HEY YOU! Porn stars might practice safer sex than general public

An April 26 Newsweek inset by Andrew Murr tells an interesting and unfortunate story.

"A porn actor named Darren James, fresh from a shoot in Brazil, tested positive for HIV last Monday," although he tested "clean" a month ago. Suddenly, "about half of the industry is shut down." Understanding that the historically controversial porn industry is an unwavering monster at $9 billion in annual revenue, it took one "positive" yet negative test result to freeze production.

Contracting a sexually transmitted disease is undoubtedly the worst thing that can happen to an adult film actor or actress. In the case of Darren James and Laura Roxx (the first actress found to have contracted HIV from James), it can destroy a career, and it goes without saying what AIDS can do to a person's life in general.

Sadly, some people have decided to use the destruction of at least two lives as an opportunity to argue against a business that they feel is immoral. Pornography, it could be argued, is a legal and voyeuristic form of prostitution.

What the antipornography lobby fails to realize is that most people wouldn't disagree that adult films contradict our dear traditions. In our own lives, we know that it's erroneous to have sex with partners with little regard for safety, but we just don't care.

You see, whether or not adult films have influenced us to act this way, we are way too sexual for our own good. Advocates for Youth and the Alan Guttmacher Institute reports that 27 million young Americans under the age of 25 are sexually active, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported in 2000 that 9.1 million new cases of STDs were reported in this age group. These numbers are increasing.

Meanwhile, there is a group of actors and actresses who have sex with seven or eight different persons a month, and only a small percentage of them contract STDs. How does that make sense?

A recent study by the American Social Health Association suggests that the average Joe may understand the seriousness of sexually transmitted diseases, but fewer of us truly protect ourselves as much as we claim or advise others to. Dr. James Allen of the ASHA reports that "82 percent of those who said they were sexually active said they never used protection against STDs for oral sex, and 47 percent never used protection for vaginal sex."

Another study from the University of Alabama at Birmingham reports that 80 percent do not use condoms consistently, although "81 percent acknowledged sexual contact with two or more partners during the preceding six months, 45 percent reported sexual relationships that overlapped, and 65 percent said they had been diagnosed with one or more STDs in the past."

When a similar HIV scare occurred in 1999, several adult film companies voluntarily mandated that condoms must be used, and organizations like the Adult Industry Medical Health Care Foundation test more than 1,200 performers for STDs on a monthly basis. Most people my age have never had an STD test at all.

Believe it or not, it seems that some porn stars may be more sexually responsible than the average young adult.

I may not be able to condone what these people do, but I can definitely say that we could all use a morality lesson ourselves.

Write to Gregory at gttwiford@bsu.edu

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