The reckless practice, known as "be-heading", started in the US as a bizarre means of getting a sexual high from risk-taking.
Now, according to one - that number again ONE - man who I won't name cause he's made up, hundreds of men in the UK are introducing themselves on online forums, Facebook groups and Twitter.
Many then meet up and try and cut each other's heads off.
Often they are under the influence of mind-bending gay drugs such as "Crystal K" and "Special GBH".
Some be-headers actually claim not having a head gives them a better quality of life because of the medication they subsequently have to take - which costs hard-working taxpayers millions.
Nick, 30, an admin worker from the Midlands, who doesn't exist, said: “I feel fit as a fiddle," he said, in a phrase no-one has used since the 1920s.
"I feel full of energy and healthier as a result of being on my medication - and not having a head."
Although there is absolutely no evidence any of this happens, and just shows I know fuck all about gay men or culture, I need money and enjoy telling lies for a living.
And, let's face it, you can get away with writing any old shit about gay men these days.
That's what they teach you at Roedean.
Okay, yah?
Gemma Aldridge, Sunday Mirror.
Next week another shocking exposé on the sordid life of the gays by Penelope Gymkhana-Trainer-Bra - 'Gay men eat their own feet!'
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I think you are being a little unfair. This has been covered before
ReplyDeletehttp://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4895012.stm
http://voices.yahoo.com/bug-chasing-why-some-men-want-become-hiv-positive-10487.html
Okay.
DeleteI'm now going to write a sentence...
"I am the second coming of Jesus Christ."
I just wrote that, and published it, so it must be true, yeah?
Cause everything anyone says in the media is true.
Glad we've got this sorted.
...and not everything anyone says in the media is untrue either.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Professor Le Blanc,who has studied this 'real phenomena' in the USA, that the Mirror's 'excellent' awareness raising article is necessarily provocative.
I am pleased to see that Positively UK and the Terence Higgins Trust have also chosen to comment on the issue too.
Perhaps you need to open your mind rather than simply dismissing something you don't want to hear, just because you wish it were not so.
please don't post when you're pissed Gemma Posh-Loon - it's embarrassing
Delete'Fagburn' - I am not 'Gemma Posh-Loon' - nor am I pissed - and I am not a representative of the Mirror.
DeleteI am a free thinking individual with an open mind.
I appears you are a blinkered, small minded, attention seeker - and an embarrassment to the gay community you purport to represent.
Interesting that you should choose the random sentence 'I am the second coming of Christ' in response to a previous comment - delusions of grandeur or what?
I've never claimed to represent anyone.
DeleteGemma repeated something here she said on Twitter - bit a giveaway...
of!
DeleteYeah, and that's why you are "publishing" on your own, little-followed, bitter blog and not on a national newspaper where lawyers, editors, and sub-editors listen to your interview tapes to make sure they are genuine, double and triple check your copy before printing. Oh, and that means printing to over a million buyers (4 million readers)...Who reads this blog, again?
ReplyDeleteNot that this will get published, of course...
You could at least post comments under your own name, Gemma.
Deleteoh my god this is too funny. Where is my 'TEAM GEMMA' t-shirt?
DeleteArticle in italics:
ReplyDeleteBug chasing: Men deliberately trying to catch HIV for sexual thrill in astonishing craze
According to one man who willingly caught the virus, hundreds of men in the UK are meeting on online forums, Facebook and Twitter
She sets out what you;d think the article itself covers beyond doubt, given the seriousness of the claim. And the sensationalist use of the word "craze" suggests a huge amount of men are engaging in this. Let's hope the article isn't just a load of vague, fact-less guff to pad out the headline. Although the reference in the sub-heading to only "one man" doesn't bode well for an apparent "craze" revealing exposé...
Experts have warned about a new craze in which men are secretly seeking and spreading HIV.
Which "experts"? None are given in the article, oddly. Nameless "experts", like the one anonymous source are all we're given.
"Secretly seeking" and "secretly spreading HIV" are two entirely separate things. Every now and then you hear isolated cases of people of all sexual orientations who are HIV positive but who fail to tell their parners, knowing they will spread the disease. This has nothing to do with so-called "bug chasing", but here they're conflated.
The reckless practice, known as bug chasing, started in the US as a bizarre means of getting a sexual high from risk-taking.
From risk-taking? Taking a risk is having unprotected sex with someone whose status you or they don't know. Actively pursuing HIV is hardly "risk taking", is it? Walking a tightrope is risk-taking; jumping off the top of a tower block is not taking a risk.
Now, according to one man who willingly caught the virus, hundreds of men in the UK are introducing themselves on online forums, Facebook groups and Twitter.
One anonymous man. No follow-up in the article about these groups, forums or on twitter. Odd, that.
Many then meet up and try to transmit the potentially life-threatening virus, which attacks the immune system weakening the body’s ability to fight disease.
Presumably, only according to this anonymous man? No follow-up again to the claims of this single source; no journalism at all as far as I can see, unfortunately. No concrete proof or corroboration either sought or found.
Some bug-chasers actually claim the virus gives them a better quality of life because of the medication they subsequently have to take.
Who are these "some bug chasers", you refer to; finally introducing more than one apparent "bug chaser"? Yet no one else is specifically mentioned...
Nick, 30, an admin worker from the Midlands, said: “I feel fit as a fiddle. I feel full of energy and healthier as a result of being on my medication.
ReplyDeleteAh, I guess that was according to our single anonymous source, "Nick" again? And he feels healthier after being put on medication? Well, will wonders never cease. Who could have predicted that??
“I get my liver function tests every three months, my cholesterol tested regularly and I get loads of general health checks so if there are any underlying conditions I know straight away. Even better, I get it all on the NHS.”
Why wouldn't someone with a potentially life-threatening disease get help and treatment on the NHS? Still, it plays into NHS anxiety of many of your readers, I guess.
Last year, 73,659 people in the UK were treated for HIV – 43 per cent of them gay or bisexual men – a rise of 58 per cent over the last 10 years.
So, less than half were men. A rise in HIV is indicative of a rise in unprotected sex. Nothing here suggests a connection the point of the article.
In 2012, the NHS spent £840million on HIV treatment, an average £10,000 per patient.
Entirely irrelevant to the point the "reporter" is trying - so far extremely unconvincingly - to make.
Simon Prytherch, of the Elton John Aids Foundation, said: “This practice is very scary and highly irresponsible.
"What we see increasingly are cases of treatment failure and then rapid decline in health.”
Simon says nothing factual about whether or not this "craze" exists. His second point is a general point about HIV patients. Irrelevant to the point of the article.
Bug chasing is so new to the UK it is impossible to say how many men are involved.
The idle rumour and urban myth has been around in the UK for many years and in all that time I've never seen an article that presented any factual basis to suggest it was a "craze", a phenomenon or happening on a large scale, if at all. No concrete evidence whatsoever.
But if, as you say, it's impossible to verify the numbers involved; isn't it your job as a journalist to find out before writing an article as flimsy as this in a paper you so proudly claim has millions of readers? Is there not a primary responsibility in your position and in your profession to do so?
An investigation by Rolling Stone magazine in 2003 claimed a quarter of all new HIV transmissions in the US could be attributed to bug chasing.
As Fagburn has already shown, it was later retracted. Also, the word "could" seems the operative word in your sentence there; ie. they don't know. And, again, it was later retracted...
No such studies have been done in the UK but one Facebook group dedicated to the practice has been “liked” by 1,172 people.
ReplyDeleteWhich Facebook group? Again, no concrete facts are given; and liking a Facebook page is basically meaningless. A useless piece of information as it tells us nothing.
A US website which promotes meetings of bug-chasers and gift-givers – those who are already HIV positive – has more than 5,000 members.
Which one? Yet again, nothing concrete.
Nick, who contracted HIV in 2011, joined the site two years ago.
He claims he has had unprotected sex with more than 1,000 men, including many he knew were HIV positive, in his quest for the virus.
He joined the site in 2011, the year he actually contracted HIV but he had unprotected sex with more than 1000 men to catch the virus? Can anyone else see a flaw in the math here???
“I have faced a lot of vitriol on my blog,” he said. “But I just think that as it’s between two consenting adults, it’s no one else’s business."
He has a blog? Where is it? And if he was open enough to start a blog about what he did or was doing, why is he now using a pseudonym?
Silvia Petretti, of HIV charity Positively UK, has been living with the virus for 16 years.
She said: “It may not be a death sentence any more but living with HIV is not a walk in the park either.
"It makes me very sad and very worried that people are seeking to contract it.
"Bug chasing needs to be addressed, both by the NHS and the education system, so that people are aware of the risks from a young age and receive the help they need if they are feeling compelled to act this way.”'
If it's widespread, shouldn't she, in her position, have access to more concrete facts and specific information to educate?
Or, like everyone else it seems, does she just not know how many are engaging in this practice - and by extension - if anyone at all is?
The Terence Higgins Trust said: “Although it is a tiny minority taking part, we recommend that gay and bisexual men protect themselves against HIV and other sexually-transmitted infections by using condoms.”'
"A tiny minority"; still no concrete figures, facts etc; but a bit more measure than to suggest it's a widespread craze or a phenomenon.
Nick is not his real name.
Quelle surprise! But he has a blog detailing his "bug chasing" - though no one seems to know where it is...
It's a flimsy article, with absolutely no factual basis, besides the testimony of one anonymous source.
And for you to say that Positively UK and the THT have "commented on the issue" is not the same as them giving any kind of credence to the claims of it being a craze or a phenomenon or that 100s or 1000s of gay men are doing this.
BK - I'm not sure if your response is aimed at me or not? The final paragraph suggests so. I am one of 3 anonymous contributors above - and NOT the journalist who wrote the article.
ReplyDeleteI appreciate your lengthy and reasoned response - which I suggest might have been, better placed on the Mirror's own website.
I would, however, reiterate the comments of another anonymous contributor (above) - that in the current post-Leveson climate, surrounding newspaper journalism, there are stringent procedures regarding the authentification of source material.
It cannot be possible that 'Nick' is not an actual person, and that his disclosures have not been tape recorded and kept on file.
The reporter makes it clear, throughout, that the article is based upon Nick's version of events.
The editor, was presumably satisfied that they were genuine, and his story was legitimately newsworthy - or it would never have gone to press.
It is perfectly acceptable, and I would suggest desirable, that it should provoke reasoned debate - but it is less than edifying to see, what appears to be, a personal vendetta being waged against a journalist who was acting in good faith.
And who knows fuck all about gay men.
DeleteHow is it "newsworthy" if this lie is ten years old?
PS "Acting in good faith" seems to suggest it wasn't based on fact, Gemma.
Is the criteria for publishing a story in the Sunday Mirror these days really "Well, if one person says something is true and we believe him, then we publish"?
DeleteDoes anyone there actually, you know, investigate the claims? Not just to ascertain their veracity but to actually create an article with a clear, unambiguous factual basis?
Because there doesn't seem to be much else in your very short article beyond this one anonymous person's claims.
Your defence about post-Leveson checks seems to be less persuasive when you go on to basically describe the process as you giving some tapes of your one single source to your editor and they believed what they heard so gave the go ahead to publish.
Again, was any of this actually and rigorously investigated?
And if it was, why is there absolutely no factual content in your short article to support your one anonymous source's claims?
And your final statement about it being desirable that your article should provoke reasoned debate is extremely disingenuous when your article is so thin on actual content beyond the claims of a single anonymous source.
What about the actual content of your article is there to debate?
The debate is how such a flimsy, non-article about something as serious as HIV and the possibly false claims about a large amount of gay men can be published in a paper that you so proudly claim has so many millions of readers
Sorry to disappoint you but I can only reiterate for the third and final time that I am NOT the author of the offending article, nor do I work for the Mirror.
ReplyDeleteI do confess that the Mirror, & the Observer,
are my preferred Sunday papers.
I have no idea what the Mirror's specific criteria are for publishing a story.
However, it is my understanding, as a member of Joe Public, that there are, post - Leveson, protocols in place across the newspaper industry to prevent the publication of false information and to protect the rights of individuals to anonymity.
It would also be my guess that individual newspaper reporters are strongly advised,if not contractually prevented,from entering into dialogue surrounding their work on forums such as this.
In conclusion, I am a straight male, and have never worked in the newspaper industry. I enjoy friendships with male and female gays.I do understand the seriousness of HIV.
Actually, journalists are encouraged to join in debate about their work on online forums.
DeleteThis is interesting - seems Gemma usually writes about EastEnders and Posh Spice...
ReplyDeletehttp://journalisted.com/gemma-aldridge?allarticles=yes