Dam(n)!
Well, another Carnival鈥檚 come and gone. The good news is that, as a result of our stall, a number of people have put their names down as potential Rights Lobby volunteers (although we can always use more).
No folks, believe it or not, it isn鈥檛 all going to be 鈥榦ver鈥� if/when the marriage equality battle is won. There will still be plenty of human rights and equity issues to be addressed by the LGBTI community/ies and our allies.
One that鈥檚 close to my heart is health.
Every year I do a quick circuit of the Carnival stalls to check out what鈥檚 on offer. Every year I see large containers brimming with condoms and lube, on every second stall, it seems.
Every year I see countless booklets/ pamphlets/ flyers about HIV and other gay men鈥檚 health issues. Every year, I see huddles of men negotiating clipboards and spaghetti pens, filling in the Periodic Survey of Gay Men鈥檚 Health.
Being in a somewhat mischievous frame of mind, this year, I went up to some of the people staffing the stalls and asked for dams. (This was necessary because there didn鈥檛 seem to be any dams 鈥� or gloves 鈥� on the front of the stalls, next to the condoms.)
Responses to my request varied. One was 鈥淲e had some, but we ran out of them鈥�. Another was for the person of whom I made the request to go to the very back of the stall, rummage around, and bring me one dam.
(Do they think lesbians have much less sex than gay guys?) One person said 鈥淭hey cost more鈥�. So鈥�?
Later, someone chased me down the aisle between the stalls, brandishing a box with half-a-dozen or so dams. A comical scene, but it masks a more important issue.
I don鈥檛 understand the assumptions that lie behind all this.
Evidence shows that women effectively share around sexually transmitted infections, such as bacterial vaginosis and HPV (the precursor to cervical cancer).
Which comes first, the chicken or the egg? Do lesbians not use protection so often because they think they鈥檙e immune, or because methods of protection are not freely available, or because someone who gathers the courage to ask a pharmacist for a dam is treated as if she鈥檚 asking for a piece of moonrock?
INFO: Barbary Clarke is Convenor of the VGLRL鈥檚 Policy Working Group, and is doing a PhD on women and life-threatening illness.
