"Isn't it all about sex anyway?" That's what a female student said during a classroom discussion of gay issues, according to the professor leading the discussion.

People have always spoken about gay men being too promiscuous. Whether it is sex in public places or as part of the gay club scene, the idea has been part of the public discourse for decades. Now, the television show "Queer as Folk" portrays gay men having sex often and with numerous sexual partners.

In addition, recent local headlines like "Whitman-Walker Clinic Releases 'Alarming' Figures on STD Rates Among Gay and Bisexual Men," and "Rise in HIV Infections on Both Coasts Should Be 'Wake-Up Call for Washington,'" may stoke the idea that gay promiscuity is real and something to worry about.

Still, the consensus seems to be that gay men are not more promiscuous than the general population. It is certain that many think otherwise but perhaps not as much at American University. No one interviewed for this article--male or female, liberal or conservative, gay or straight--admitted to ever thinking of gay men as promiscuous or "too sexual."

"Men are more promiscuous in general," senior James Dozier, who is gay, said. "Straight men and gay men."

Mindy Michaels, director of AU's Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender & Ally Resource Center, also says that men can be more promiscuous than women, regardless of their sexual orientation.

"Men in this society are taught to value being able to have multiple sexual partners and women are taught not to," Michaels said. "So if you have two men negotiating whether or not to have a sexual encounter, it's going to be a different equation than if it is a man and a woman."

Of course, she adds, this scenario does not apply to every gay couple.

Dr. William Leap, anthropology professor and coordinator of AU's annual Lavender Languages and Linguistics conference, agrees with Michaels and says gay male couples have as many sexual encounters as their straight counterparts. "I have not received any evidence of any kind that suggests that gay guys have a monopoly on playing around," he said.

"Almost everybody in college is promiscuous," senior Carrier Raines said. "It does not matter who they're sleeping with."

According to Leap, the popular belief that gay men are too promiscuous is part of society's discrimination against homosexuals.

"Rank-and-file America still views lesbian and gay people as deviant individuals," Leap said. "There's not going to be any way a gay man can talk about meeting someone without it immediately being tainted in mainstream society as being perverse."

High schools have notoriously been an unwelcoming environment for kids exploring their sexual orientation. A more open environment like AU allows young gay men to explore their sexuality. Leap says that if gay male students are more sexual, this may be one of the reasons.

"All the things you learned in high school, you're going to have to do again in a gay kind of context," Leap said. "You have to learn how to date, how to deal with your body&unavoidably, you're going to play around."

According to Michaels, "Queer as Folk" is not providing young gay males with role models of "meaningful sexual encounters." But she also says shows like "Sex and the City" provide similar unhealthy messages for straight viewers.
So why are sexually transmitted disease rates among gay men so high?

Statistics show that gay men are not protecting themselves enough. According to D.C.'s Whitman-Walker Clinic, which specializes in AIDS patients, one in every five gay men has anal sex without a condom. For oral sex, the figures increase to 80 percent. Experts say gay male sexual activity is the most risky when STDs are concerned.

These numbers are especially important to the AU community because most of them refer to young gay men. For example, men 20-29 years old accounted for almost half of all new HIV infections.

"I do worry when students come in and are worried about safety issues," Michaels said of students who approach her about having had unprotected sex. "There's a lot of education out there but research shows that the level of people paying attention to it goes up and down."

In the 1980s, everyone--gay or straight--encountered the AIDS epidemic much more directly than young people today do. People were dying quickly, and no one knew much about the disease. Now, there are life-prolonging AIDS medications, and many are optimistic about the possibility of a vaccine. Researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say many people, including gay men, attribute the risky sexual behavior to the success of AIDS medications.

"Our generation has become rather apathetic to the whole thing," Dozier said. "AIDS is not a big deal to many people. Our generation feels that it is completely invincible, that 'it can't happen to me.'"

According to Leap, this mindset was popular even before AIDS. Because most STDs were curable, people didn't worry about protecting themselves.

"You had gonorrhea, you went, you got shots, you got treated, no question," Leap said. "It meant that people didn't have to worry about questions of safety because we knew there was treatment."

AU's GLBTA Resource Center, headed by Michaels, distributes condoms and provides students with information about STDs. Her goal is to provide factual information about safe sex, especially gay sex, without delving into morality. She says that decision is the student's prerogative, according to his or her values.

"People should have the information of how disease is transmitted," Michaels says, "and they can make their sexual decisions from that context."

But Leap says he does not see enough information about safe sex on campus. According to him, condoms should be more easily available, even in the residence halls.

"We don't have any visible signifiers on this campus to remind people that people are dying of AIDS and that it's a serious phenomenon," he said.

Dozier joins Leap in saying that this message should be provided to students in high school as well, even though the issue is controversial and many disagree with teaching kids about sex. According to them, sex education courses should tell students about the risks of unprotected sex, in both a straight and gay context, so that every student comes to college knowing about sexual safety.

"I think at younger ages we have to get the message across that you have to protect yourself," Dozier says. "Its just not a gay issue, its an everyone issue."

To read more about the availability of condoms on campus, click here.

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