Above, “acted-up” should have been “acted-upon”.

Oops!

On one hand, it’s worth debunking the notion that vast numbers of gay men seek to transmit HIV and cause new infections.

On the other hand though, I don’t know if it’s helpful to refer to the whole thing as mythical. I understand that there is more “discourse” about the idea than epidemiological evidence. But I think the very fact that it is talked about among gay men means the idea is worthy of working through rather than pushing away.

Whether or not this is an acted-up phenomena, I think it is in fact something present in many gay men’s psyches. That documentary “The Gift” was sensational and awful in my view, but those were real gay men being profiled and interviewed in it. I personally know people who have expressed deep inner conflict over “bug chasing” urges. It’s documented that in many serodiscordant couples, the negative person sometimes expresses a desire to eliminate dissonance by seroconverting themselves.

So rather than downplaying the notion of “bug chasing,” I think we all need to try and understand it a lot better, no matter how often it is or isn’t acted upon.

Either way, I’m shocked and I kind of want to give these crazy kids a wake-up call: while treatment is available, there is no cure, they could be potentially stuck with HIV for life, you know?

Jeez…….