Sex! Sex! Sex! Please! Can I have your STI identification card first.

[Bara_no_Hime]

Oh, so we are stigmatising people with diseases now?

Great idea, lets encourage people not to get tested.

Maybe we could all make them wear some kind of symbol to identify themselves. It should be easily recognizable, like the letter 'A'. And just to make sure no one misses it, let's make it be bright scarlet.

Goddamnit, beat me to it.

This.

How would you enforce this without encroaching on Doctor-Patient confidentiality? You really can't without violating someone's personal privacy.

And this.

Don't want an STD? STOP SLEEPING AROUND!!! I mean, fuck... how is it people still miss the fucking idea that STD's are spread due to promiscuity?

As for you, way to go straight to the slut shaming. You had some reasonable things to say later (never mind diamonds - condoms are a girl's best friend) but you opened with some fairly mean spirited things for those of us who enjoy being promiscuous AND safe.

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

An STI card?

Who is seriously going to carry one of those?

Edit: Also, who is seriously going to ask to see one of those?

Well, I'm not an expert in the slightest, but there is a strong push here in Austin to both know your STI status and talk about it with potential sex partners in the Gay community. And, honestly, it isn't a bad policy all around. Sure, there are some people who, for whatever, reason, know their status with various diseases and never even give a heads up to maybe slap on a raincoat (or whatever ladies might do), but at least you'd force people to face a moral dilemma instead of just spreading disease unknowingly.

 

[ERaptor]

As for you, way to go straight to the slut shaming. You had some reasonable things to say later (never mind diamonds - condoms are a girl's best friend) but you opened with some fairly mean spirited things for those of us who enjoy being promiscuous AND safe.

To be fair, im pretty sure it wasnt his intention to "shame sluts". He should've added that the issue is promiscuity COMBINED with a lack of protection tough. (Which, to me, translates into a lack of responsibility.)

Im a paranoid guy when it comes to meeting Girls, so i usually carry around a pack'o'rubbers all the time. And i do recommend just wearing a condom if you're not in a longterm relationship and REALLY trust the person. Even if you decide to sleep with a long-time friend, they might have something they themselves dont know about.

However, (luckily?) i dont have the looks to score with girls anyway. At least my lonely death will be STD-free!

 

[Imperioratorex Caprae]

Oh, so we are stigmatising people with diseases now?

Great idea, lets encourage people not to get tested.

Maybe we could all make them wear some kind of symbol to identify themselves. It should be easily recognizable, like the letter 'A'. And just to make sure no one misses it, let's make it be bright scarlet.

Goddamnit, beat me to it.

This.

How would you enforce this without encroaching on Doctor-Patient confidentiality? You really can't without violating someone's personal privacy.

And this.

Don't want an STD? STOP SLEEPING AROUND!!! I mean, fuck... how is it people still miss the fucking idea that STD's are spread due to promiscuity?

As for you, way to go straight to the slut shaming. You had some reasonable things to say later (never mind diamonds - condoms are a girl's best friend) but you opened with some fairly mean spirited things for those of us who enjoy being promiscuous AND safe.

Well, safe as you can be considering condoms break, and are even printed with disclaimers telling you they're only 99% effective. Sleeping around also means you give up the right to complain if you get an STD. Its like me, I smoke and I know smoking can cause cancer. I take my chances and hell I'm not going to complain if I end up with it. I know the risk involved in what I do, that was my point. Sleeping around, more chance of an STD. Smoking, more likely to get cancer. Drinking every day? Liver may fail. Drive like an asshole? Die in a car wreck, maybe...
Consequences people. Sure things I've mentioned happen to people who've done nothing to warrant the event, but exceptions happen.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

Oh, so we are stigmatising people with diseases now?

Great idea, lets encourage people not to get tested.

Maybe we could all make them wear some kind of symbol to identify themselves. It should be easily recognizable, like the letter 'A'. And just to make sure no one misses it, let's make it be bright scarlet.

Goddamnit, beat me to it.

This.

How would you enforce this without encroaching on Doctor-Patient confidentiality? You really can't without violating someone's personal privacy.

And this.

Don't want an STD? STOP SLEEPING AROUND!!! I mean, fuck... how is it people still miss the fucking idea that STD's are spread due to promiscuity?

As for you, way to go straight to the slut shaming. You had some reasonable things to say later (never mind diamonds - condoms are a girl's best friend) but you opened with some fairly mean spirited things for those of us who enjoy being promiscuous AND safe.

Well, safe as you can be considering condoms break, and are even printed with disclaimers telling you they're only 99% effective. Sleeping around also means you give up the right to complain if you get an STD. Its like me, I smoke and I know smoking can cause cancer. I take my chances and hell I'm not going to complain if I end up with it. I know the risk involved in what I do, that was my point. Sleeping around, more chance of an STD. Smoking, more likely to get cancer. Drinking every day? Liver may fail. Drive like an asshole? Die in a car wreck, maybe...
Consequences people. Sure things I've mentioned happen to people who've done nothing to warrant the event, but exceptions happen.

But.. but... slut shaming! Victim blaming!

Seriously, this is why so many people immediately get skeptical when they hear either of those two phrases used in the contexts they're most often used in.

Edit: You know, reading through this thread, it came to me just how similar the arguments as to why rape is a crime totally unlike any other in the history of mankind, and therefore any comparisons to the way we deal with those other crimes is automatically invalid, are pretty much identical to the arguments used to explain why videogames are a unique medium totally unlike any other in the history of mankind, and therefore any comparisons to how others manage to survive with such things as consumer rights and a used market are automatically invalid. I'm sure I'll probably regret posting this in the morning, but man does that explain a lot about why post-slutwalk feminism bothers me.

 

[Callate]

It would have to be more like a tattoo.

Sure, not going to happen. But I have to admit I'm a little amused by the idea of taking off someone's clothes and finding they have a ring of angry red devils with pitchforks around their anatomy, and not in a sexy way.

Be safe. Use protection. And ideally, have some kind of awareness if your partner is the kind of waste of life who would have sex with someone despite full awareness that they're carrying a sexually transmitted disease. Maybe, I don't know, don't go to bed with someone after no more introduction than a couple of drinks and a shitty pick-up line?

 

[Drathnoxis]

Dumbest thing ever. Can you imagine smooth-talking a girl for a night and right before you bang her she is obligated by law to show you that she has herpes?

No way would any rational human ever be in favor of this.

As quite a few people have already said...
What would kill the mood more after meeting a girl (or guy), going to their (or your) house making it up into the bedroom only for them (or you) to go "WAIT! I have to tell you I have (STI Here)"

Yep, moodkiller and certainly argument starter...

This is sarcasm, right? You feel that people with STIs shouldn't be obligated to tell their sexual partners because it might "kill the mood"? Are you serious? You do know that some STIs cannot be cured, right? You would rather have one night of uninterrupted passion than have a little heads up that the person you are going to bed with is carrying an infection that could potentially ruin your life and or kill you. They could literally give you AIDS, and you wouldn't want to be warned beforehand??

OT: I agree with Abomination here, people with incurable STIs should have a visible marker on them that will warn all potential partners. It would probably reduce spread of sexually transmitted diseases if infected individuals were branded as soon as they were diagnosed. Yes, I know it doesn't sound very nice, but you know what is *really* not nice? Giving someone your disease that you bloody well know you have and don't feel like telling about because you don't care about anyone but your needs. At the very least they should be legally obligated to tell all potential partners, and I cannot fathom why this is not already law. This is like contracting something like SARS, *knowing* you have SARS, and walking into the supermarket without even shouting "Hey everybody! Watch out I have SARS!"

 

[MorphingDragon]

"Hey everybody! Watch out I have SARS!"

I'm going to shout this while going through customs.

 

[CriticalMiss]

Just wear protection if you are going to have sex with a stranger and if you have hope of a longer term relationship then ask them to go get tested. I had no problem asking my girlfriend to get tested before we did the horizontal tango, we even went together so we knew each others results (plus the doctor was giving out free cinema tickets). And even though we don't sleep with other people we still go to get tested regularly just to make sure nothing sneaks in (no more movie tickets unfortunately).

I don't think requiring people to carry a disease card is going to work, someone could easily lie about it or get a fake card and a lot of people probably wouldn't ask anyway. And when you have sex you are responsible for your own safety, so if you choose not to wear a condom or don't ask your partner to wear one it's kind of partly your fault if you catch something. You can't blame them for you not using protection.

 

[not_you]

snip

no, it wasn't sarcasm... one nighters you get what you deserve no matter what happens....

But I DO feel that if it's a committed relationship THAT sort of information should be known by their partner...

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

no, it wasn't sarcasm... one nighters you get what you deserve no matter what happens....

Why would somebody deserve to get an STI just because they have a one night stand?

Let's rephrase the question: why would somebody who made a bad choice that could have easily been avoided deserve to deal with the consequences?

And I /do/ believe anyone who knows they have an STI should, at the very least, inform /all/ potential partners. They definitely deserve all the blame for being the kind of scumbag that would go around knowingly spreading herpes or HIV. That doesn't mean I'm going to trust a stranger to be honest just because they should.

 

[Ken Sapp]

[HEADING=3]C-
See me after class[/HEADING]

I think people just need to except accept the fact that if you're willing to whip it out for people you don't know, then you are taking on an inherit inherent risk.

If you don't want herpes, then don't have unprotected sex with strangers. Problem solved.

Sorry, you probably don't have any spellcheck installed, I just had to, it was too tempting. Also, not sure, but I think it's Than rather than Then.

Anyway, sounds logical, but not reasonable or feasible. Nobody who wants to have sex will bother carrying one, and it'll probably get ignored. Not to mention the fact that some people might not actually realize they have it.

The primary issue would be the morality of it, the difficulty to actually uphold, and the fact that it most likely is against the constitution.

Usage of then is correct. Spellcheck would not have helped as both of the incorrectly used words are spelled correctly.

 

[Abomination]

I'm all for a bright red bio-hazard sign stamped on to both inner thighs of individuals with an STI.

Fuck privacy laws. They know they've got it. They shouldn't be having sex with anyone. But anyone can't know they have it.

The onus is suddenly on the other party to screen the person who knows they have an STI?

Funny how hypocritical the law is at times.

Is the onus on anyone in my office to warn me if they have a cold that I could catch from using the same office telephone as them? Is the onus on the guy next to me on the bus who has head lice to inform me when I sit next to him on the same padded, upholstered bench seat?

This just doesn't work in our cultural treatment of other diseases. Now, I support it for careers where sexual contact is required as a part of doing the job (porn, prostitution) because there are liability issues[footnote]Complete aside here, but I would love to see the invention of a "Adult Actor's Guild" or a "Prostitution Guild" to create a standardized system of protecting workers. No doubt things like this exist in some areas but I just love the idea of there being a sex trade guild. I want them to have an ornate guild hall that in order to learn the handshake that gets you in, you have to accept a quest to dry-hump 6 NPCs from a radiant quest-decided location.[/footnote] (though good luck getting any prostitute to agree to this while prostitution is illegal in their jurisdiction, because otherwise all they're doing is carrying a card that says, "Arrest me please!"). I'd even go so far as to make someone who knows they are infected with an STI and who lies about it to a sexual partner subject to damages. But we can't just impose mandatory disclosure for one communicable disease unless we impose it for all diseases.

The hilarious thing about where I live compared to other places - especially the United States - is we have the ability to make laws that do not require a blanket treatment of other similar aspects.

For the same reason why cigarettes and alcohol are legal is it possible for the "other" recreational drug - marijuana - to be illegal despite the obvious hypocrisy there.

Speaking of hypocrisy and alcohol, why is it that a drunk driver can be arrested for even attempting to drive while intoxicated and will be punished more severely for driving while drunk yet a person with an STI can not be arrested for attempting to have sex with someone else... and good luck prosecuting someone with an STI who had sex with someone else. We don't tell drivers on the road to just "be more careful" in case there are drunk drivers out there - as in people who have a condition that excludes them from driving because it is dangerous to others when they drive... similar to how people with STIs should be excluded from fornication while they have their condition since they endanger others the most when they engage in fornication.

What justification is there for a person with an STI to have free reign to have sex with anyone they so desire WITHOUT any obligation to warn those they will have intercourse with? We aren't talking about colds, we aren't talking about the flu or conditions that can be treated very easily. If an individual is diagnosed with a dangerous contagious disease or a highly-contagious and debilitating disease do you know what happens? They are detained in a medical facility until they are deemed no longer dangerous to the public. Individual's rights be damned - they're dangerous to the rest of the society they operate in.

Branding the inside of a person with an STI's thigh is a marker in a location that someone who is going to engage in fornication would be able to see but discrete enough that someone who is not going to engage in fornication would not be able to see. It would only "restrict" the individual in a scenario where they should be restricted or where their partner should be entitled to the knowledge the brand conveys.

 

[Nomad]

Well, safe as you can be considering condoms break, and are even printed with disclaimers telling you they're only 99% effective. Sleeping around also means you give up the right to complain if you get an STD. Its like me, I smoke and I know smoking can cause cancer. I take my chances and hell I'm not going to complain if I end up with it. I know the risk involved in what I do, that was my point. Sleeping around, more chance of an STD. Smoking, more likely to get cancer. Drinking every day? Liver may fail. Drive like an asshole? Die in a car wreck, maybe...
Consequences people. Sure things I've mentioned happen to people who've done nothing to warrant the event, but exceptions happen.

I'm not entirely convinced by your reasoning. By the same logic, you can't complain if someone runs you over while you're crossing the street. You brought that on yourself by walking around where there could possibly be people in cars. And don't you dare call the police if you get mugged at some point, because you knew when you walked out your front door that there are criminals outside.

Condoms break, yeah. But the chance is miniscule to begin with - the 99% figure means 1 in 100 condoms will break. That's 99 that don't. And even then, only a miniscule share of instances of unprotected intercourse result in an STD-infection or a pregnancy. You should also keep in mind that 99% is a bare minimum figure - in the US, I think the lab requirement is actually 99.6%. And that's just to pass the tests, in reality most condoms will be way more consistent and durable than that.

To sum it upp, living is dangerous. You could die. So if we're going to act based on risk-elimination, then it's probably safest just to end it right away. A more reasonable stance would probably be to just be as safe as possible while still getting the most out of your short existence. Employ every precaution you can, as long as it doesn't actually limit you (or anyone else) in any meaningful way.