Threequarters

AIDS, Statistics, and What the Fuck?

So, this post is mostly piggybacking off of a post on Jason Rs page from 6/26/03 (the date is important because he doesn’t title his posts). Essentially, Jason was pointing out that the most stigmatized group in the AIDS pandemic is shifting from gay men to women in their 20s—due to the fact that young women are contracting HIV at a faster rate. Really, he had a lot more to say and you should go read his original post, but that is the part I’m focusing on.

Here’s my question. Where the hell do people think these women are getting HIV from??? I mean, the numbers are undeniable. Women in their 20s (especially young women of color) are being infected with HIV at an alarming rate. But they certainly aren’t infecting each other! Transmission of HIV through lesbian sex can be done, but you have to work at it. The vast majority of women are being infected by straight men. So why are there so many more women who are infected? Two reasons. #1 – Due to the biological mechanics of (unprotected) heterosexual intercourse, more (virus filled) body fluid leaves the male and enters the female than leaves the female and enters the male. Thus, an infected man can have sex with several women and leave enough semen behind to infect each of them. But, an infected woman can have sex with several men, and the amount of her vaginal secretions that manages to enter those men’s systems is going to be significantly lower. So both men and women are having sex, but women are being infected far more frequently. #2 – I believe that the same “few” men are infecting multiple women. Because our society teaches men to be tough and unconcerned with their health, while praising them for their promiscuity, men who may not know they are infected are filling their societal gender roles by getting as much play as they can—and unwittingly infecting their female counterparts in the process.

I guess my point in all of this is that it blows my mind that our culture is so focused on the end, rather then the means. As a society we are so comfortable with the act of stigmatization that we have ceased to ask questions and seek out the source of the problem.