Barebacking
Encyclopedia
Bareback is a slang
term to describe acts of sexual penetration
without the use of a condom
.
The term comes from the equestrian
term bareback, which refers to the practice of riding a horse
without a saddle
. Barebacking usually refers to a conscious and deliberate choice to forgo condoms; accidental misuse or non-use is not usually called "barebacking."
purposes, condoms also came to be used to limit or prevent sexually transmitted disease
s, even after other contraceptive methods were developed. As AIDS
emerged and the sexual transmission of HIV
became known in the 1980s, the use of condoms to prevent infection became much more widespread, especially among homosexual men. At the beginning of the AIDS crisis, in the context of the invention and development of safe sex
, the uptake of condoms among Western gay men was so widespread and effective that condom use became established as a norm for gay sex. From 1995 several high profile HIV positive men declared their refusal to wear condoms with other HIV positive men in gay publications, dubbing the practice "barebacking". While these early articulations of barebacking expressed a concern for HIV prevention, in that they generally referred to dispensing with condoms in the context of sex between people of the same HIV status, the moral panic
which ensued was so pronounced that barebacking came to be framed as a rebellious and transgressive erotic practice for HIV positive and HIV negative people alike, irrespective of the risks of HIV transmission.
, Genre magazine, and Out magazine. An article in the online resource The Body lists no fewer than 22 reasons as to why barebacking has become increasingly acceptable in the gay community. The following list includes some of the points made by The Body, but goes beyond it in drawing on some more recent research:
was standard in "pre-condom" films from the 1970s and early 1980s. As awareness of the risk of AIDS developed, pornography producers came under pressure to use condoms, both for the health of the performers and to serve as role models for their viewers. By the early 1990s new pornographic videos usually featured the use of condoms for anal sex. However, beginning in the 1990s, an increasing number of studios have been devoted to the production of new films featuring men engaging in unprotected sex. For example, San Francisco-based studio Treasure Island Media
, whose work focuses in this area, has produced bareback films since 1999. Other companies that do so include SEVP and Eurocreme
. Mainstream gay pornographic studios such as Kristen Bjorn
Productions have featured the occasional bareback scene like in "El Rancho" between performers who are real-life partners. Other studios like Falcon Entertainment
have also reissued older pre-condom films. Also, mainstream studios that consistently use condoms for anal sex scenes may sometimes choose editing techniques that make the presence of condoms somewhat ambiguous and less visually evident, and thus may encourage viewers to fantasize that barebacking is taking place, even though the performers are following safer-sex protocols. (In contrast, some mainstream directors are conscientious about using close-up shots of condom packets being opened, etc., to help clearly establish for the viewer that the sex is not bareback.)
Some bareback pornography studios say that they do not inquire whether their models are HIV positive, but assume that they are infected. For example, Hot Desert Knights (HDK) was one of the studios that initially operated on the assumption that all of their bareback models were HIV positive. However, in February 2008 HDK announced that it would begin testing its models for HIV and engage in a process of "sero-sorting", which match HIV-positive performers with other HIV-positive performers, and negative with negative. Critics suggest that sero-sorting may not prevent the development of a multi-strain "supervirus." By contrast, Bel Ami
is one of the studios that claimed from the beginning to test their bareback models for HIV before allowing them to participate in condom-free scenes. A notice on the Bel Ami website states: "all our performers are regularly tested for the presence of HIV or other communicable diseases."
Adult Industry Medical Health Care Foundation
was formed to promote and facilitate STD testing and safety precautions among pornographic film actors.
arena, where organizers frequently offer a vetting
service for members to reduce the risk of STDs.
or polyamorous
.
" (GFE) was coined to denote an encounter between a prostitute and a client that could be considered "a real relationship for the moment with a sincere woman who apparently enjoys the experience, not just mechanical sex. It should not, however, be implied that the GFE automatically includes barebacking; to do so may result in denial of commercial sex services. "
Slang
Slang is the use of informal words and expressions that are not considered standard in the speaker's language or dialect but are considered more acceptable when used socially. Slang is often to be found in areas of the lexicon that refer to things considered taboo...
term to describe acts of sexual penetration
Sexual intercourse
Sexual intercourse, also known as copulation or coitus, commonly refers to the act in which a male's penis enters a female's vagina for the purposes of sexual pleasure or reproduction. The entities may be of opposite sexes, or they may be hermaphroditic, as is the case with snails...
without the use of a condom
Condom
A condom is a barrier device most commonly used during sexual intercourse to reduce the probability of pregnancy and spreading sexually transmitted diseases . It is put on a man's erect penis and physically blocks ejaculated semen from entering the body of a sexual partner...
.
The term comes from the equestrian
Equestrianism
Equestrianism more often known as riding, horseback riding or horse riding refers to the skill of riding, driving, or vaulting with horses...
term bareback, which refers to the practice of riding a horse
Horse
The horse is one of two extant subspecies of Equus ferus, or the wild horse. It is a single-hooved mammal belonging to the taxonomic family Equidae. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million years from a small multi-toed creature into the large, single-toed animal of today...
without a saddle
Saddle
A saddle is a supportive structure for a rider or other load, fastened to an animal's back by a girth. The most common type is the equestrian saddle designed for a horse, but specialized saddles have been created for camels and other creatures...
. Barebacking usually refers to a conscious and deliberate choice to forgo condoms; accidental misuse or non-use is not usually called "barebacking."
History
Initially used for contraceptiveContraception
Contraception is the prevention of the fusion of gametes during or after sexual activity. The term contraception is a contraction of contra, which means against, and the word conception, meaning fertilization...
purposes, condoms also came to be used to limit or prevent sexually transmitted disease
Sexually transmitted disease
Sexually transmitted disease , also known as a sexually transmitted infection or venereal disease , is an illness that has a significant probability of transmission between humans by means of human sexual behavior, including vaginal intercourse, oral sex, and anal sex...
s, even after other contraceptive methods were developed. As AIDS
AIDS
Acquired immune deficiency syndrome or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome is a disease of the human immune system caused by the human immunodeficiency virus...
emerged and the sexual transmission of HIV
HIV
Human immunodeficiency virus is a lentivirus that causes acquired immunodeficiency syndrome , a condition in humans in which progressive failure of the immune system allows life-threatening opportunistic infections and cancers to thrive...
became known in the 1980s, the use of condoms to prevent infection became much more widespread, especially among homosexual men. At the beginning of the AIDS crisis, in the context of the invention and development of safe sex
Safe sex
Safe sex is sexual activity engaged in by people who have taken precautions to protect themselves against sexually transmitted diseases such as AIDS. It is also referred to as safer sex or protected sex, while unsafe or unprotected sex is sexual activity engaged in without precautions...
, the uptake of condoms among Western gay men was so widespread and effective that condom use became established as a norm for gay sex. From 1995 several high profile HIV positive men declared their refusal to wear condoms with other HIV positive men in gay publications, dubbing the practice "barebacking". While these early articulations of barebacking expressed a concern for HIV prevention, in that they generally referred to dispensing with condoms in the context of sex between people of the same HIV status, the moral panic
Moral panic
A moral panic is the intensity of feeling expressed in a population about an issue that appears to threaten the social order. According to Stanley Cohen, author of Folk Devils and Moral Panics and credited creator of the term, a moral panic occurs when "[a] condition, episode, person or group of...
which ensued was so pronounced that barebacking came to be framed as a rebellious and transgressive erotic practice for HIV positive and HIV negative people alike, irrespective of the risks of HIV transmission.
Claimed resurgence
A resurgence of barebacking in first-world gay communities during the 1990s has been a frequent topic for gay columnists and editorialists in The AdvocateThe Advocate
The Advocate is an American LGBT-interest magazine, printed monthly and available by subscription. The Advocate brand also includes a web site. Both magazine and web site have an editorial focus on news, politics, opinion, and arts and entertainment of interest to LGBT people...
, Genre magazine, and Out magazine. An article in the online resource The Body lists no fewer than 22 reasons as to why barebacking has become increasingly acceptable in the gay community. The following list includes some of the points made by The Body, but goes beyond it in drawing on some more recent research:
- "Some men no longer fear AIDSAIDSAcquired immune deficiency syndrome or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome is a disease of the human immune system caused by the human immunodeficiency virus...
." In other words, the advent and relatively noticeable success of protease inhibitorsProtease inhibitor (pharmacology)Protease inhibitors are a class of drugs used to treat or prevent infection by viruses, including HIV and Hepatitis C. PIs prevent viral replication by inhibiting the activity of proteases, e.g.HIV-1 protease, enzymes used by the viruses to cleave nascent proteins for final assembly of new...
and other drugs for treating HIV infections have changed the perception of HIV infection from an untreatable terminal illness to a treatable chronic malady similar to diabetes or epilepsyEpilepsyEpilepsy is a common chronic neurological disorder characterized by seizures. These seizures are transient signs and/or symptoms of abnormal, excessive or hypersynchronous neuronal activity in the brain.About 50 million people worldwide have epilepsy, and nearly two out of every three new cases...
. - Some men are dispensing with condoms in the context of seroconcordant sex (sex between two men of the same HIV status). Early articulations of barebacking generally referred to sex between two HIV positive men. This poses no risk of infecting an HIV negative person newly with HIV. On this account, barebacking could be considered an early harm reduction strategy similar to serosortingSerosortingSerosorting is the practice of using HIV status as a decision-making point in choosing sexual behavior. Frequently the term is used to describe the behavior of a person who chooses a sexual partner assumed to be of the same HIV serostatus for the purpose of engaging in unprotected sex with the...
, which was later endorsed by some public health authorities in the USA. - There is a decreasing effectiveness of health education messages in the gay community, a kind of condom fatigueCondom fatigueCondom fatigue is a term used by medical professionals and safer sex educators to refer to the phenomenon of decreased condom use. "Condom fatigue" can also be used to describe a general weariness of and decreased effectiveness of safer sex messages...
: "Some men are so sick of hearing about HIV/AIDS that they just ignore the whole issue." - Individuals under the influence of drugs, such as alcohol or methamphetamineMethamphetamineMethamphetamine is a psychostimulant of the phenethylamine and amphetamine class of psychoactive drugs...
, are less likely to be concerned over potential hazards of their behavior. - "It has been suggested that barebacking is a form of rebellion." Along the lines of this suggestion, some recent academic work has argued that barebacking is a way to reach for transcendence, to overcome the boredom of everyday average life in our hyper-rationalized society.
- Online solicitation services for barebacking partners have led to an increase in the practice.
- Some gay men feel that using condoms is "unnatural". For example, in a trailer of the Rockafellaz Entertainment video "Raw Rods 2," released in 2008, a scene of two men having unprotected anal intercourse is accompanied by the caption, "We do it like God intended us to."
- The resurgence of barebacking has led to an increase in sexually transmitted diseases among the MSMMen who have sex with menMen who have sex with men are male persons who engage in sexual activity with members of the same sex, regardless of how they identify themselves; many men choose not to accept sexual identities of homosexual or bisexual...
community. A study that Perry N. Halkitis conducted found that of the 448 men in this study who were familiar with barebacking, nearly half reported they had bareback sex in the last three months. In the San Francisco study, fewer men reported engaging in barebacking when the behavior was defined as intentional unprotected anal intercourse with a non-primary partner. Using this definition, 14% of the 390 men who were aware of barebacking reported engaging in the behavior in the past two years. Perry N. HalkitisPerry N. HalkitisPerry N. Halkitis is an American psychologist known for his research on issues of health, human behavior, and developmental psychology, with a specific application to the domains of HIV/AIDS, substance abuse, and mental health burden....
and Richard Wolitski also found that HIV-positive MSM were more likely to have bareback sex than were HIV-negative MSM.
Gay pornographic films
Bareback gay pornographyGay pornography
Gay pornography is the representation of sexual intercourse between men with the primary goal of sexual arousal in its audience. There is also a tradition, and continuing considerable output, of lesbian pornography....
was standard in "pre-condom" films from the 1970s and early 1980s. As awareness of the risk of AIDS developed, pornography producers came under pressure to use condoms, both for the health of the performers and to serve as role models for their viewers. By the early 1990s new pornographic videos usually featured the use of condoms for anal sex. However, beginning in the 1990s, an increasing number of studios have been devoted to the production of new films featuring men engaging in unprotected sex. For example, San Francisco-based studio Treasure Island Media
Treasure Island Media
Treasure Island Media is a San Francisco-based gay pornography studio founded in 1998 by director Paul Morris and specializing in bareback films. The studio is named after Morris's favorite childhood book, Treasure Island. In addition to the original San Francisco office, T.I.M. has production...
, whose work focuses in this area, has produced bareback films since 1999. Other companies that do so include SEVP and Eurocreme
Eurocreme
Eurocreme is a European company based in London, England, that specializes in the production and distribution of gay pornographic films, generally featuring twinks, although it has also released a number of series devoted to studs and men of more diverse appearance.-History:The company was founded...
. Mainstream gay pornographic studios such as Kristen Bjorn
Kristen Bjorn
Kristen Bjorn is the stage name of a British director and producer of gay pornographic movies and a former gay pornographic actor....
Productions have featured the occasional bareback scene like in "El Rancho" between performers who are real-life partners. Other studios like Falcon Entertainment
Falcon Entertainment
Falcon Entertainment , an United States company based in San Francisco, California, is one of the world's largest producers of gay pornography....
have also reissued older pre-condom films. Also, mainstream studios that consistently use condoms for anal sex scenes may sometimes choose editing techniques that make the presence of condoms somewhat ambiguous and less visually evident, and thus may encourage viewers to fantasize that barebacking is taking place, even though the performers are following safer-sex protocols. (In contrast, some mainstream directors are conscientious about using close-up shots of condom packets being opened, etc., to help clearly establish for the viewer that the sex is not bareback.)
Some bareback pornography studios say that they do not inquire whether their models are HIV positive, but assume that they are infected. For example, Hot Desert Knights (HDK) was one of the studios that initially operated on the assumption that all of their bareback models were HIV positive. However, in February 2008 HDK announced that it would begin testing its models for HIV and engage in a process of "sero-sorting", which match HIV-positive performers with other HIV-positive performers, and negative with negative. Critics suggest that sero-sorting may not prevent the development of a multi-strain "supervirus." By contrast, Bel Ami
Bel Ami (adult film company)
Bel Ami is an gay pornographic film company with offices in Bratislava, Prague and Budapest. It was established in 1993 by filmmaker George Duroy, a Slovak native who took his pseudonym from the protagonist Georges Duroy in Guy de Maupassant's novel Bel Ami...
is one of the studios that claimed from the beginning to test their bareback models for HIV before allowing them to participate in condom-free scenes. A notice on the Bel Ami website states: "all our performers are regularly tested for the presence of HIV or other communicable diseases."
Adult Industry Medical Health Care Foundation
Adult Industry Medical Health Care Foundation
The Adult Industry Medical Associates P.C. , also known simply as AIM or AIM Medical, was an organization that tested erotic actors for HIV and other STDs on a scheduled basis....
was formed to promote and facilitate STD testing and safety precautions among pornographic film actors.
Heterosexual bareback
Barebacking is gaining popularity in the swingingSwinging
Swinging or partner swapping is a non-monogamous behavior, in which both partners in a committed relationship agree, as a couple, for both partners to engage in sexual activities with other couples as a recreational or social activity...
arena, where organizers frequently offer a vetting
Vetting
Vetting is a process of examination and evaluation, generally referring to performing a background check on someone before offering him or her employment, conferring an award, etc...
service for members to reduce the risk of STDs.
Fluid bonding
Fluid bonding refers to unprotected sex in longterm relationships. The relationships can be either monogamousMonogamy
Monogamy /Gr. μονός+γάμος - one+marriage/ a form of marriage in which an individual has only one spouse at any one time. In current usage monogamy often refers to having one sexual partner irrespective of marriage or reproduction...
or polyamorous
Polyamory
Polyamory is the practice, desire, or acceptance of having more than one intimate relationship at a time with the knowledge and consent of everyone involved....
.
Prostitution
In the sex trade, the willingness to bareback is a selling point for sex workers to their clients, despite the increased risks. The term "girlfriend experienceGirlfriend experience
The girlfriend experience is a type of service a female sex worker offers which includes acting like a girlfriend to the client.If the service provider is male, the service is called boyfriend experience....
" (GFE) was coined to denote an encounter between a prostitute and a client that could be considered "a real relationship for the moment with a sincere woman who apparently enjoys the experience, not just mechanical sex. It should not, however, be implied that the GFE automatically includes barebacking; to do so may result in denial of commercial sex services. "
Further reading
- Race, K. (2010) “Engaging in a Culture of Barebacking: Gay Men and the Risk of HIV Prevention”. In M. Davis & C. Squire (eds.) HIV Treatment and Prevention Technologies in International Perspective. Basingstoke: Palgrave MacMillan ISBN 9780230238190
- Nicolas Sheon and Aaron Plant, "Protease Dis-Inhibitors? The Gay Bareback Phenomenon," managingdesire.org. With a long list of further references.
- Riding Bareback: A Qualitative Examination of the Subjective Meanings Attached to Condomless Sex by MSM, Bruce W. Whitehead, Journal of Sex Research (Feb 2006)