It's cause and effect

Have you had sex? Do you want to have sex? Have you fallen asleep, curled around your pillow, thinking about sex, or woken up and lain in bed for a few moments considering sex with that quiet grin on your face? During the course of the past week, how many times during your work or shopping hours did you think about how great it would be to have sex?

So. Now. If someone does have sex, and gets infected with some STI (sexually transmitted infection) - the worst being HIV - why do you judge them?

Is the general populace still judging people who became infected with HIV? Because if it does, talking openly about HIV seems to hit stumbling blocks, and seems to be allowed to thrive. Funny that irony.

Why are you judging HIV-positive people?

Is it because they did not use a condom?
Because they did not ensure that a sexual partner was tested and knew their status?
Because that person choose whatever circumstances to have sex?
Because it could have been you, considering moments of “stupidity” in your life. And your judgemental attitude now allows you to put up a wall between that person, that reality, and those past indiscretions of yours.

What is sex?

Is it a gift that your god(s) gave to us humans? Is it a drug from the daily grind (excuse the pun)? Is it simply a means of procreating to keep our species going? Is it the most base of instincts?

Or is eating the most base of instincts… and are there not diseases one gets from eating or drinking water (dysentery comes to mind)?

Why are we so scared of being blunt about the causes-and-effects around HIV?

Let alone in your personal life, but in my mutating AIDS industry – it is all about the “Politically Correct”. I had a meeting with some UN people this week, and did not know whether to grin or grind my teeth in frustration. Because with them, “the fight against AIDS” so often is all about the wording.

Oh, sorry, according to the latest terminology guide, ““the fight against AIDS” is to be replaced with “response to AIDS”.

I can’t complete an awareness task at work this week, because I am waiting on one official logo and one tick against approximately 100 words.

But then, sometimes I get some random guy in a bar, who’s trying to stumble into my pants, hypocritically telling me that people who are infected deserve the agony and death from AIDS because of their promiscuous “pomping” ways. And I realise, maybe the wording is so crucial... until “sex” does not have so many loaded (excuse the next pun) words against it and “stupid hypocritical” people hold the means to have and think and talk about it.

A few weeks ago, a woman who seemed to know her stuff commented on a blog post of mine. As a result I discovered her site, and linked her back here. Little did I know (and now feel quite honoured!), she was finishing up a now-published book that has had articles flying about in our AIDS Industry… where she is finally demanding an end to all this politically-softened talk. And she asks:

When can we hit the nail on the head, deal with the real causes of HIV, and so generate some real and some good effects in this fight/ response!

[I recommend the read of the article, " 'People do stupid things, that's what spreads HIV' " about Elizabeth Pisani's book, "The Wisdom Of Whores"!]