I first heard about this group from PositiveLite.com publisher John McCullagh in a post he wrote, which you can read here, where he interviewed Jody Jollimore, the program manager at the Health Initiative for Men (HIM), a gay men’s health organization in Vancouver, and Rui Pires, Gay Men’s Community Education Coordinator at AIDS Committee of Toronto (ACT). Both leaders described it as a leadership program for young gay men where we can learn about love, life, sexuality, sexual health and how we can apply this knowledge in our community.     

Intriguing, I thought, so I might as well register. I soon received an email advising me of the program schedule. We were set to meet for four full-day Saturday sessions. I wasn’t too sure about giving up my Saturdays for four consecutive weeks but I figured that I should check it out and see how I felt after the first session. 

Not knowing what to expect, I approached the first session with a hint of caution. The lay out of the room was well done and I was greeted warmly by the facilitator Rui Pires. I was overcome with a bout of absolute shyness at first as we went around the table giving brief introductions about ourselves and what we hoped to get out of the group. I was pleasantly surprised to hear that I wasn’t the only one hoping to learn how to connect with other gay guys outside of the bar setting with no pressure to get sexual. 

After our intro’s Rui told us a bit about himself and the work he has done with the gay/HIV community. It was safe to assume that we were in good hands. We then launched into an interactive workshop on coming out. We gathered around the room in the order of who was out the longest and we each shared a little about our coming out process. This exercise was enlightening and the stories were amazingly diverse.  Rui then gave some tips on coming out and being supportive to others who are coming or thinking of coming out. 

Throughout the duration of the program we had the opportunity of hearing from various community leaders ranging from health and mental health professionals to community activists. We also got to learn about the dynamics of different types of gay relationships. And there are quite a few that I wasn’t aware of! We got first hand testimony about the importance of getting involved in different aspects of the community, like the fight against HIV. We even had a crash course on flirting and cursing! 

So without giving too much away about the program, I would strongly recommend it to anyone between the ages of 18-26 who wants to learn about the gay community and the issues that affect us, as well as develop great communication and leadership skills. Above all it’s a safe space where guys can come to have fun and engage in conversations on a variety of topics that affect us today.

The next session of Totally Outright takes place in June. For more information, you can visit www.actoronto.org/to or you can contact Rui Pires at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Bio: I’m Jan, 22, residing in Singapore. I’m an aspiring… something. I’ll let you what that is when I figure it out. Until then, I’ve allowed my government to decide what I need to be for the next two years – a soldier. Drafted into the local army by compulsory service, I am hoping that it treats me as well as the pornographic fantasies filmed in army barracks. That, or I will forever live with the regret of opting to not take up the exemption extended to HIV+ individuals. But hey, I told myself my virus will not be a deterrent to living my dreams (and fantasies), even if it’s never again bareback.

I’m creator of SilenceSg.org, a local campaign for youth that tackles STDs I also sometimes write on my personal blog, where I hope to serve as a warning sign to others who are taking the road I did, to proceed with care - not with the reckless abandon I once had.

“Hi, I’m Jan and I’ve been living with HIV for almost two years. I was diagnosed with HIV even before I legally entered adulthood…”  It’s an introduction that’s unfortunately becoming surprisingly unsurprising, even common. What would have sounded shocking years ago would today garner but a few raised eyebrows.

Truth is, people have become oblivious to the virus, and resultantly, from those of us suffering from it. T The modern-day politically-correct term would be people living with HIV, but I think this does disservice to the people who have valiantly campaigned before us. You do not just ‘live’ with cancer or any other disease, it is a tough walk - and while most of us manage, it is can be tortuous. There is no other way around this truth. The desensitization from years of campaigning by those before me, who bore messages of hope and called for urgency, is in full effect. At the very verge of my teen-hood, I contemplated how I would lend my voice to the resounding echoes of those who stood before me, as an adult.

I realize we’ve got most bases covered. We have the activists who continually spread hope covered. We have the drug companies encouraging people by extending a lifeline so long as we can afford it. We have lawmakers fighting to undo discriminatory policies against HIV+ individuals. What I think we lack is honesty.

Honesty reminds people not to forget that today, over 30 years on and 25 million dead, the virus is still as prevalent in our society as ever, way past the deadline for the oft-promised but elusive cure, that is, if the drug companies who drive HIV research are still focused on looking for one.

It’s like when a relative or friend who knows about your condition asks how you’re doing, and you smile and take the easy route of saying “I’m good,” instead of offering  “I’m struggling, with a myriad of things like the increasing cost of maintaining my health, my mental well-being, and emotional turmoil when I look back in regret, but otherwise, I manage, as most people do with their problems.”

You ask, wouldn’t it be easier to smile, because smile and the world smiles with you,  right? Smiles we put on everyday hide problems like veneer masks a chipped tooth. It may be cracked, but people will never know until you tell them. They’ll never see that you’ve been broken underneath. This mentality that we are all ‘just fine’ really has, I think, undone the urgency to find a cure, and bred a new wave of activists who talk of rainbows and butterflies with the miracle of medication. 

When a call was made out for writers for PositiveLite.com, and I got the wind of it, I immediately wrote in about getting a feature spot. While I’m a country and continent away, HIV knows no borders, does not discriminate, and I think us activists should tread along the same path. Truth was, I just wanted to spread honesty. You see, there is no point in arguing a smoker does not deserve lung cancer if he’s already got it, it is nothing but meaningless sympathy. I however find great purpose in warning smokers who haven’t to try and quit, to minimise their exposure to the risk. To, at the very least, let them know where they are bound for  if they don’t get off. Hopefully while I’m at it, I’ll stop people from getting on board as well.

Now, if I’ve still got your attention, I’m Jan, 22, and while I struggle with the virus, I get by, just like everyone else.

A mother’s love is her biggest downfall  

My personal journey began clichéd enough - writing in a secret leather diary I intended to keep away from prying eyes, chronicling my life and emotions. Whenever I put pen to paper, I escaped the cycle of depression that seemed to rinse, lather and repeat on me.

What unfolded after, I did not quite expect.  My mother found my diary. As any curious mother would, she read it, probably expecting whimsical stories about schoolboy crushes, maybe even the resultant romps with them and the little babies we would have (adopted). Sure, it did have that, at least at first, but progressively, it got gloomier. My diary served as self-therapy after all, and one does not exactly go to a therapist to recite all that’s good in life. I had been writing pretty dark things.

Keeping yourself recluse can do that to you, and let me tell you, writing when you’re contemplating suicide doesn’t come out nice on paper. I imagine she was wincing, but my mother read on, perhaps stoked that life’s intervening allowed her into the sanctum that is the mind of a scared, misunderstood teen.

You see, weeks before she found my diary, I had been fearing that I could be HIV-positive. About a year before, I took a free HIV test during World AIDS Day that came out negative, as it did the year prior. Two successive years of being HIV-free tend to make you feel invincible. A feeling that was shattered when my best friend who was every bit of as promiscuous sexually active told me he had herpes… and gonorrhoea and syphilis.

Long story short, I had followed him to the clinic for his follow-up appointment for moral support, and had picked up brochures about HIV for casual reading to hide my face in, hoping I didn’t get seen by anyone I knew while in the clinic, or in disgusting ignorance, thinking I could lose my perceived STD virginity by catching it from sitting in the waiting room. I realised, wait a minute, I’ve got a few of these symptoms for HIV. I had shrugged it off (or more likely, entered a state of denial) to the seasonal flu. I did that until came the thrush, and nightly chills.

All this was penned in my sacred diary, defiled by my mother’s eyes. As a reprisal for her desecration, my words put her in a state of unrest - not unlike the frame of mind I myself was in. She got into cahoots with my best friend for an intervention. An intervention that would bring me to the very clinic I was afraid to be seen in, but this time less afraid of catching a disease as being diagnosed with one. My best friend came with me, my mother in tow. All of us were on edge as we waited over half an hour before the results came through.

I guess you’d have guessed by now that the test came up positive;  if not I won’t be here writing and would perhaps, more than ever be up in a place of self-righteous ignorance telling myself ‘it can never happen to me, it only happens in stories.’  I’ll save the sappy parts for another time, but for the matter, most of it came from my mother. I got my diagnosis and just sat stunned in disbe-grief. My mother did most of the crying, like she was crying for two, and my best friend ended up consoling her more than me.

A successive blow came when I had to put my family in financial strain with my month-long hospitalisation after my CD4 count came in with AIDS-level numbers.  I racked up hospital bills over $25,000 for treatments for TB, operations and regular scans.

It was during this time that my mother did her very best, forced not only to come to terms with my sexuality, my sexual activity but also my HIV and at the time, what looked to her like my impending death. She certainly put it that way whenever she spoke to me while I lied helpless in bed, with IV shackles. It’s like I skipped all the basic lessons and little journeys you need for parenting and just dunked her in straight in the deep end of the pool. Of course, with anyone who’s been thrown in to drown, she was furious when she got over the initial shock.

Not long after, our relationship took an even deeper swim than when I had first thrown her in, to the point we did not speak for weeks. Things got so bad, I moved out of the house for almost 2 months after a huge argument. Jobless undergraduate at 20 - not very common with us traditional Asians!  I relied on the compassion and support of friends, all the while thinking, is this the fate I’m resigned to?

The first step to fixing my life came from the most unlikeliest place. Grindr. This is where I would find the nicest 30-something-year-old-man who in the short time of knowing me, offered his house keys and trust after he figured out I was technically homeless. He even got me a job waiting tables. You’d be surprised to know he was an ex-convict,  fresh out of prison, living in a rental flat, who did not force himself on me or expect sexual favours in return. We really only went as far as talking, sometimes cuddling in the morning and me doing my part in cleaning the apartment (mostly my own mess though). It was during this time, when I had much time to think, that a revelation struck me.

All of the bad things had to happen, like my diagnosis, my subsequent hospitalisation and me moving out of the house (my friends would joke and insist on calling a spade a spade – I ran away, like a desperate overgrown teen). If these things had not happened, I doubt either me or my mother could have found it in us to allow reconciliation to happen. It could only transpire after we found ourselves from being lost and caught up in our own situation, hers with disappointment and myself with admitted guilt and self-pity. Amidst all this, we had no time to find the love that bonded us as mother and son. Our relationship had years of strain, and consequently needed time to rid itself of pain.

A year on, and I can’t say we’re perfect. We still have our spats and misunderstandings every now and then, but every family has those. What matters is the worst is behind us, and we discovered through it all how strong our love for each other is. If we could get through that, and find it in ourselves to forgive each other, and ourselves, to move on… we could get through anything.  We after all share the same blood - even if one has HIV coursing through it.

 

The Song 'It Does Get Better', written by Georgey Payne (below right) , is set to be a positive message to anyone who experiences the struggles that can come with being different.

Georgey herself was moved to action by the experiences of a young gay friend: "I noticed one night he was worried about going home after working an evening, and when I asked him what was wrong he told me he was being bullied at school. I then listened while he explained everything that had been happening, and just remember feeling so sad at what he was having to go through. Being a songwriter, the best way I could think of to help raise money and awareness to prevent this kind of thing happening to others was to write a song. I then asked the most talented UK lesbian artists I know for their help by getting together to record it for charity, and they all said yes - without hesitation."

The L Project is focused on raising awareness and money in the UK. "If the song sells beyond the UK, that would be fantastic. If I jumped back now to age 13 and had heard a song like this, knowing I was gay, but had remained silent, I would have felt so happy, and realised it's not just me, and that I actually had a life waiting for me where I belong" says Georgey. "Our aim is to reach as many people as possible with the release of this single, young, old, friends and family of those affected, it doesn't matter who you are, we all have a chance to help make difference. Our charities help prevent young gay people from being bullied - that's the focus of the L Project," says project partner Sofia Antonia Milone.

All the artists, promoters, sponsors, supporters and anyone else involved with The L Project came together because they are passionate about giving hope that it gets better to LGBT youth. As a result every single penny made from the sales of this single, including all royalties are being donated to charitiy.

Participating artists who worked on the charity single are Scottish legend, Horse, Georgey Payne & Emma Kavanagh (Greymatter), Sofia Antonia Milone (GeEkgiRL), Sandra MacBeth, Amber Taylor-Groves (HeadsHearts), Mel Sanson (Kenelis), Nina McCann, O'Hooley & Tidow, Lorna Thomas, Leanna Goring, Juey, Jess Gardham, Amy Sutton (Neon Choir), Nicky Mitchell, and Ella Chambers.

The benefiting charities are Diversity Role Models and Stonewall. Visit The L-Project on Facebook  for more information.

You can also follow the L Project on twitter at @thelproject11

 

Part Eight found Scott back home in the Caribbean.  You can read that episode here. 

Since I was newly single and ‘going to die soon’ and my co-workers were sure that I was gay, I decided to party hard and have a good time. There was one gay bar that wasn’t publicly gay and in a somewhat hidden venue. I went a couple times and soon found out that it wasn’t for me. It was shut down one time by police officers while I was there and they requested to see the ID cards of all the patrons. The paranoia was still there since I had an uncle in the police force so that was enough to kill my disco fever.

I decided to check out a straight bar some time after that incident with a couple of gay friends I made. Turns out it wasn’t a good idea either. Some guys began throwing ice at us chanting “fire bun batty man”. It was probably because one of my friends was a bit effeminate. The bouncer didn’t do a thing to help us and it pissed me off big time. So I went to the police station to make a report. The police laughed at us and said that we deserved it, looking like that and that they couldn’t do anything. They didn’t even pretend to take the report.

I decided that the partying thing wasn’t going to work. I had vacation coming up and I wanted to go someplace where I can be as gay as I want. After some research I decided on Toronto because of its active and liberal gay movement. I visited with my godfather that year who’s also gay and had a blast. He recommended that I come for gay pride and I did.

It was out of this world. My will to live was now my annual two week vacation where I could go somewhere that no one knows me and just be me.

Back at work I finally got a transfer to a different location. I was tired of all the moving around on account of my sexuality but it was necessary to cope with the trauma of being discovered. But the pattern of being discovered followed me to the new branch. I guess I wasn’t very good at being on the ‘down low’. My new manager was a male this time. He told me that some people were uncomfortable around me because they thought that I was gay. One employee even went as far as to complain to human resources saying that I was giving my manager sexual favours for preferential treatment! Ashamed and bruised, it was time for another vacation.

I flew into to Toronto once again for the Pride week celebrations. I went to the pride flag raising ceremony at city hall where I met a guy. He was gorgeous and seemed like a nice guy. We spent the day together walking around downtown. We stopped at Allan Gardens to have a rest. While talking, he disclosed to me that he was HIV-positive. Talk about shock! I wanted very much to say “me too!” but I had never told anyone other than the doctor I saw at home, so it was hard. After a week or so, most of which time I spent with him, I had to leave and I decided to tell him the truth about my health and also tell him that I was on vacation and going back home. That was a detail I deliberately omitted when we met out of fear that he’d opt not to see me again.

His reaction wasn’t what I expected. He was shocked but not upset. He was sad and concerned about me. He then asked me if I had ever heard that Canada helps people like me who are being treated unfairly in their own country. I had no clue about the process. He told me that he’d do some research and send me some links to places that can help. And for the first time in a long time, I was able to anticipate an end to my suffering.

Please stay tuned for the final instalment of my journey where I arrive in Canada and how I adjust to live as a refugee.

Youth in the Caribbean and the Caribbean Diaspora in Canada face many similar issues with respect to the risk of contracting HIV. An international project that linked youth from Jamaica and Ontario to address these issues resulted in a powerful 20-minute video documentary that takes you into the hearts, experiences and struggles of those living with and affected by HIV.

You can see the video here.

You can also read more about the issues facing these youth on the website of the Interagency Coalition on AIDS and Development that, along with partners in Canada and Jamaica, produced the video. But to summarize:

In both the Caribbean itself and in the Caribbean Diaspora in Canada there are challenges in capturing the full picture of HIV among these young people. In the Caribbean there are inconsistencies in data collection and methodology while neither Ontario nor Québec, where 94% of the people of Caribbean descent in Canada live, report ethnicity information with their HIV statistics. However, some broad facts are clear:

• Half of new HIV infections worldwide are among young people. More than half the Caribbean population is under the age of 24.
• HIV prevalence in the Caribbean is higher than in any other world region outside sub-Saharan Africa.
• In Canada, there are a disproportionate number of African, Caribbean and black (ACB) people living with HIV. Since reporting began, youth have accounted for 27% of all positive HIV test results in Canada.
• The Caribbean is the only region, aside from sub-Saharan Africa, where the proportion of women and female youth living with HIV (53%) is higher than that of men and male youth.
• In both the Caribbean and the Caribbean Diaspora in Canada, heterosexual sex is the main mode of transmission, with steadily rising rates of HIV infection among women and female youth.
• In both Canada and the Caribbean, the highest prevalence of HIV infection is found among gay men and other men who have sex with men. In Jamaica, 32% of these men are living with HIV. In Canada, in 2009, 44% of new HIV infections were among this population.

There are a number of social factors - or determinants of health - that shape HIV risk at an individual level. These factors influence how people’s lives unfold as well as the choices available to them and, in turn, their health outcomes. Key factors for youth in the Caribbean and the Caribbean Diaspora include the following:

1.  Gender norms. Norms of masculinity and femininity in Caribbean societies play an important role in shaping HIV risk. Young men’s masculinity emphasizes multiple partners, aggression and the need to affirm heterosexuality through these behaviours. These norms of masculinity pose challenges for women and female youth in negotiating safer sex, increasing their vulnerability to HIV. These same norms, as well as the pervasive homophobia in Caribbean culture, also lead gay men to hide their sexuality which increases their own risk and that of their partners.

2.  Popular culture can also play a role in influencing gender roles and sexual expression - and also HIV risk among youth. In the Caribbean and the Caribbean culture, music, for instance, can be an important part of the lives of many young people. Some researchers have linked genres including dancehall in the Caribbean and hip-hop in North America - both of which project unapologetic sexuality and hyper-masculinity - with increased sexual risk taking and multiple partners among youth.

3.  Poverty. An important factor that significantly influences the context of people’s lives, and, in turn, their HIV risk, is income and social status. In both the Caribbean and within Canada’s ACB population, poverty and unemployment rates are significant challenges. In the Caribbean, youth living in poverty may have less control over their sexual rights and less access to education, therefore increasing their HIV risk. Young women may engage in transactional sex with older men to pay for school fees, food and money.

4.  Migration and acculturation. Caribbean people commonly migrate within and away from the region to improve opportunities for employment and education. Sometimes children are left behind and can as a result face increased risks of physical and sexual abuse and may suffer from psychosocial problems. Immigrants from the Caribbean to Canada also face challenges that may increase their risk of HIV. They may have to cope with racism, difficulties with the immigration process and problems in finding and maintaining housing and employment. Fitting in with the dominant culture can also cause problems. This is especially true for lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans youth who may experience rejection from their families and multiple forms of oppression, including racism and heterosexism within white society, racism and sexualization within the white gay community, and heterosexism and homophobia within the ACB community.

5.  HIV stigma and discrimination. In Caribbean societies, gay men, sex workers and sexually active youth are stigmatized and marginalized. As a result, in the Caribbean itself, these groups are often excluded from targeted HIV-related programming and from school sexual health curricula. This results in limited access to essential HIV prevention information. There are also conservative attitudes towards gender roles and sexuality within the Caribbean Diaspora in Canada that contribute to HIV stigmatization and prevention messaging.

PositiveLite.com’s own Scott Foley has experienced many of these issues first hand and he is currently writing about them in his own series of articles which you can read here. Scott has this to say about the One Blood: Youth Linked in Action video:

“It really touches on some of the issues I myself have faced. The stigma of going to a public health care facility is very real. If my trip to New York City to get an HIV test hadn’t happened, I probably would never have gotten tested in my own country. Even if I’d strongly suspected I had HIV, I still wouldn’t have gone.

“The music is another thing. Dancehall and reggae promote way too much violence towards gays and promiscuity. I got caught up in dancehall music at a very young age and that’s where I learned about sex from a Caribbean perspective. I surprise myself that to this day I still listen to dancehall music even though I should know better. It’s so powerful in my culture.”

Clearly, many factors influencing HIV risk are rooted in cultural and social contexts. To stem the rise of HIV in Caribbean and Caribbean Diaspora communities in Canada, collaboration and targeted education and care are required. The youth who made and participated in the One Blood: Youth Linked in Action video documentary that we are highlighting here are taking a lead in this effort.

Although Canada’s a rich country, homelessness is a reality for far too many of our fellow citizens. A significant proportion of them are young people. In addition, there are many youth who, if not technically homeless, experience precarious living situations. There are many reasons for this - poverty, family rejection, domestic violence, parental drug and/or alcohol misuse or a lack of space where young people feel they can be themselves.

These circumstances make these so-called street-involved youth vulnerable to HIV and infection with other STIs. This was the subject of a presentation at the recently concluded Ontario HIV Treatment Network (OHTN) research conference by Dr Josephine Wong, an assistant professor at Toronto’s Ryerson University. I caught up with her after her presentation to talk further about her research in this area.

John McCullagh: Thank you, Josephine, for agreeing to speak to PositiveLite.com.  What led to your interest in this subject?

Josephine Wong: I’ve spent many years in sexual health education and have talked with young people from diverse backgrounds and circumstances. I’ve learned that most of them are aware of the importance of using condoms to keep themselves safe, even though they may not know the details about STI/HIV transmissions. But for many of them, condom use was not simply an individual choice. It was a practice that needed to be supported by the right social conditions.

JMcC:  The research you presented at OHTN concerned only young men. Why’s that?

JW: Because I’ve found that most sexual health programs are focused on women. We’ve done little to address the sexual vulnerabilities of young men.

JMcC: Before we go any further, I need to understand what the term “street-involved” means. Are we talking here of homeless young people or those who have run away from home or does it describe something more subtle?

JW: I use the term to include young people who are homeless, living on the street, staying in a shelter or couch-surfing with acquaintances in rooming houses, as well as young people who spend most of their time on the street, engaging in local street culture and economy.

JMcC: Your research was informed by the participation of young street-involved men themselves, right?

JW: Yes. I talked with 24 young men of diverse backgrounds who grew up in different neighbourhoods in Toronto. Seven of them were street-involved of which five were homeless and two were involved with the street economy. Their ages ranged from 16 to 24, but most were around aged 18- or 19-years-old. The majority were born in Canada into working class families and they had quite diverse ethnic and racial backgrounds.

JMcC: What issues did you want to explore with them?

JW: My study was driven by my interest in providing an opportunity for the voices of marginalized young men to be heard. I wanted to explore how gender expectations in our society influenced the way they constructed their masculine identities, and which in turn shaped their sexual practices.

JMcC: So, if I understand you correctly, you were wanting to learn what these young males thought was manly, and how they developed and maintained that masculine identity.

JW: Yes, but more importantly, what I really wanted to learn from them was not so much their thoughts and behaviours, but how their social conditions shaped those thoughts and behaviours. I believe that these young men often “perform” their situational manliness without any conscious thoughts; they just do it as if it’s their nature. I’d argue that their masculine performances are far from being natural; they’re the results of early socialization and the structural conditions that men live in, which helps to explain how young men of different racial or class backgrounds, or sexual orientations, perform their manliness and sexual practices differently.

JMcC: What role did these young men’s sexual practices play in their perceived sense of masculinity?

JW: An important one. Unfortunately, sexual health educators often focus on the sexual behaviours of young people and limit their goal to promoting condom use. While that is critical, we tend to negate the contexts of young people’s sexual behaviours. We overlook that “gender performances” play an important role in how and why young people engage in what type of sex, who they have sex with, and so on. In our society, we live in a very gendered world. We have received and internalized messages at a very young age about how we should behave as males and females. Without conscious awareness, many young men perform their masculine identities through their sexual practices.

JMcC: You’ve  talked about sex as cultural capital. What do you mean by that?

JW: In our advanced capitalist society, we often think of capital only in economic or material terms, like money and financial assets. However, if we think about our everyday world critically, we may realize that there are other forms of capital – symbolic capital (prestige, honour, fame), social capital (networks, connections) and cultural capital that we embody (mannerism, tastes, physique), turn into objects (cultural goods, lifestyle consumptions) and institutionalize (credentials, qualifications). But it’s important for us to know that the value or worth of these different forms of non-economic capital is dependent on competition at the local and societal levels.

JMcC: Could you give me some examples of this cultural capital that’s specific to the street-involved young men in your study?

JW: Street-involved young men are marginalized in society. They have little economic or social capital. Thus, they’re limited to competing with each other through certain actions and practices that yield local cultural capital. So, some of them engage in street fights to gain “street respect”, which is a form of cultural capital. Others have sex with multiple female casual partners or claim to have many female casual partners to gain “masculine capital” among their peers. They often drink and share drugs together to develop “homosocial” bonds, which is a form of “homosocial capital”.  All these different types of capital together define a street-involved young man’s position or ranking among his peers.

JMcC: And if you’re living on the street, I suppose your street capital keeps you alive and safe.

JW: Yes, and your homosocial capital helps you out when you need a place to rest or if you need to escape from the street for a while.

JMcC: What were these young men’s perceptions of and relationships with young women?

JW: While I have ample empathy for them, I was at times quite disturbed by the masculinist culture of many of them. Sometimes women were treated as objects to be traded for masculine or homosocial capital, especially women who were considered casual partners. Some admitted to being violent towards their female casual partners when they were drunk or high on drugs.

JMcC: How did they self-identify in terms of their sexual orientation?

JW: All the seven street-involved young men self-identified as straight.

JMcC: What did they know about HIV and STIs?

JW: They all knew that they should use condoms to protect themselves from HIV and STIs. However, they often engaged in unprotected sex because they were under the influence of alcohol and drugs, or because they were having sex in places where condoms weren’t accessible. One young man told me that he frequently engaged in sex with women in public washrooms, in restaurants or supermarkets. He didn’t use condoms because he didn’t have any with him and because these women looked “clean” to him.

JMcC: Did they know how to access health care information and treatment and did they make use of those services?

JW: Most got their information about HIV and STIs at agencies serving street-involved youth. They also learned from news or rumours circulated on the street. Many of them had been tested for STIs or admitted to having been diagnosed with STIs in the past. However, they hadn’t been tested for HIV.

JMcC: Why not?

JW: Most likely because they didn’t want to know the results.

JMcC: What do you think needs to happen to reduce the risk to street-involved young men of being infected with HIV and other STIs?

JW:  Condom distribution and HIV/STI prevention education programs are, of course, critical. But I strongly believe that we need to move beyond focusing on individual behavioural change to developing socially just public policies to address the structural determinants of these young men’s health. For instance, I believe access to stable housing, harm reduction and addiction rehabilitation programs, adequate employment, and inclusive education is critical to reducing HIV risks among these young men. In my research study, the young men who reported consistent condom use were those who aspired to finish high school and get a good job. As a society we also need to challenge racism, sexism, homophobia, heterosexism and culturally normative ideas of masculinity. I don’t think we can change young people’s sexual behaviours without addressing these issues.

JMcC: This is all very interesting, Josephine. Thanks so much for talking to us here on PositiveLite.com about your research.

JW: Thank you, John, for your interest in it.