I mentioned in tweets and what-not a while back that Treasure Island Media pornographer-in-chief Paul Morris was to launch a HIV positive line. The bareback porn company seems to want to turn up the notch on controversy and so has announced that one of their performers (James Roscoe, pictured right) is HIV positive and will be featuring in the new series. Even more interesting, his ‘real life’ partner (Brad McGuire, pictured second right) is another TIM performer who is HIV-negative and they both (obviously) fuck bareback. Check out the story on Gay Porn Times here.This is an area of porn I continue to be fascinated by and it forms part of some ongoing research. Morris is on the one hand a guy making money. As such, he is hardly some pure campaigner. Yet, a campaigner he also is. Whilst this latest announcement is a bit of marketing, it is also important in challenging our notions around being positive. It projects, as have previously written, an image of what we are rather than what we seek to be. It documents the raw sex lives of men and in doing so is also a major headache for sexual health campaigners.
In a press release, Morris commented: "As a community we have a moral and social imperative to demolish the HIV positive closet," Morris said. "We are adults and we are participating in a tremendously vital and important sexual culture that is under attack. We know exactly what we're doing, and we will not allow reactionary individuals and organizations to dictate our behavior. James and Brad are fitting role models for young gay men. They are living their lives with honesty and integrity. I couldn't be more proud to have them in the T.I.M. family."
The press release went on to conclude that Roscoe's sero-status hasn't stopped anything for Treasure Island Media. To the contrary, T.I.M. is currently shooting work that features proud poz men engaged in what TIM describes as 'fucking each other to within an inch of their lives'. The first of these poz-only bareback pics is slated for general release in spring 2011.
Although the Free Speech Coalition (an industry) group didn't go massively on the attack, they did seem to offer a mild condemnation of the move, stating that: "Despite our opposition to a state-imposed mandate for the universal use of condoms, FSC does not endorse the exploitation of potential HIV infection of performers for promotional purposes,” Executive Director Diane Duke said. “(S)uch conduct is at the center of the efforts to find appropriate regulations for the adult industry by both Cal/OSHA and the FSC”.
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