If any of you are web designers and looking for work, please contact me – rawtop@breedingzone.com – be sure to tell me about your experience and give examples of your work. First and foremost you should be a good designer, but if you know the basics of PHP that’s a huge plus. I’d prefer someone from central/south America – the time zones work well the money I’m able to pay stretches further down there than it does here.

I will say I’m picky when it comes to design. My bf is a web designer but too busy with other work to do my stuff. I know good design (though you wouldn’t know it looking at most of my sites). I tend to prefer designers who primarily design in Illustrator. Designers who design everything in Photoshop usually have a different aesthetic that I don’t like as well as Illustrator-based design. Though, obviously, Photoshop is necessary for some tasks…

If you’re available and we’re a match I can keep you pretty busy for a while. I need more than a few hours a week. Contact me and we’ll discuss the details.

The criminalization of HIV is a huge problem – especially for the bareback community because so many in the bareback community are poz and bareback sex is the leading cause of HIV infection. If you’ve been reading this blog for a while now you know I’m a huge advocate for personal responsibility. I believe it’s the neg guy’s responsibility to ask about status and protect himself as necessary. And I believe it’s the poz guy’s responsibility to not lie when a sex partner asks about his status (evading the question I can sorta understand in some situations, but outright lies are a huge no-no).

The problem is that too often the law doesn’t work that way – remarkably the neg guy isn’t responsible for his own health – all the blame gets put on the poz guy who can get sent off to jail because he didn’t answer a question that was never asked. But not only that… Poz guys can get put in jail even if there was no harm done and his accuser is still HIV negative.

The impact of stigma on the lives of real people is the topic in this week’s In The Life broadcast and they focus a lot on the criminalization of HIV. Take a few minutes and watch the video…

Continued in part two…

If you think the status quo is OK because a few states have gay marriage, think again. The program pointed out that Iowa has gay marriage, but they also have one of the most draconian HIV criminalization laws in the US.

With the US swinging right politically we’re going to see more of this sort of thing. While being a vocal radical isn’t everyone’s style, take the little day-to-day steps that, together, can make a big difference. Here’s a map showing the states that have criminalized HIV. Next time you take a vacation – go to one of the white states. New York and New England are a great place to go. 🙂  Or if you’re thinking of moving – pick a white state.

Even if you’re not poz you should care about this because people you know are poz and (especially if you’re a barebacker) you could be poz at some point.

And don’t forget to bring HIV criminalization up in conversations with friends. Tell your friends the stories you saw in the videos… It could be you in those videos or it could be one of your friends…

About a month ago I was contacted by a writer for NEXT magazine. If you’ve lived in New York you’ll know it’s one of the “party rags” here… But they do like to do serious articles and with Worlds AIDS Day this week, barebacking was the topic of this week’s featured article. Take a look at his article – “Bare Truth”…

When I was chatting with him I didn’t realize he was quite so pro-condom. I got his email that the article was up last night and as I was standing in Rawhide  reading the first part of the article on my iPhone, I worried that if he was that pro condom that he might not give me a fair shake. Needless to say I was pleasantly surprised when I saw he quoted me extensively, and I was also surprised at the substance of what he quoted. For the most part it gets right to the center of my argument – that the bias against barebacking is largely blown out of proportion. If you want to get all riled up about things that kill gay men, go after smoking.

Anyway, thumbs up to the author for being pro-condom but still managing to be fair and balanced.

Sorry I’ve been so lame about updating the blog. There are 4 guys I’ve fucked and haven’t written up and I’m planning on fucking another guy tonight… I promise I’ll get to them soon…

Anyway, a guy hit me up (for the second time) asking me to tell you guys abut the poz party that’s held every Thursday from 8 to midnight at Vlada (2nd floor) in Hells Kitchen (here in NYC – 331 West 51st Street between 8th and 9th Avenues).

Vlada is actually one of my favorite bars. It’s really nicely designed, sorta cozy – a great place to go with friends and chat. My bf and I go there pretty frequently.

I should be clear – this is not a sex party… But there are bunch of presumably horny poz guys and obviously if an organizer is asking me to promote them, they’re bareback friendly (though officially they have no stance on the issue other than you should make informed choices – lol).

This is really close to the guy I was going to fuck tonight. I think I’ll drop my load and head over. And just to be clear – it’s not just poz guys, but also guys who are “poz friendly” (friends, supporters, “etc.”)

So head over there and find a hot poz guy to have sex with tonight…

UPDATE:

So I went… Nice crowd. Some really hot guys there, and others who were quite good for their type…

Like many bar crowds it’s a little cliquey, but the host works hard to make up for that. I showed up by myself. I’m not really a people person and I’ve never done all that well in bars. I’m just not very assertive in crowds. I saw the host when I came in, he said ‘hi’ and then after I had gotten a drink he came over and talked. People tended to congregate around him and he was good about introducing me to other people. I actually met the blogger “Hot Pig”, but he had no clue who I was and clearly had zero interest in me (whatever), but other guys were nicer and more engaging.

I did feel a little awkward / self-conscious about the fact that I was a neg guy at a poz party. No one actually asked me if I was poz – guess they just assumed I was. That may have been a factor in why I didn’t converse all that easily with the guys there – they probably felt my uneasiness. My boyfriend had been busy with something else and knew where I was, but didn’t know the nature of the party. He decided to join me and I had to quickly explain where he was when he showed up. He seemed pretty fine with it. At the end of the evening I asked the host “so, were the two of us the only neg guys here?” He said “no… yes…” pointing at me and my bf respectively. There was this really awkward pause and then he followed up with something like “well, you shouldn’t be with everything you do”. It was a weird thing to say, but given his perspective on being poz he probably thinks of it as a compliment.

So all in all, if you’re socially outgoing, you’ll love it. If you’re pretty reserved, like me, then go with a friend.

I had a long IM chat yesterday with Mason Wyler (a bit over an hour). As a result of the chat my opinion of him has changed for the better…

The last week or so he’s had a lot of shit thrown at him. Someone outed him as poz before he was really ready to make it public, and then, given his history, people started saying all sorts of things about him. Some people even started openly wondering whether this was a bit of a publicity stunt. The skepticism comes from the fact that previously he said he had been raped but then then didn’t follow through with the police investigation. People then wondered whether there was merit to the rape allegations – thinking it had all been a publicity stunt. So this time some people wondered whether this too was a publicity stunt.

Well, after talking with him, I tend to believe 1) he really was raped, and 2) he really is poz.

For me the thing that really made me not particularly like him (as a person) was his blog post back in October 2008. Even to this day I think it’s pretty hostile to poz guys and guys who bareback. He swears I misread it and he his intention was to make fun of the stupidity of people who do fear-based anti-bareback campaigns. I’ll let you decide what you think of it. At a minimum I think you’ll be able to see where it can be interpreted as hostile, even if that wasn’t his intention. The real issue was the he didn’t communicate his thoughts clearly enough in that blog post. He looks at it and sees his original intention, but others of us fail to see that intention. But he’s a porn star, not a copy editor – so I’ll excuse that now that I’ve heard his side of things.

After chatting with him for an hour the worst thing I can say about him is that prior to testing poz he didn’t have any poz friends – so he may not have really understand what it’s like to be poz. That’s hardly a crime. Apparently his day-to-day life is pretty solitary – it’s just him and his boyfriend. I have a similarly codependent relationship and if we weren’t in Manhattan and if my bf weren’t a “people person” I’m sure I’d be in a similar situation. Now he’s starting to chat with some poz guys, but they don’t live near him – but at least he gets to interact with them one way or the other. I really think that will help him.

I still think that the ‘milieu’ he was in was not all that great. For example, his production company refuses to work with poz guys – they won’t even pair poz guys up with each other and have them do condom porn. To his production company, if you’re poz you’re an undesirable leper. As a result when he became poz he assumed his porn career was over because that’s what he was told by his production company – the anti-poz crowd was the only reality he really knew. I think he’s just now realizing that’s not the case – that he’s totally welcome in bareback porn, and there are other condom porn companies that don’t have a problem with him either.

It won’t surprise me if the world of condom porn continues to shun poz guys – there’s a reason why we call them “Condom Nazis”. In fact I sorta dare any (major) condom company to break the conventions and use Mason as a regular performer (more than a few scenes). It’s a statement that really needs to be made – that you can be poz and sexy and there’s a (sex) life after testing poz.

Strangely, the poz-hostile condom producers (who are supposed to be pro-condom) are basically saying condoms are only for neg guys, which means condom usage tends to continue to based in fear – it’s all about neg guys protecting themselves from dirty/evil poz guys. To me that’s just incredibly divisive…

Anyway, back to Mason… After an hour talking with him I really got the sense that he’s a sweet, somewhat submissive guy… He kept calling me ‘Sir’ which was pretty endearing. I don’t know if he just knows the buttons to push with guys like me or if he’s genuinely that way, but I liked our chat a lot… I kept getting the sense that he was sorta vulnerable and that he needed a protector. My daddy instincts kept getting triggered with him… 😉  He would make an incredible boy for some top daddy…

The other side of him is the persona of Mason Wyler. He’s sorta built up this persona that he’s a total slut, and while there does seem to be a side of him that enjoys being a slut (he’s been in 200+ porn videos in about 5 year – averaging one every 9 days for 5 years), his day-to-day life is way more boring and average than that. It seems the persona he created works against him at time like this (and probably back when the whole rape thing was going on). People see the image of a slut and trivialize what he goes through when it comes to things like rape and HIV.

So what’s Mason’s future look like? Well, his porn career will change somewhat… Unfortunately, while there are poz guys in condom porn many of them don’t like to discuss their status, which means all of them have to sorta stay in the closet about their HIV status. As soon as one of them is known to be poz (like Mason) the assumption is that the guys he does scenes with are poz. I hate closets and lies… The whole idea that poz guys can’t be open about things just bugs me.

That means I’d guess Mason will mostly be doing bareback porn (where being poz is no big deal) even though he’s open to both condom and bareback. But he really prefers bareback – so much so that he wishes could start his own bareback porn production company (though he doesn’t have the capital to do it). Frankly, I’m really glad he’ll be doing bareback porn. I’m totally looking forward to featuring it here on the site. It’ll be hot seeing him take loads 😉

In terms of Mason’s personal future – I get the sense he still has a few things to figure out about being poz, but that’s to be expected. Hopefully he’ll get some poz friends and compare notes. If you’re in Houston and poz (and don’t want to just get in his pants) you might try hitting him up – I got the sense he’d really like a local poz buddy…

But all in all, he’ll be fine… I’m guessing he’ll be better than ever a year from now…

UPDATE: I had an hour long IM chat session with Mason Wyler. It changed my perception of him and I think I understand him a lot better now. Read my write up of the chat…

If you haven’t heard by now, Mason Wyler disclosed this week that he tested HIV+ in May, but he only came out with the news after having his status “outed”. What I’m about to say here is a lot of conjecture, but I’d almost put money on most of it being true…

Let’s go back to October 2008 when Mason posted a blog post with alternate wording to the song “Rudolph The Red Nose Reindeer”…

Then all the gay boys hated him
as they shouted out with glee:
“Bobby with your unsafe sex,
you’ll die alone in misery!”

From that post it’s clear Mason looks down on poz guys and apparently thinks barebacking is so awful that barebackers are punished by becoming poz and that they will (or should) die alone in misery. Thing was, even when he wrote that, he was secretly attracted to barebacking. A few months after that post he put up blog posts talking about his attraction to bareback sex and bareback porn and then he’d take them down a little while later apparently out of shame/guilt. [Read more in my blog post back then about Mason’s love/hate relationship with barebacking.]

Now he’s poz and apparently still holds his negative attitude about poz guys. Even the wording of his disclosure shows he feels shame and self-hatred…

I tested positive. I have only myself to blame. I have HIV and it kind of sucks.

“Blame”… There’s no acceptance in that statement – just self-loathing and shame. I mean really, in what way has his life changed? Well, maybe some condom-Nazi studios won’t work with him any more, but other than that, how is his life all that worse now than it was a couple years ago?

And lets not forget – with the amount of sex someone like Mason has, there’s a good chance he got infected through safe sex. He hasn’t revealed details, but safe sex is not safe – it’s just lower risk. Have enough of it and the cumulative risk builds up. If he was fucking a lot with condoms then he could have very well gotten infected that way – which makes his shame all the more sad (potentially).

Then a few days after he disclosed his status he felt the need to clarify things a bit…

I have not gone around fucking, barebacking, or infecting HIV negative people. I am a sex fiend. I am NOT a monster.

So apparently he thinks poz guys who have sex with neg guys are monsters. Interesting choice of words. To be blunt, the poz guys I fuck are anything but monsters. And guys who have bareback sex are consenting adults.

So let’s put things in perspective… First off, he’s a HOT messed up little boy who is listening to all the wrong people. I mentioned he’s hot, right? I mean that is one beautiful poz ass…

But I digress… The issue here is Mason’s fear, loathing, shame and self-hatred. It’s just sad. He’s like this confused messed up little boy. Where did he get the idea poz guys die alone in misery? Really? Who gave him that idea? Probably “Condom Nazis”. And they think barebackers and bareback porn are hurting the gay community. As far as I’m concerned their fear and hatred does more damage to our community than barebacking ever will. Mind you, back in the day there really was something to fear – HIV could kill you in a couple years. But these days I’m more worried when I find out someone is a chain smoker or likes to PNP.

I’m not saying HIV is desirable, instead I’m saying it’s really sad to see someone like Mason hate himself for becoming poz. It’s completely possible he got pozzed by a high-viral load top while he was wearing a condom. Most poz guys are on meds, and it’s safer to bareback with a poz guy who’s on meds than it is to have protected sex with a poz guy who’s not on meds. I don’t get the sense that he has any big picture sorta perspective. It’s like he’s back in the late 80’s and he thinks his life just ended or something.

There’s a reason why I tell guys to accept risks before they take them. If you like taking anonymous loads, just accept the fact that you’ll probably become poz, it’s not the end of the world, and then go on and enjoy your life. I don’t get the sense that Mason is enjoying his life or that he’s accepted and embraced his new status. He loves sex and has only hooked up 3 times since he tested poz in May. For someone like him that’s just horribly wrong. It’s done. It’s over. Move on and make the most of it…

And for god’s sake reject all the negativity and the people who spread it…

I really hope Mason comes to peace with being poz and learns to make the most of it. I would love to see him in some good bareback porn – maybe getting gangbanged by a bunch of poz tops. That’s one video which would be really hot if it included “poz talk” – seeing him get past his fear and really embrace being poz and beg guys to shoot toxic loads in his cunt would be incredible.