An Undercover Look Inside the World of HIV Bug Chasers and Gift Givers
[font size=3]Officials boast of San Francisco's success in lowering its HIV infection rate, but a dangerous subculture is undermining those efforts by spreading the virus on purpose.[/font]
An attractive young man posts an ad online. Soon afterward, he is naked and face-down on the bed in a dimly lit hotel room. Throughout the night, nameless men enter through the unlocked door. Instead of saying hello, they unzip their pants. When they are finished, they leave. By sunup, the young man has lost track of how many sex partners have come and gone. If he has achieved his goal, his next test for the human immunodeficiency virus will come back positive.
On another day, a different man posts an announcement indicating the day and time that he plans to be at a local sex club, 442 Natoma. Then he kneels in a dark corner of the club — his naked silhouette barely visible — as he waits for those who want to help “convert” him.
Though chasers and gifters are active around the world, many see San Francisco as a kind of mecca. With its famously liberal attitudes toward sex, thriving gay culture, and high-profile kink festivals like the Folsom Street Fair and Up Your Alley, the city is particularly attractive to members of the little-studied subculture, many of whom are spreading the virus not only among themselves but also to unsuspecting people, making the disease even more difficult — and costly — to fight.
For members of this dangerous minority, Craigslist is a popular choice to connect with one another, for obvious reasons: Posting there is free, and because almost everyone uses the site at some point or another, the ad will be seen by a relatively large number of eyeballs. Alternately, a monthly subscription to BarebackRT.com, also known as Bareback Real Time, costs $5.95. But an ad featured on that site — designed for gay men who engage in “bareback,” or condomless, sex — is likely to reach a smaller but more targeted audience. The site’s search function also makes it relatively simple for subscribers to find and communicate with those who would classify themselves “gift givers” — HIV-positive men who are seeking to “poz” others — and “bug chasers” — HIV-negative men who long to become positive. In addition, smartphone apps like Grindr and Recon, as well as the website Breeding.Zone, where gifters and chasers share advice and stories about their sexual experiences, make it relatively straightforward to meet people who want to be infected with the virus that causes AIDS — or to infect their partners.
Read more: http://www.sfweekly.com/topstories/undercover-look-inside-world-hiv-bug-chasers-gift-givers/
