- Resistance Is Futile!
Posted on 12/04/2005 9:15:19 PM PST by Dane
AIDS campaign draws fire Committee director resigns in protest But health official calls it `innovative' Nov. 25, 2005. 01:00 AM ELAINE CAREY MEDICAL REPORTER
A Toronto public health official says she has no problems with an AIDS community group providing information on an unsafe sex act and bathhouse visits as part of its new education campaign.
But a director of the AIDS Committee of Toronto has quit in disgust over the campaign, arguing he can't condone using taxpayers' dollars to promote unsafe sex when HIV cases in Toronto are on the rise.
"This is crazy — it boggles my mind," said Richard Churchill, a 44-year-old gay businessman. "If 90 per cent of taxpayers knew they were using tax dollars for this, they would go through the roof."
The AIDS committee, a registered charitable organization, gets 60 per cent of its funding from various levels of government and received $271,400 from the Toronto public health department this year.
The committee has produced a deck of 26 cards, called Sex from A to Z, and one in particular explains an oral sex act that cannot be performed safely using contraceptives.
Barbara MacPherson, manager of the urban issues team at the Toronto public health department, said the cards, which weren't funded by the city, "seemed like a very artistic and innovative way of getting the safe sex message out."
But the card in question describes an act "that would be difficult to make safe," she acknowledged.
"There are some sexual activities that it is impossible to make safe, but very few."
The committee is also hosting "Virgin Tours" of two Toronto bathhouses this Sunday for "curious bathhouse virgins," aimed at 18- to 25-year-olds.
But bathhouses are rampant with drugs, particularly crystal meth, which encourages unsafe sex, Churchill said.
"If I'm in a bathhouse, I'm 18 and high, I'm likely not going to make a conscious decision to have safe sex," he said. "And since when did the AIDS committee become agents for selling bathhouses?"
The AIDS committee was founded in 1983 to provide HIV prevention and education services for people living with or who were at risk for HIV/AIDS.
MacPherson said drug use is "an illegal activity that happens in all kinds of places. If someone wants to do drugs, there are all kinds of places to do them.
"I think a lot of the AIDS prevention message was getting a bit stale," she said. "You need a variety of different strategies. There isn't one silver bullet."
John Maxwell, a spokesperson for the AIDS committee, said the card has been redesigned since an earlier draft that Churchill saw — and now points out that the sex act in question, called felching, is risky.
Advertising agency Leo Burnett Canada designed the cards free of charge after holding focus groups with 18- to 25-year-old gay men who said they wanted "something that talked about HIV in a light-hearted way while acknowledging the risk," Maxwell said. "This card falls within the philosophy of risk reduction."
The bathhouse tours are "to provide men with information so they can protect themselves," he said. "A lot of men are curious. It can be intimidating if you don't know the layout and the culture. We feel it's better to provide people with information than to withhold it."
Since 1985, 15,696 people in Toronto have tested positive for HIV, almost two-thirds of all the cases in Ontario.
Toronto had 800 new HIV cases last year, up from 765 the year before.
Unbelievable. I am very curious as to what that act that is impossible to protect may be, though.
fresh meat for the reaper?
As far as I'm concerned, if governments don't stop condoning gay sex, they are just as responsible for the spread of HIV/Aids as homosexuals.
Sounds like liberal hollywood gobbledegook. Trying to shame responsible people and say they are the problem instead of those who engage in risky sex and IV drug abuse.
Oh, how on earth did I miss that?? I know what that is... and it's definitely an EEEEEEWWWWWWWW (I live in the Seattle and used to hang out with some characters.)
It's part of their new AIDS awareness campaign. (Sorry, messed up the tag.)
If you really want to know I will send you a private message explaining it. You better have a strong stomach though as it's a bit on the repugnant side.
And so this is the end of our story
And everyone is dead from AIDS
It took from me my best friend
My only true pal
My only bright star (he died of AIDS)
Well I'm gonna march on Washington
Lead the fight and charge the brigades
There's a hero inside of all of us
I'll make them see everyone has AIDS
My father (AIDS!)
My sister (AIDS!)
My uncle and my cousin and her best friend (AIDS AIDS AIDS!)
The gays and the straights
And the white and the spades
Everyone has AIDS!
My grandma and my dog 'ol blue (AIDS AIDS AIDS)
The pope has got it and so do you (AIDS AIDS AIDS AIDS AIDS)
C'mon everybody we got quilting to do (AIDS AIDS AIDS AIDS AIDS)
We gotta break down these baricades, everyone has AIDS!
If you want on/off the ping list let me and little jeremiah know.
Homosexual behavior is so queer.
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