Disclosure

[Guest guest]

i have read the recent exchange about HIV disclosure with some interest. i am an

advocate of open disclosure under all circumstances of consensual sex or other

potentially risky encounters...exceptions including rape and assault. if someone

were raping or assaulting me, they have no intrinsic right to know my status,

and their getting infected would be the barest minimum punishment i could hope

for.

anyway, i recently had my own views challenged in an unexpected way. some of u

may be aware of CHEST and the studies they do on gay male sexual behavior. for

years they would turn me down for any study i inquired about, and the obvious

reason in almost every case was that i do not PNP.

they finally accepted me for the " Pillow Talk " study, and i'm having a mixed

reaction. in the initial online interview and subsequent face-to-face follow-up,

they have made it clear that they do NOT regard having one's HIV-positive status

in one's online profile to be " direct/active disclosure " ...rather, they regard

it as " passive disclosure " , explicitly equating it with simply assuming someone

knows my HIV+ status bcuz they saw me at an ASO or saw me take medication or met

me at a barebacking party. to them, " active disclosure " means directly telling

each individual face to face, over the phone or via email.

i find this infuriating, frankly. i verbally disclose face to face only if

that's where the encounter begins...otherwise my disclosure occurs in whatever

medium i encounter them in first. my own online profiles on manhunt, adam4adam

and barebackrt (tonyredux under all) each have 3 separate declarations of my

status: in the title, the very first line of the ad-text, and in the listed

attributes next to hair and eye color. in the 7 years i have had online ads

since sero-converting, i recall exactly 3 people who failed to comprehend my ad.

the first guy was on meth in 2004, the second guy in 2007 was an idiot (exact

exchange: " so why are you sending mixed messages about your status?!? you write

'HIV-positive' as if you're trying to confuse people! how am i supposed to know

what 'negative/positive' means?!? " ...he was assuming the hyphen between " HIV "

and " positive " was somehow saying " negative " ...!) and the last guy was earlier

this year, who exchanged over a dozen emails with me before writing angrily " so

you never told me you were HIV+!! " ...my reply back was " is that some kind of

fukn joke? my ad tells u exactly that 3 separate times, you cant even contact me

without encountering that! " .

anyway, i told CHEST that all of my answers about disclosure will presume my

profile counts as " active " , regardless of their parameters. further, i told them

that with many partners there has been further discussion of both of our

respective HIV-status, but that i have made no mental notation whatsoever as to

who i've had such " further discussion " with and who i haven't. i elaborated that

i entirely resented having my answers skewed to represent a data-point that is

not actually indicative of my real life practices...and would make no effort to

help them do so. surprisingly, they kept me in the study.

i also told them that their differentiation is actually representative of a

school of thought i have argued extensively against online in much ruder forums

than this. there are some who passionately feel that not even e-mail or

telephone-based disclosure can truly count, and that ONLY direct, face-to-face

disclosure can legally or morally " count " .

i find this presumption disgracefully unreasonable. if someone won't read the

part of your profile that declares " HIV-positive " (one or more times...at my

peak in 2006, my ad actually mentioned my status SEVEN (7) times, just to make

sure no meth-heads missed it!), how can u be sure they will read the part of an

email that discloses status? for that matter, how can you even be sure they

heard you face-to-face? maybe we should be required to say it aloud 3 separate

times, with at least 60 seconds in between?

the irony for me is that, besides advocating disclosure under all voluntary

circumstances (rape n assault, not so much...), i have also lately found myself

publicly critiquing HIV-decriminalization efforts that focus on or even simply

include removing the legal requirement of disclosure, as i think doing so is

morally questionable and politically radioactive...and prosecutions of HIV+

people are overwhelmingly miscarriages of justice in almost every case.

however, now i wonder just how far into absurdity will legal requirements for

disclosure go? perhaps there's an army of guys out there waiting to say " i liked

his pix so much i never read his ad! HE SHOULD HAVE TOLD ME DIRECTLY FACE TO

FACE AT LEAST (once, twice, 10 times, etc) " ...

Jeton

[Guest guest]

My personal policy is to disclose my HIV status in all of my on-line profiles. I have however encountered a few guys who simply did not understand the expression "poz" or simply did not read the profile fully or carefully. Sometimes, guys just see a subject such as "Long Beach, CA: Safe Sex Bottom" and they respond only to the header without reading much else. For that reason, I have started asking for confirmation. When I reply, I ask the person to acknowledge his understanding that I am HIV positive. When I get his response, I save it in a special folder so that I could use it as evidence in the case that I might later encounter unjustified legal action. I get really angry when I see discriminatory prosecutions of HIV positive people. On the one hand, I believe that it is morally correct to disclose one status. On the other hand, the other person also has a responsibility to ask and to protect himself. My gut feeling is that disclosure is practically non-existant in casual or anonymous sexual encounters (example: Gay bathhouse). I do believe in prosecution when a person is willfully running around trying to infect. As I understand the law in California, one can only be prosecuted if it can be shown that the person purposefully intended to infect others. Furthermore, I have heard that under this law it is quite difficult to prove intent. Other states allow prosecution whenever an HIV positive person has sex (sometimes even if it is with a condom).Since I am the passive partner (bottom), I believe that I am more at risk that the active guy (top). For example, I could be infected with another strain of the virus (HIV 1), with a mutated virus (conferred resistance) or with another sexually transmitted disease (such a Hepatitis). To protect myself as well as my partner, I choose to use a condom whether the other man is HIV positive or negative. One also has to remember that the status of the other person can easily change between testing sessions and he will not know until his next test. A couple of months ago, one guy spent 10-15 minutes trying to convince me to have unprotected anal sex. He kept insisting that he was HIV negative, but he never asked me about my own status. Since this was a casual encounter, I insisted on using a condom, but his blindness to the potential risk associated with my status was shocking.To be absolutely candid, I have often wondered how I would proceed if I were to find a monogamous and committed partner. In a Gay relationship, there certainly is no concern about an unwanted or HIV infected child. Most people would agree that unprotected sex is more fun and more intimate. Nevertheless, I must say that I get plenty of pleasure from safe sex. Sometimes, I encounter a man who cannot perform at all when wearing a condom. It seems to me that even in a relationship safe sex remains an issue. One would have to have a great deal of trust in his partner to engage in unprotected sex. To put it bluntly, some people lie and deceive. In addition, some people have "open" relationships where each partner is free to have sex on the side. I would suggest that good strong communication is essential to a quality relationship. I had a wonderfully loving monogamous relationship with one man for over 38 years. Unfortunately, he passed away of heart failure in 2009. During the final years of his life, his medications and health prevented him from sexually performing. At one point, he sat me down, told me that it was unfair for me to be so sexually frustrated and begged me to go out for sex. That was a difficult transition and I was aware of the AIDS epidemic. I read everything that I could find about safe sex and attended numerous workshops. Ultimately, however, one irresponsible guy tricked me and threw the condom away behind my back. I assume that this is how I got infected.I guess that the bottom line is that intimacy in the context of HIV is an extremely complicated issue. Given this complexity, I find it difficult to judge anyone in regard to sexual behavior. Each person needs to get informed and make his own personal decision. At age 68, I am fortunate to have gained some wisdom and some common sense that tend to accompany maturity. Sex, however, is a powerfully driving force. Even my HIV doctor readily admits that the safe sex ("use a condom") message has been largely a failure. I would hope that everyone does some serious thinking about the issue and that everyone makes his own informed and responsible decision.Best wishes for a happy and healthy holiday season,Long Beach, CApozabilities@...

[Guest guest]

When I first tested poz in 2004, I naively put my poz status in my online

Manhunt profile. Pretty much no one ever read it, and it was a buzz kill

spending most of the time on line making sure that the person who I was chatting

with.... nevermind hooking up with.... knew that I was poz.

It's a drag when you are just trying to get laid w/o putting another person at

risk.

Because Manhunt, in particular is so pervasive, eventually a person who knew a

group of people in my industry saw my status on Manhunt and told a potential

employer. Employers don't like to think about health care costs going up, and

whether their decision was informed or not, my Manhunt profile status caused me

to not get a job.

Personally, I think that anyone who posts ANY health information on a public

website to be seen by literally thousands of people *who you are never gonna

have sex with* is nuts.

I disclose, but only face to face. My HIV status on public profiles is blank.

I tell the people who I need to tell....namely, the ones in my apartment with

their pants down. Those are the only people who need to know.

>

> My personal policy is to disclose my HIV status in all of my on-line

> profiles. I have however encountered a few guys who simply did not

> understand the expression " poz " or simply did not read the profile fully or

> carefully. Sometimes, guys just see a subject such as " Long Beach, CA: Safe

> Sex Bottom " and they respond only to the header without reading much else.

> For that reason, I have started asking for confirmation. When I reply, I ask

> the person to acknowledge his understanding that I am HIV positive. When I

> get his response, I save it in a special folder so that I could use it as

> evidence in the case that I might later encounter unjustified legal action.

>

> I get really angry when I see discriminatory prosecutions of HIV positive

> people. On the one hand, I believe that it is morally correct to disclose

> one status. On the other hand, the other person also has a responsibility to

> ask and to protect himself. My gut feeling is that disclosure is practically

> non-existant in casual or anonymous sexual encounters (example: Gay

> bathhouse). I do believe in prosecution when a person is willfully running

> around trying to infect. As I understand the law in California, one can only

> be prosecuted if it can be shown that the person purposefully intended to

> infect others. Furthermore, I have heard that under this law it is quite

> difficult to prove intent. Other states allow prosecution whenever an HIV

> positive person has sex (sometimes even if it is with a condom).

>

> Since I am the passive partner (bottom), I believe that I am more at risk

> that the active guy (top). For example, I could be infected with another

> strain of the virus (HIV 1), with a mutated virus (conferred resistance) or

> with another sexually transmitted disease (such a Hepatitis). To protect

> myself as well as my partner, I choose to use a condom whether the other man

> is HIV positive or negative. One also has to remember that the status of the

> other person can easily change between testing sessions and he will not know

> until his next test. A couple of months ago, one guy spent 10-15 minutes

> trying to convince me to have unprotected anal sex. He kept insisting that

> he was HIV negative, but he never asked me about my own status. Since this

> was a casual encounter, I insisted on using a condom, but his blindness to

> the potential risk associated with my status was shocking.

>

> To be absolutely candid, I have often wondered how I would proceed if I were

> to find a monogamous and committed partner. In a Gay relationship, there

> certainly is no concern about an unwanted or HIV infected child. Most people

> would agree that unprotected sex is more fun and more intimate.

> Nevertheless, I must say that I get plenty of pleasure from safe sex.

> Sometimes, I encounter a man who cannot perform at all when wearing a

> condom. It seems to me that even in a relationship safe sex remains an

> issue. One would have to have a great deal of trust in his partner to engage

> in unprotected sex. To put it bluntly, some people lie and deceive. In

> addition, some people have " open " relationships where each partner is free

> to have sex on the side. I would suggest that good strong communication is

> essential to a quality relationship.

>

> I had a wonderfully loving monogamous relationship with one man for over 38

> years. Unfortunately, he passed away of heart failure in 2009. During the

> final years of his life, his medications and health prevented him from

> sexually performing. At one point, he sat me down, told me that it was

> unfair for me to be so sexually frustrated and begged me to go out for sex.

> That was a difficult transition and I was aware of the AIDS epidemic. I read

> everything that I could find about safe sex and attended numerous workshops.

> Ultimately, however, one irresponsible guy tricked me and threw the condom

> away behind my back. I assume that this is how I got infected.

>

> I guess that the bottom line is that intimacy in the context of HIV is an

> extremely complicated issue. Given this complexity, I find it difficult to

> judge anyone in regard to sexual behavior. Each person needs to get informed

> and make his own personal decision. At age 68, I am fortunate to have gained

> some wisdom and some common sense that tend to accompany maturity. Sex,

> however, is a powerfully driving force. Even my HIV doctor readily admits

> that the safe sex ( " use a condom " ) message has been largely a failure. I

> would hope that everyone does some serious thinking about the issue and that

> everyone makes his own informed and responsible decision.

>

> Best wishes for a happy and healthy holiday season,

>

>

> Long Beach, CA

> pozabilities@...

>