if condom use would lower the risks enough to justify the consequences.
I guess the thing that has me scratching my head is how condom use in porn detracts from the video
Its about fantasy thats why,personaly use of condoms isnt a big deal for me, use of a black guy is becuase, not being black, it makes it that much harder for me to imagie its my dick in the hottie on screen.
For some people using condoms is a mental roadblock in their fantasy.
But this guy isnt stoping with just condoms – did you miss the part about goggles and gloves?
The problem is that the state doesn’t have the right to enforce one special interest group’s idea of a “safer working environment” on people who don’t want it, any more than it has the right to stop people who want to go to a smoking club from smoking or people who want to eat fatty food from doing so. Every such decision sets a precedent that the government has the right to veto adult decisions “for their own good”.
Anytime I hear or see the words “for their own good” accompanying the proposal of using gov’t force, I KNOW I’m dealing with an apologist for tyranny. They just might not be self-aware enough to understand they are supporting tyranny and that is all the slack I’m willing to cut them.
I agree with your principle — and yet, if (as you’ve posted elsewhere) no whore would ever do “bareback” unless she is both desperate and lacking in self-respect, then I have to wonder why the same doesn’t go for porn performers. Is there any reason to believe that unprotected sex with a porn performer is less risky than with an average customer-of-whores? I would think it more risky, since the porn performer is probably getting a lot more sex. This sounds to me like an employer making unreasonable demands (and one has to wonder if the performers are getting “hazard pay”).
Until the day that all customers of whores are tested regularly and barred from both professional sex and making money if they fail the test, the comparison is apples and oranges. “Bareback” with a client requires trusting one individual, horny and usually somewhat deceitful guy, which is not at all the same as trusting a clinic whose livelihood depends on its accuracy. Choosing whether to trust the latter is an informed and calculated decision; choosing to trust the former is nothing but a crap shoot.
Why are you concerned for the sex workers? They also know what’s in their best interest and are far more concerned for their own lives are than anyone else can be for them.
If the mainstream Hollywood community can be trusted to decide whether or not the star can do that fall or if a stunt man needs to be called in, and whether that stunt man needs an airbag or if a decelerator cable will work, then the porn industry should be trusted to decide how much risk is acceptable for its stunt performers.
I think that’s partially the insurance company’s call…
Then let Vivid Video’s insurance company either demand condoms or not.
It would be interesting to know what Vivid Video’s insurance company says about the matter.
I’ve watched several documentaries on porn, and read a few books, and I’ve never heard or read about that. When somebody makes the next pornomentary (it’s fun to make up new words), they should go into that.
Back when it was in operation, AIM (Adult Industry Medicine) system worked fairly well. You’ll never eliminate all risk in porn, or any other sex work. You try to make reasonable and sensible precautions. While AIM might not have been perfect (Their database eventually got hacked, and lots of private data released, including mine.) they served a real purpose, and I always trusted them as much as I’d trust anyone in that situation.
I don’t foresee condom use working out.
But these days the cost of entry into porn production is so low that I don’t see how any official body could hope to regulate it.
People who have never done sex work have no idea how rough condoms are on the interior of the vagina after half an hour of intercourse, much less hours and hours of punishing intercourse in all sorts of positions. As I said in my very first column on the subject, they’re the best protection for whores at our current level of technology, but they really are a medieval solution.
Maggie, if you think modern condoms are medieval, I suggest you have little conception of how primitive, uncomfortable, and nasty the medieval world really was. I would suggest that modern condoms are Victorian, which the Gods know is bad enough!
I said they’re a medieval solution to the problem; not the same thing.
If I ever actually write the story with Vertilya, she won’t use condoms, but that’s because she’s a priestess and thus magically immune.
Anzu spends a week “doing things that would normally get me branded the Great Whore of Babylon” and never a condom near her, but that’s because by 2109 all the STDs have been cured.
But until whores in the real world have access to magic (I’m not holding my breath) or medical science conquers the STDs (it’s just a matter of time), hookers will continue to use condoms for obvious reasons, and the clients, cops, etc. should just go along (for equally obvious reasons).
Interesting, Maggie. I’ve never heard a woman say this before. Ideally lambskin condoms could be made with enough germicides in them to make them an effective barrier against STD’s.
I’ve heard many whores say it; in fact I’ve heard girls many complain that their own natural lubrication is plenty when doing “bareback” with a boyfriend but not enough with condoms. You want to see what it’s like for us? Put on a latex glove and then masturbate with that gloved hand using only spit and pre-ejaculate, and watch how fast you get irritated.
Lambskin condoms still have pores that the bugs can wriggle through, so I for one would never trust them (it’s too hard to kill a virus).
True that. Lube is the secret.
I never had much problem with the irritation, although I saw it happen. Once, when doing a long group/gang-bang thing, one of the other woman began actually bleeding from it and had to stop. So it’s a factor, for certain.
Hi Comixchik,
I still get a kick out of watching fucking whether a condom is in use or not, but a bj with a condom is not very attractive. It wouldn’t be sexy to watch a guy lick pussy if he was doing it through a barrier, either.
Did you make films? Are they still available?
I did, but it’s been almost 20 years ago. They are probably available somewhere still, with the internet today, what isn’t? Although now that I am old, and living a “normal” life, I keep dreading the day when one of my co-workers stumbles across one.
Eh, you can always claim it was just someone who looked like you, a fictional sister for example. I auditioned as a stripper and got laughed out. I auditioned for a porn film and got rejected. Given a choice though it would have been my career.
I’d like to know if this “AIDS Healthcare Foundation” is lobbying to legally pester the Gay community to the same extent; requiring venues for casual Gay encounters to oversee protective measures, on the grounds (still true, so far as I can determine) that the vast majority of HIV transmission happens through unprotected Gay sex with strangers. It seems to me that if not (which I tend to assume is the case) that might well serve as a club with which they could be beaten to death, so to speak. I don’t want to belabor the Gay community; A) that’s their business, and B) it will, eventually, be brutally self-correcting in any case, but I see no reason to tolerate different standards for Porn Actors simply because Porn isn’t Politically Correct.
One thing no one talks about: there are a few pornographers who are pouring enormous amounts of money into medical research. I’ve personally known prostate cancer researchers bankrolled by porn interests (albeit through shell companies so no one knows who they are).
In other words, the porn guys are doing more to improve human health than Weinstein could imagine.
The porn industry has for decades also bankrolled the majority of the legal costs for challenges against censorship laws. If it had been left to the mainstream media, the First Amendment would’ve been gutted by now as so much of the rest of the Bill of Rights has been.
I think that’s beautiful. Yes, the benefits to them are obvious, but we all benefit from medical advances and a strong First Amendment.
The next pornomentary should go into this as well.
Maggie,
Sorry to be pedantic, but could you change that to “the First Amendment would’ve been gutted by now as so much of the rest of the Bill of Rights has been”?
If it’ll make you happy, sure. 😉
The porn industry is also one of the most pure examples of capitalism going these days. The performers are all independent contractors, there’s really no union, not much at all in the way of worker protections. Escort work is another example.
And like other capitalist models, the performers take the risk of permanent physical damage, and the producers/distributors reap the bulk of the profits. Unlike Hollywood, there’s no SAG, no residuals. Get something like hiv, and your career, and livelihood is over, and your expenses huge.
So what’s the solution? Well, I’ve heard the idea advanced that porn companies be forced to pay into a fund that will care for performers who become ill. While that might work for Vivid, and other larger companies, it might kill the smaller ones. Also, as I’ve pointed out, the industry is becoming more and more diverse, the cost of entry for producers lower, and internet distribution the big thing. While that’s all well and good, it make things confusing and unstable, unlike the days when most off of it was shot in the valley, and it was a smaller group.
I also suspect that having so many different people involved might bring more disease in, and without AIM, and some organized system for regular testing, there won’t be a lot of control on that.
But porn has always adapted to new technology. When I got started, the “golden age” of cinematic productions had ended, and people were beginning to shoot on video, and it was confusing. Back then, for a while, AIDS was called GRIDS, (Gay Related Immune Syndrome) an straight people thought they couldn’t get it.
I don’t know of perfect solution for sex industry health care, except maybe if the USA had a real national health care scheme that covered everyone, even sex workers.
In an essay I wrote in 1990, I predicted that as American medicine became more socialized, we would also see a dramatic increase in laws restricting personal behaviors deemed “unhealthy” and federal lawsuits and denials of coverage to those who were found to have broken those rules. So far, my prediction has been entirely accurate (anti-smoking laws, piss testing, etc) and we’ll see what happens when nationalized healthcare comes in. I guarantee you that all sex workers will be denied coverage if the “authorities” find out what they do, and if the statists succeed in establishing true universal coverage any “unhealthy” behavior will be considered a criminal offense on the grounds that it costs the government money.
Piss testing isn’t a law, it’s usually policies of some private company or organization. And sex workers are covered under national health care schemes in Europe. I’ve lived with so-called “socialized medicine”, and it’s not so bad. I’d prefer it to medical decision made by companies putting their profits before my health.
That’s not the U.S., though. What works well for a small, homogeneous country can be nigh-impossible for a large, heterogeneous one, which is why small communist countries like Cuba and North Korea are still holding on decades after the Soviet Empire collapsed and China became communist in name only.
You’re also forgetting that in Europe, sex work is legal whereas in the US it’s not only illegal but demonized.
You’ve got two good points there. Do you think any sort of democratic socialism is impossible in the USA?
I know I’ve always been politically out of step here. I grew up in Europe and have lived there since, on and off, and worked there. What seems normal there seems unthinkable here.
Odd though, that in terrible old socialized Europe, whores have more rights than here.
Somebody has to pay for social programs; small countries manage it by selling surplus resources (such as Sweden’s vast petroleum reserves) to wealthy countries, but large, populous countries haven’t got anyone larger to support them.
I hear similar arguments about why decriminalizing drugs would be a disaster here, even though it wasn’t in Portugal.
Not the same thing at all. Decriminalization is a lack of government interference, which is EXACTLY the opposite of socialized medicine. It’s a wholly spurious comparison.
Too true. The government is too twisted to get anything right. Secede!
If at first you don’t sesede, susceed, succed…
Forget it.
“AHF: Follow the Money” video on Youtube.
MIchael Weinstein of AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) is a man with an agenda, and it’s got nothing to do with public health. Michael Weinstein opposes government funding of research to cure AIDS; instead, Weinstein wants those billions of government dollars to be diverted toward treatment and prevention services, the kind that he and his organization provides. Michael Weinstein and AHF even sued Pfizer over Viagra, alleging it encouraged risky sexual behavior, but Weinstein filed suit only after Pfizer turned down his multi-million dollar funding request. And what do AIDS activists say about Weinstein and AHF? the AIDS Treatment Activists Coalition has called AHF’s efforts “half-hearted” and “self-promoting” “AHF has a history of bargaining for its own interests to the exclusion of those in the community as a whole.” AHF’s campaigns “are always self-serving.” – Paul Dalton of Project Inform, Philadelphia Inquirer, August 29, 2008. “Petty” and “small-minded” – AIDS activist Michael Barr, Bay Area Reporter, January 25, 2007. Analysts have called his campaigns “demeaning”, “disturbing”, “patronizing” – Bay Area Reporter. “Ridiculous”, “extortion” – former San Francisco AIDS policy adviser Jeff Sheehy, Bay Area Reporter, January 25, 2007. Weinstein is an opportunist who shamelessly exploits the misfortunes of others. When news hit that a single adult industry performer had tested positive for HIV, Weinstein revealed his plan to make the world a better place by demanding that adult performers be required by law to wear condoms. And which AHF supporter provided the picket signs for AHF’s protests outside the Hustler Hollywood store? LifeStyles Condoms. Want to know the key to Weinstein’s real agenda? Follow the money. Michael Weinstein sure does.