OW 73 - Outweek.net

',ui RykoNCo/.mln rlpl/,,:
I dId not charg, Dr. Burk,tt
wIth plagIarIzIng Bruce Nuss·
baum's book. In cQntext, as Is
clear from the first four paragraphs
of my crItique, the
statement deals with the pre·
publication IntBrtlSt Good
Intentions was generating .....
I am not now, nor have I
ever been, a misogynist.
IMPRUDENT
ANNOUNCEMENT
In his letter [no. 70, Oct.
31], Dr. Bern~rd Blharl states
that Community Research Inl-.
tlatlve (CRI) of New York will'
open trials of VaxSyn In
December 1990 and of
566C80 In February 1991. In
addition, h'estates that ~RI/NY
may soon open trials of WOB
enzyme, Curdlan sulfate, etiocholanalone
and the IVAX
AZT/ddl dimer study. '
, While Dr. Biharl certainly
• •
,
Weekwrote [that] ''the demon- tts list of virtually safe (meaning
stratlon targeted the c~rdlnal absolutely no risk of tranamlsfOf...hls
refusal to countenance slon) actlvttlea. I assume this Is
safer-sex education within the what you mean by "safe," but
Institutions ofthe church." then again, trylng'to'deflne
What burns In the belly "safe" Is part of the problem.
of this activist IsO'Connor's- There are no safer-sex guidedirect
obstruction of p.ubllc lines In this country (or !n Aus- -
policy-making when It comes tralla, Holland, France, England
to the health education of and Germany, am9ng: others)
public ~chool children In New that have ever stated that oral
York CHy. And I dare say sex Is safe. In fact, eve,n the
that's what brought many of CDC has always categorized
the thousands of people out oral sex as carrying a high risk
that cold day to scream for of transmission. , /
three hours. Where have you Your editorial makes It
been? We stili don't have real . sound like someone Is trying
sex and health education 'In to pull the wool over our eyes.
public schools In New York, It's not as If we've been led to
much less the condom distri- believe that oral sex was absobution
planned by Schools lutely safe, and now, suddenly,
ChancelJor Fernandez (read we're finding ol:lt It Isn't. There
ACT UP). has been, a risk of unknown
While I,care about par- - severity associated with oral
,
ochial school children and am sex from the beginning. You
greatly sadd~ned that they're state that the "biggest barrier
getting their minds polluted to a clear appraisal of the reJa""
every day, let's exercise our tlve hazards of oral sex is the
constitutional right to educate lack of a major CDCstudy preour
children lJl public schools clsely delineating the risks of
without the deliberate, sophlstl- the practice." This Is the least
catedand unconstitutional significant barrier. The point of
,(therefore Illegal, get it?) Inter- a major CDC study Is to force
ference of that small hateful them to act on our behalf, to
man Inthat big stone building.' listen to, us and take us serl-
By'the way, thanks for an ously, to value our lives and to
otherwise thoughtful and do their best to find out exact-
Informative piece. Iy what puts us at risk. How-
. Steven Keith ever, It will have little bearing
Address Withheld on whet.her we suck cock or
/
SAFETY AND
SUPPORT
In response to your editorial
[~'Oral ConSiderations,"
no. 70, Oct. 31]~ I would like
to add to some of the pOints
you made.
You state that the canadian
g,overnment has pro-
nounced oral sex safe. This is.
not true. The Safer-Sex Gulde-
. . ,-
lines: A Resource c
Document
for Educators and Counsel/ols
of the Canadian AIDS SOCiety,
which Is the document I belleve~you
are referring to, states that
oral sex carries a "minimal to
low risk" of transmission. It
\. • I
does not Include, oral sex under
,
•
,
not. Telling someone that the
risk for contracting AIDS from
.oral sex has gone from 1 In
5,000 to 1 In 900 Is hardly
going to be the deciding factor
of Whether to go down on that
dick or not. What you're talk-
Ing about Is knowledge, and
.knowledge does not necessar-
Ily equal action.
There are two Issues ,
here, neither of which has to
do with charts, percent~ges,'
numbers, statistics, bar
,
graphs and anything else CDC
researchers will throw at us
after a long, two-year study on
oral sex that Is not even In the
planning stages. These two
Issues have to do with support
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