I Have Something to Say. . . About AB1576

The Sword is launching a new column this week, published every Thursday, bringing together voices and opinions from across the gay porn world and outside of it, on topics ranging from gay sex, celebrities, politics, and industry business. We’re kicking off with a word from NakedSword CEO Tim Valenti.

As some of you may have heard, there’s a bill in the California Assembly that is nothing less than a full-frontal assault on the rights of adult performers. Not only does it mandate that all performers in porn wear condoms, it requires they turn over sensitive medical information about their HIV status to anyone they work for, including — in a last-minute addition added to the bill last night — a forced waiver of their right to medical privacy.

On the surface, AB1576 seems like it would protect performers — condoms in every scene, testing every fourteen days, mandated by law. But for those of us who work with performers, it’s much more complicated. Why? Because it makes it a crime — yes, a crime punishable by law — for not using a condom while filming a porn scene. Now, I can understand if you want your performers to be safe. I do too. In fact, at NakedSword we already use condoms in all of our films, and always have. But what a performer does sexually should be up to the performer, not the government.

AB1576 was engineered by Michael Weinstein, the controversial head of the AIDS Healthcare Foundation and Isadore Hall, a politician and minister from Los Angeles. For reasons that few can comprehend, Weinstein and Hall have spent millions of dollars and several years trying to control performer’s sexual behavior. To hear them talk about porn — shame has been a common refrain at the hearings — you’d think it was coming from members of the religious right. (And it’s not just porn — prominent AIDS advocates and The Sword alike have called for Weinstein’s ouster for sex-shaming comments over the HIV-prevention drug Truvada.)

Not surprisingly, the bill has generated outrage among performers. Hundreds have signed a petition asking the state Assembly to vote no on the bill when it comes up next week. Others have called or faxed or tweeted at their representatives to let them know that the bill does little to improve performer safety, while opening the door to allow discrimination and stigmatization of adult performers.

As gay men, we know how important our privacy is, and we know how HIV has been used to whip up fear against gay men. As a condom-only producer, it’s not my business whether someone is negative or positive. The reason so many gay porn studios use condoms is because it means we don’t have to know about a person’s status.

The bill also puts an incredible burden on performers who choose to produce their own films. Under the law, even a monogamous gay couple using webcam from their own home could be prosecuted for not wearing a condom, regardless of whether they do it in their private life or not. They’d also be required to test every fourteen days, to maintain filing cabinets of medical records, and a log detailing every penetration in which they engaged. It’s sexually Orwellian. 

This isn’t a healthcare bill, it’s a moral crusade that uses HIV to scare legislators. If Hall and Weinstein wanted to protect performers, they’d work with them, not against them. Instead, they demean performers as threats to public health and dismiss their concerns as irrelevant. Instead of designing a campaign to empower performers, or educating them about HIV-stopping medications like Truvada, they’ve wasted millions of dollars that could have gone into treatment and prevention — things the gay community, particularly in underserved areas, desperately needs.

Next week, AB1576 will be voted on by the Appropriations Committee. It’s a vote that could determine the rights of thousands of performers. But it’s crucial that legislators here from all of us.

The link below offers a way to tell the California State Assembly that you oppose AB1576. If you live in California, use it. If you don’t, please help spread the word about this dangerous bill using the hashtag #stopAB1576. The rights of us all depend on it.

Take Action | STOP AB1576

1. Contact members of the Appropriations Committee.
2. Sign the “Keep Adult Performers Safe – Stop AB 1576!” petition on change.org.

Previously: MICHAEL WEINSTEIN IS A BACKWARDS, OUT-OF-TOUCH SLUT-SHAMER WHO NEEDS TO RESIGN, SAYS NEW PETITION

18 thoughts on “I Have Something to Say. . . About AB1576”

  1. condoms save lives…no studio will be “forced” to go underground thats their choice and even if they go underground they can still choose to be safe. no one forces studios to be unsafe they choose what they will or wont do. “forcing” performers to wear condoms isnt taking away their freedom, this is a job when you take money at work you do what your employer says or you go find another job. “forcing” people in general outside of your workplace, in your PERSONAL life would be an example of taking away freedom. i dont know know of anyone that gets to write their own safety rules in their workplace so why should these guys?? oh and good for PREP, great idea, use it WITH condoms now we are all more safer. about testing, it only tells you you already “got it” if i get tested 2x a month theres lots of time i can bb and become infected after a test and before the shoot so unless you locked two tested guys in a room before the shoot testing isnt much help is it?

  2. I have always felt torn about this issue because bareback sex is legal and as a lontime married and monogamous person I engage in bareback sex with my spouse; so why shouldn’t raw sex porn be legal? However, I am very peturbed by the rise in raw sex porn films, because it bothers me that these may be influencing younger folks to engage in raw sex with many partners while making big bucks for companies. Also, as a former industry safety officer I can see the issue from the employee’s side of maintaining a safe workplace.

    So, I have read the bill [http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/13-14/bill/asm/ab_1551-1600/ab_1576_bill_20140130_introduced.html] which you conveniently left out of your post, and do not see any slut shaming in it – where specifically did you see that? I do see that a selected officer at a porn company would have access to the STD records of all employees, vs as you mention all medical records, but only those records specifically that relate to STDs. Just as when I was a radiation safety officer, I had access to the radiation exposure records of all of the employees at my site, plus pregancies. This is an analagous situation and necessary to operate this system and keep records.

    Finally, this bill requires adult entertainment companies to take some responsibility for performers’ medical costs and testing which I think is wonderful and a step in the right direction. Unfortunately, we will have to sacrifice bareback sex pornography, which is a small loss when compared to the chance of eradicating HIV completely from our society. And for those of you who wish to argue with that last statement, I would point you to the rise in HIV conversions amongst the young minorities in our country [http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/statistics/basics/ataglance.html].

  3. This is an example of porn wanting to have its cake and eat it too. On the one hand porn has had a long history of conflict with the law and has sought to be seen as a legitimate business and not just a nest of seedy individuals out to exploit vulnerable, naive young people for the pleasure of creepy voyeurs in trench coats. On the other handd, upon recognition and validation as a legitimate business, porn wants to do things that are indeed exploitative for the sake of the dollars of those who have no qualms about the safety and real vulnerability of the performers and the pleasure they are ingesting.

    I love porn. I don’t want anyone taking away my porn as it has in the past, especially in Canada during the years when bookstores such as Little Sister’s were shut down under the premise of morality. At the same time, as a person that views, enjoys, and gets off on porn, I as a consumer do not want to be responsible for a Bangladeshi incident due to my merchandise. Personally I do not watch bareback porn. Not because I have some holier than thou attitude about people who bareback, or barebacking, but because I do not want to endorse a scenario that puts people at risk.

    In just about any employment setting there are hazards and dangers and it is the responsibility of the employer to create an environment where those hazards and dangers are minimal to the employee. In a construction site people are required to wear protective gear. Bulky neon coats, helmets, steel toe boots, etc. Workers must wear these uncomfortable, heavy, equipment for the duration they are on shift, sometimes 8 hours. When people argue that condoms after so long begin to chafe and create discomfort, guess what? It comes with the territory. Just as we would not allow minors into pornography for very much reasons of safety, so too then, it is the same with condoms. You go to a gym and you lift and callouses begin to form in your hands. The logic escapes me, when people see laws for condoms as somehow trespassing on their freedoms. Yet, they fail to recognize that there are performers pressured into performing without condoms, and THAT’S NOT A TRESPASSING OF FREEDOM? There are also many, who would love to see children in mainstream porn too. Does this mean we comply, because we should not have the government involved in pornography regulating the desires and wants of a group? Seriously? Where do we draw the line? So we risk performers because I want to get off.

    Ultimately, there is something really disrespectful about how barebacking has become nonchalant in gay circles as of late to those who died very horrific, painful deaths of H.I.V. & A.I.D.S. and it seems to me, that it is almost spitting on the grave of those who have gone before us. I boycott places such as wal-mart because I do not want to wear the blood of others on my t-shirt. I buy fair-trade, equitable groceries because I do not want to be part of the net of exploitation and colonization. I am not one of those who thinks everyone in porn is exploited. I too believe in the choices that we make, and will say, if indeed pornography was something that people engage in out of reluctance because they are hard up for cash, it would no longer exists.

    Pornography is culture. People want to perform in it, people want to film, people talk about, as we are here for example, we are all part of that pornographic culture. If people did not want to participate in said culture, then it would not exist, it could not exist. People love to cook and people love to eat. And there are food cultures. People like to make clothes and people like to wear clothes, talk about clothes, flip through magazines about clothes. It is a culture. But just because someone loves to cook doesn’t mean we won’t provide the safe means for them to do so. There is also a reason why food inspectors exist. Pornography, the makers, the performers, the viewers all need to start taking responsibility. Otherwise pornography is reduced, and rightly so, to the very thing that people decry about it.

    Finally, back to governmental intervention: The government should have no say in our desires. Well, the government should have no say in policing anyone’s homophobia either. Laws exist for a reason.

    1. Are you educated about PrEP and that a significant portion of actors are using PrEP as their primary and secondary form of HIV prevention? Do you know that the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, run by Michael Weinstein, FOUGHT to DENY the approval of PrEP and continues to SHAME anyone who wants to make their own health decisions for what is best for themselves, including using PrEP??? Michael Weinstein is also pushing for the adult industry to be regulated under OSHA, literally to the point that actors/actresses would be required to were gloves, use dental dams, goggles to prevent ejaculate from entering the eyes, etc. Is this what we want the porn industry to come to? Because this is what the people behind these efforts ARE demanding.

  4. “As a condom-only producer, it’s not my business whether someone is negative or positive. The reason so many gay porn studios use condoms is because it means we don’t have to know about a person’s status.”

    I’m sure the HIV-negative performers would love to hear that you are looking the other way when it comes to pairing a negative person up with someone (who might be / probably is / none of my business) HIV positive.

    1. You do know that HIV negative performers have worked with HIV positive performers for years and that not one case of infection has occurred, correct? Do you even know what it means to be HIV positive and undetectable? Performers are not stupid. This is why government has no business regulating what performers chose to do on a set.

  5. Stupid and insecure people, sketchy porn studios/producers/directors need laws to be reminded not to harm / exploit others and not to hurt themselves. Smart people and businesses have common sense, self respect, and compassion as guidance.

    Porn is a business. The bill prevents studios from taking advantage of a popular demand legally. This is about real or potential profits that slip through porn studios’ fingers located in California which are willing to be an active part of the supply and demand model of the free market.

    The bill will have a negative impact on those studios and performers who value profits and earnings above all.

    While I do think Mr. Weinstein’s slut shaming is wrong, and as any other bill it is wide open for abuse through loop holes, I do believe that the bill has its merits and has good intentions to keep porn performers safe and give them access to data to make an informed decision.

  6. It’s easy and cheap to use a condom, HIV/AIDS texts are fundamental and if people aren’t confortable enough to disclose their status it’ll be better quit porn. I support Mr. Weinstein. I think he’s right.

    1. You do realize with him it’s condoms or the highway. PREP isn’t even an option to him. You would expect a guy that’s so hardcore on combating aids he would support stuff like that but instead he calls Truvada a party drug. Do your research.

  7. Great editorial Tim. I’ve been following the Michael Weinstein/AHF drama for the past several years and it not only is bizarre and a waste of valuable resources but it does smell of far-right ideology against sex all-together. I’ve asked people like the current Mr LA Leather and others who are fighting back what can be done? Weinstein has come out emphatically stating he will NOT step done from the organization “he created” and has the full support of the AHF board (clearly the board of AHF must be just as crazy!) The only thing I know that will force a change is to hurt them where it counts, financially. While this would impact services provided to those with HIV/AIDS, I am convinced it is the only option available against a tyrannical leader whose agenda is a threat to the health and safety of both the adult entertainment industry as well as gay men (due to their anti-PrEP stance.)

    Keep up the fight and keep us informed!

  8. Adult performers have the right not to use a condom on the set? I understand that not using a condom might be a choice or preference, but I wasn’t aware that it was a right.

    And I am certain that adult performers are not obligated to work for studios that require condoms, testing or medical disclosures. And I am equally certain that studios are not required to hire everyone that applies.

    I also know that even without the passage of AB1576, any person–not just an “adult performer”–who knows he’s HIV+ and fails to disclose his status to a sex partner may be subject to civil and criminal prosecution.

  9. I don’t understand the controversy here. Most mainstream gay porn use condoms including Kink.com for gay scenes. Instead of attacking this bill there should be outrage of why such a bill was created. Guys will AIDS (not HIV) performing bareback in gay porn. Straight porn would be shut down instantly if HIV positive performers where making porn videos without condoms. Are gay people worth less than the straights? I hope not. Countries like Brazil have mandated condoms for porn sets for years. If it was not for the insane antics of AIDS porn this would not even be an issue. You are still free in infect others with HIV in the privacy of your bedroom. But if you are a porn company you MUST be responsible. I remember how serious gay porn companies treated HIV and AIDS in the 80s and 90s with HIV statements on gay porn tapes before the porn stated. Directors like Chi Chi would ban any bareback performers for working with mainstream studios. Look what has happened over the past 10 years. Gay porn studios hire guys with AIDS and porn is no longer sexy. Bareback is the new trend and HIV is considered a right of passage for gay youth.
    I strongly support this bill because it will save lives. The gay porn community has been overtaken by HIV promoters. Safe sex is no longer spoken about, performers no longer talk about their status, and anything goes is now the normal.
    Very very sad. Gay porn has lost so many performers to AIDS. I cant even believe this is even controversial. Wake up people!

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