Grantale:

I believe the CDC has many groupings associated with their study of HIV.

One such grouping is African Americans, intraveneous drug users and so on.

I am sure you are familiar with the site: but I will post the link here http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/topics/surveillance/resources/reports/2002report/pdf/2002SurveillanceReport.pdf

It appears that cases of are increasing for teens and young adults “AIDs incidence increased for the following age groups: 13-14, 15-24…”

The actual numbers indicate a growth of about 300 cases or a 10% increase for this population of HIV/AIDS diagnoses. A small but important goup. There are multiple ways to contact HIV/AIDS, the most common being high risk sexual behaviors.

The lifetime survivability of HIV/AIDS is increasing, however, life expectancy is significantly lowered for those who contract HIV/AIDS. If adolescents are impulsive (they are) and risk-taking (they are) then high risk sexual behavior is likely to have lifetime consequences for them. The exposure rate of an impulsive, risk-oriented adolescent and young adult is of concern, since this group is the most vulnerable.

Protecting them is kind. Your previous post suggested that those who were promiscuous were not your concern. Your anger at me has clarified you position. I think teens and even young men are our concern.

David Blakeslee

If we’re talking about being gay, as such, not.

But as being gay also involves tennis clubs, or not, it’s not so defining if one talks about that “gay lifestyle (c)”

Although, we do — of course — hold membership drives too. Just like the tennis club. Most of the small appliances in the kitchen, and near all of my wood-working tools, have been acquired through our very success in this area.

/looking for a rolling eyes icon.

PS and who on earth mistook you for a desperate housewife? We did warn you not to go whipping up a batch of your famous scones without drawing the curtains first, didn’t we?…

I will clarify the abuse the David didn’t just imply, but laid cause to.

The CDC stats are quite clear that within this current generation an entire slab of men are becomming infected in their early 20’s. This is tragic.

However, David claimed — confusing the period of HIV to AIDS with period of HIV infection to notification – that this meant (older HIV infected) gay men were infecting teenage boys.

That is so far from the truth, but so close to the most vile of anti-gay beliefs, that we will not tolerate it.

We will also not tolerate being told we do not care. We cared, long before you or David did.

As a final thing we will not tolerate — it is, being told what gay “really” is. We need no education on that. We have told you that before. This time we told David. I doubt David could educate us, in any fashion — knowing his educational background — but he may learn a great deal if he was to listen.

We have no desire to temper his anti-gay religious beliefs. They are his own, and he will answer for them. They should, frankly, have no bearing on our lives. But we will not remain silent when David (or anybody as equally ignorant) accuses us — and gay men generally — of being careless, ignorant, or child molestors.

We are none of those. Yet we suffer the consequences of some people assuming that we are.

And so, we speak up. But you know that.

I like your list. I would also add

9. Forbidding discrimination in all services, requirements, recognitions, or benefits provided by federal, state, or local governments.

Also, I’m not sure as to the practicallity of number 5 for either gay or straight youth.

I also like your list and Timothy’s suggested addition.(I also admire your tenacity! Thanks for your persistence.) And, although #5 may be the most difficult, I share your concerns. Could we broaden that one to include safer sex practices if they can’t restrain? I am alarmed at the increase in teenage mothers and fathers along with the teen risks of AIDS. It’s obvious that young people have a disdain for latex. In my day, you carried one in your wallet as a ‘badge of honor’; nowadays, they seem to laugh at them.

Warren: if the other bloggers seem interested, perhaps we could discuss each point as a new thread and see what kind of consensus we could come up with. There might indeed be value to a consensus opinion from an unlikely mix such as the bloggers on your site.

Thanks for your persistence, and that of grantdale and tim.

However miniscule (or imaginary) the middle ground is, it is worth seeking.

Whatever facts we share, misunderstand or distort, they are here for others to see and to reflect upon.

Part of this dialogue has to expect misunderstanding, I think, in order to move toward understanding.

A short-list of proposed common ground:

1. Ethical Therapuetic Practices.

2. Protecting Gays and Lesbians in Public and Private settings.

3. Forbidding discrimination in employment and housing.

4. Access to quality sex education (not advocacy education)

5. Encouraging delay in sexual expression (heterosexuals also) into early 20’s.

6. Building a consensus on the scientific literature on Same-Sex Attraction (a general title).

7. Protecting all groups (gay and straight) from sexual exploitation.

8. Encouraging the bonding of love as an expression of empathy and devotion with the behavior of sex.

Others may suggest a better shorter, or longer list.

David Blakeslee

nope. I was simply applying your clarifications to your original statement.

nonetheless…

I attempted to post some information addressing your other point about promiscuity in young gay men aged 18 to 25 but it got held up. I think it is because it had links attached to source documents. So, here’s a brief rundown without the sources:

From the CDC: roughly 40% of gay men age 20 to 24 had 2 or more male sex partners in a year. This compares to 34% of straight men who had 2 or more female partners. The numbers of gay males age 15 to 19 who had 2 or more partners was so small as to be undetectable (straight was about 20%).

This indicates that gay men ages 15 to 24 are not significantly more promiscuous than their straight counterparts. Any discussion of gay promiscuity that hints, suggests, implies, or claims that gay youth are much more promiscuous doesn’t seem to hold up to the facts.

From NIH, roughly 1 in 200 gay males age 15 to 24 contracted HIV in a year. Yes that is terrible and horrifying. But it does not rise to the level of requiring inclusion in every discussion about gay people.

Your claims of concern do not seem to be matched by your knowledge of the facts. This causes me to doubt your sincerety and suspect that your compassion may not be sincere but is instead based on a desire to negatively portray gays. I hope I’m wrong.

I would love to have reasonable and effective dialog resulting in a meeting of the minds. Truly. But it is frustrating, David, because you seem to believe so much of the anti-gay propaganda that is created and disseminated by NARTH and others with an anti-gay political agenda.

It’s hard to have a conversation with someone who brings up things that have no relevance to my life whatsoever. If we were discussing a film about Christians and I suddenly said “well, it didn’t discuss Christian husbands beating their wives”, you’d be justifiably mystified. It would have little relevance to the topic and would demonstrate an unreasonable bias. And if I thought that Christian men generally beat their wives, it would show a willful ignorance on my part. Even if anti-Christian media suggested it was true, this would not justify my believing it when there was ready evidence to the contrary.

Please consider that assuming negative things about gay people is as equally offensive. And bringing them to a conversation as though we all share belief in these myths is (sorry) laziness on your part.

I had a rather frank discussion on the Bridges Across board about a year ago on the pitfalls of language. We were discussing the Saddleback AIDS initiatives in So. Cal., and I pointed out that it was fraught with difficulties because of the deep level of mistrust — a mistrust on the gay community’s part that in my view is very well earned. History provides us ample reasons to be suspicious.

And I mentioned how unintentionally ill-considered choices of terms can cause the whole thing to break down. I think we’ve seen that here in this thread.

The discussion had a great start, but the simple term “lifestyle” threw everything in disarray. I believe it is perfectly predictable — that word is a red-hot button, and once uttered, is not easily forgotten or forgiven. I also believe that many who are not gay may not know this pitfall. (I don’t know whether Dr. Blakeslee understood it or not.) And yet, it’s too bad that a single word can cause so much damage — to the listener and to the speaker both.

I, of course, believe that Grantdale and Timothy made some very strong points, ones which I think Dr. Blakeslee would be willing to concede. I believe also that Dr. Blakeslee offered some very valid concerns that, if couched in different language, are concerns that we all share.

I also believe there is room for common ground on these concerns if we can all take a step back and listen to each other — and be really committed to learning from each other.

Maybe on another thread, we’ll have a better opportunity for a “do over” with the lessons we learned here.