Quote:
Originally posted by bey0nce
I've never understood why it's so high in gay males. Is it because unprotected anal sex is simply a more common way of the disease being transmitted compared to vaginal, or is it because of the mass amount of apparently gay men having unprotected sex, period?
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Well, I'm not formally educated on this, but I suspect it's that among other factors. From what I know, as the anus isn't self-lubricating like a vagina, it develops tears easily during intercourse (as well as other body processes
), which DOES make it somewhat easier to transmit a virus by blood in anal sex, as opposed to vaginal or oral.
Additionally, I think the size of the community has a lot to do with it as well. The MSM(men who have sex with men, as opposed to just "gay") community is significantly smaller than straights. Thus, if one person is infected, and has casual sex with various partners at exactly the same rate as someone in the straight community, they will spread it to a significantly larger percentage (which is what we're dealing with here) of the gay community than someone would in a straight community.
Some degree of it is simply leftovers from the AIDS epidemic decades ago. It just gets passed on, and as the nature of sexual orientation keeps things generally closed, it gets passed on only to other gays. Combine that with the new ease which we have to get laid, and the numbers aren't totally surprising.
Speaking purely anecdotally, most of the straight guys I know are much more serious about using condoms, ESPECIALLY for casual hook ups. Not for STDs, as most young people seem to have delusions that if the person they're talking to is hot, "looks healthy" and is willing, they
obviously don't have any STDs
They do it because they don't want to get a girl pregnant on a one-night stand. That may play some part in why (in my anecdotal experience) gay guys I've met have mostly all done it bareback
It's a tiny subculture, but there are also the "bugchasers" which we have in the gay community, which probably represents some portion of that 132%.
This is apparently unheard of (both here and in the gay community in general), but what a concept -- actually taking time to develop a meaningful relationship with another person and developing an environment of trust and comfort. 
