It’s not just IML, Mr. S Leathers doesn’t want barebackers either
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2 August 2009 | 13 Comments
A really hot site site has just been relaunched – Butt Machine Boys. So I figured I’d promote it. While it’s not a bareback site, it doesn’t have condoms either and it’s all about guys getting their holes abused. But before I promoted it I figured I’d find a place that sold fucking machines. I found the machines for sale at Mr. S. Leathers (a big San Francisco-based company), and saw that they had an affiliate program, so I signed up. Unlike most places they review you before you get approved, so I waited. Two days later I got the following response:
Thank you for your recent application for the affiliate program. I regret we can not approve your application; you have a pretty extensive website with videos, scene reviews and erotica but as a company that contributes greatly to HIV/AIDS research and health organizations, there is a conflict of interest when considering websites with the focus of unprotected sex.
I hope that you can understand our decision and know that we pass no personal or professional judgments. If I can be of assistance in the future, please feel free to contact me.
Needless to say I had to reply 😉
No, actually I don’t understand the decision at all. By not engaging with people who bareback you’re losing the opportunity to talk with them and express your views to them. How will you ever change anyone’s mind by rejecting them and not talking with them? I’m giving you the opportunity to get traffic from a bareback site (and btw, I’ve got condom sites as well). What you do with that traffic is up to you. If you want to show safe sex messages in the side bars – it’s fine with me. Prior to now I respected you guys. I’d much rather give you guys traffic than Extreme Restraints, but it doesn’t look like that will be happening…
Think about this for a moment… There are a lot of blogs like mine that talk about barebacking but almost none that talk about safe sex. Add to that there are very very few that talk about what it’s like to be poz. And then people like you wonder why guys don’t try to stay neg. You’ve turned inwards and then wonder why your message isn’t relevant and isn’t getting out. That will only change if you start actively engaging people who don’t agree with you.
So no, don’t understand your decision at all. While it disappoints me, given IML’s antics lately, it doesn’t surprise me.
The bottom line is that Mr. S. Leathers doesn’t want to be associated with you. So if you’ve shopped there, stop. Why would you give money to a company that doesn’t like you?
Now the one piece I’ve gotten from Mr. S is the leather hood I put on bottoms… The question is how to handle it… I’m thinking I’ll give them credit to make it clear they’re associated with bareback porn already. Maybe I should even title the scenes things like “Bareback bottom in Mr. S Leathers hood never sees the guys who breed his ass”.
But seriously – how in the hell do they expect to achieve their goals and make the changes they want to make if they refuse to engage with the people they want to change? People amaze me sometimes…
You should continue to demand that someone who doesn’t agree with you become your affiliate anyway.
You’ve pontificated before about politics and you have certainly made clear your political views are rational and should be followed by others. I find it strange that when someone else has a political principle that they’re standing by, you start pointing the finger. The bottom line is you’re whining like a baby because someone isn’t giving you want you want. You certainly know that there have been camps ever since barebacking became a cultural phenomenon. That barebacking has become a mass phenomenon with a huge money-making apparatus doesn’t mean that some folks with different opinions are going to cave in or should do so. Mr. S is being rational; the company refuses to operate using cognitive dissonance. They’re not dissing you. Just living by their principles….just like you are. So quit your crying.
Your logic is illogical, buddy. Mr. S is standing up for what IT believes in. If guys are using their gear for gardening or hockey or zoophilia that doesn’t mean that they need to support Scotts-Miracle Gro, the NHL or the public zoo. If I wish to make meth out of drugs I get at my local Walgreens, that doesn’t mean that Walgreens should embrace the fact and publicly acknowledge me as a loyal customer. Sure, Mr. S is in it for the money, just like everyone else. But your suggestion that money is just money and its exchange has nothing to do with own moral principles or that what end users do should dictate what producers believe in or support is just silly dogma, dude. According to your logic here, it’s okay now to join Manhunt again cause principles don’t matter.
I grew up in a fundamentalist environment, and I know dogma too. And when you believe something (“Barebacking is good”) and insist that other people and organizations endorse your belief, that’s dogma. Fundamentalists aren’t people who say they disagree. Fundamentalists are people who refuse to accept that other people are allowed to disagree.
Dogma laced with fundamentalism insists that others must share your point of view. Mr. S is saying they have a different point of view and aren’t letting their products be used to advance causes that are inconsistent with that point of view. They’re not telling you what to do; they’re just not endorsing you. You, however, are insisting on their endorsement. We probably disagree on what constitutes dogma and fundamentalism. But the person who insists that others bend to his way of thinking is probably substantially closer to being dogmatic.
Questions–either based on your “estimation”, or perhaps you know of some surveys:
(1) what percentage of the leather community barebacks on a regular basis ?
(2) same question for the bd / sm community ?
Thanks.
This is also somewhat surprising considering that a buddy of mine does design work for Mr. S and has been quite involved with the company for some time, and I recently watched him get barebacked, in public, by some random (but very, very hot) dude at a bar just down the street. And, come to think of it, last time I went into the store, this (cute little twinky) sales boy was talking to me about barebacking.
SF is certainly the kind of place where having the “right positions” on things can be far more important to some people than what you actually stand for or do.