Breaking the testing stigma
STD/STI testing in and out of the adult industry
There is a large stigma and misconceptions about the adult industry. One of the biggest misconceptions is that everyone is ‘unclean’ and ‘infested’ in STDs/STIs. A lot of these misconceptions arise from the ‘taboo’ stigma towards sex work.
However, I never fully understood this particular misconception, because people that work within the studio system have a requirement to get tested every 2 weeks, and if they do not have a negative certificate, then they cannot perform and they do not get paid.
On the other hand, you have people that do not work in the adult industry, who are having sex, without getting consistently tested. For example, when I was conducting interviews in Helsinki, Finland I asked 20 people when the last time they got tested was. About 20% said they’d never been tested, 10% said that they had been tested within the last month and the remainder said within the last year to two years, or that they couldn’t remember. I then asked the same group if they used condoms during sex, to which 90% said no, which massively shocked me. Therefore, there really is an irony here that this stigma is thrown into sex workers when they are tested more regularly than the general population.
Instead of demonizing sex workers, I think that we as a society need to start thinking about why people are not getting tested, and how we can increase testing. It is important to think, why are people not getting tested? And there’s a couple of reasons why (but not limited to):
Lack of education
Some people have not received adequate sex education from their parents or their schools, and so they don’t realize that they need to get tested. I’ve also heard some people claim that they didn’t need a test as they had only slept with 3 people … it only takes one. There needs to be more education around STDs/STIs that is not done in the ‘mean girls’ way, and that also explains how testing works, and where you can go to do it. Lastly, there’s been a large increase in young people not using protection because they think that if they do get something, it’ll probably just be chlamydia and they can just take an antibiotic and be fine. This mindset really needs to adjust, because there are plenty of STDs/STIs that one can get, that are not easy fix, or that even if they are ‘easy fix’ if left undetected from lack of testing can cause some long term problems.
Embarrassment
Some people feel embarrassed or ashamed to go to an STD/STI clinic. We need to look at ways to make people feel less embarrassed so that testing levels increase. One way is to have more open discussions with friends/family, so that it becomes more normalized. I also think that testing clinics need to make sure that they have online booking systems, as people are more likely to book online, than if they have to call in, especially with the younger generation who hates picking up the phone. Likewise, at-home testing kits are a great way to increase testing rates as it can be done in the privacy of your own home.
Clinics need to do better
This isn’t to say that all clinics are like this, but I myself have had some horror stories as well as close friends of mine. Clinics need to make sure that they have sympathetic staff, that is not judgemental. If someone has a bad experience with a nurse at a clinic then they are going to be less likely to return, so there needs to be more sensitive training, and careful hirings. On a side note, clinics need to automatically test for everything, I still don’t understand why they do not automatically do mouth swabs especially when oral sex is when most people don’t use a condom or dental dam.
Overall, we need to look at why we ourselves might feel shame or embarrassment around STDs/STIs, and take a leaf from adult performers on regular testing.