The onus is on you not to sleep with someone whose status you don’t know or trust. I should not have a legal *obligation *to inform you of my status anymore than I have an obligation to inform you if I have the clap or am just a lousy lay. A moral obligation, I think so, but not a legal one.
If I recall correclty, a number of states have criminalized the knowing/intentional transmission of STDs (including HIV), thus it is no longer necessary to shoehorn the offense into another category ofof crime
Cancer and anthrax don’t require the complicity or active participation* of their victims in getting infected, AFAIK. HIV does.
*I’m excluding rapes and infected blood here, but not consensual sex or nedle sharing.
murder of whom?
Well. if you don’t have a legal obligation you should IMO.
Personally, I don’t have time for a crappy lay.
Seriously though. If you KNOW you have HIV and don’t tell your partner, I wouldnt be too bothered if they took you out behind the building and shot your brains out. Obviously, the devils in the details of who knew and did and said what, but in principle I consider it right up there with attempted murder/murder.
The problem is, HIV early on got mixed in with the gay/drug user/poor folks/black folks/free love aspects of society and therefore anything that both tries to deal with HIV in a realistic manner but has a negative impact on those groups gets labeled as some sorta anti group XYZ effort.
In the case of two people who do not know each other’s sexual history, both have an equal obligation to act responsibly. For over 25 years, it’s been drummed into our heads that you should assume anyone you meet is HIV-positive, and you need to protect yourself accordingly. If you are irresponsible and don’t protect yourself you have to share the blame if you get infected . . . regardless what the other person has or has not told you.
Obviously there are exceptions to this, e.g. rape, and people who have reason to think their relationship is mutually-monogamous, when it’s not.
Oh bull fracking shit.
Thats IMO mostly an excuse for an HIV positive person to get laid if the other person is stupid enough not to ask if they are HIV positive.
Thats like blaming a driver for not driving carefully enough when the other drunk driver hits them.
HIV positive people just don’t want the onus on them to tell their potential sexual partners they have HIV, because the probability of them getting laid under any conditions after telling folks probably drops by a factor of between 10 and 100.
As many people as they knowingly infect. Much like if I sewed a bomb into someone’s chest that would detonate in 10 years and which was physically impossible to remove. Yes yes, I realize this might entail changing some statutes. Ah well.
Couldn’t you up the ante with this, though? If cheating on someone without their knowledge absolves someone of obligation, why doesn’t lying about your test results? The same excuse could be used for both, that you loved and trusted your partner to tell you the truth, and both could invite blame for being naive.
I do think people should be selective with their partners and should have a talk about STDs, AIDS and sexual history before ever having sex, and then again before having sex without a condom (if they choose to do so), but that’s different than having the conversation with one person lying through their teeth.
As far as I’m concerned, criminalizing the knowing transmission of HIV is a great way to ensure that fewer people get tested. After all, if knowingly having sex and not disclosing your HIV status is a crime, one way to avoid that is not to know.
That was the case on Law & Order.
If you had something like that, couldn’t he potentially, oh, I dunno, “tamper with” the condom? Puncter it before using? Just enough so one’s partner wouldn’t know.
That’s not at all what I meant. If someone believes they’re in a monogamous relationship, say a traditional marriage, and their partner is cheating and becomes HIV-positive, then gives the virus to their partner . . . All I was saying is that the non-cheating partner cannot be blamed for having unprotected sex.
The same goes for rape. You cannot blame a rape victim for having unprotected sex.
But aside from these two circumstances, when two people have consensual sex, it is the responsibility of ***both of them ***to be safe. You cannot just ask someone and expect him to tell the truth. You have to assume that anyone you have sex with might be positive, and act accordingly.
I classify this as an issue of consent. Specifically, since the standard of “informed consent” is required in our sexual interactions with other human beings, anything which prevents said consent from being “informed” negates the consent and reclassifies the sexual intercourse as a rape.
If someone is withholding important information about their HIV status (or outright lying about it), any consent aquired under these circumstances is not informed, and thus void.
If people are fully informed about another person’s status and chose to have sex (protected or otherwise) anyway, that’s their business, but when they are not fully informed, there is no informed consent, and thus it ought to be prosecuted as a rape, and subject to whatever statutes govern that crime in the jurisdiction.
I might be convinced that an additional charge of attempted murder is also appropriate, but that would be in addition to, rather than in place of, the rape charge.
Yes. AIDS/HIV shouldn’t be a dirty word…BUT that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t try our best to prevent the spread of it. I wonder if a socilogical survey might indicate problem popultions that we could focus on to try to eridicate AIDS.
I do not believe it should be a rape type charge, but attempted murder would work for me, as there is no consent to be exposed to the disease. And anybody who actually consents to unprotected sec with someone who is active needs their head examined! I would be perfectly happy with a mandatory tattoo somewhere near the genitals about the HIV/AIDs status just to be positive that there would be notification…
I would love to see the virus eliminated like smallpox, but until the fracking pope gets off his ass and changes catholic policy about condom use, it is NOT going to happen. there should be mandatory use for people positively diagnosed with AIDs/HIV with no exceptions including married people as trying to reproduce with the virus is just dumb and irresponsible. Sterilization to take away the temptation to try and reproduce might be in order for someone trying to reproduce when they are diagnosed with the virus might be an idea. I know it is a bit harsh, but people frequently seem to have no ability to control their actions to the point of hazardous behaviors :rolleyes:
You will accomplish only one thing: Nobody will get tested.
No one? Not the people who might actually care about their own personal health or the lives of the people they’re sleeping with? I think this might be a case where it won’t be a deterrent for sociopaths, but at least there’ll be some way for them to be punished (not that it’ll make that much difference to the people they transmit to).
I still think the example you mention (person being cheated on) can fit on the same continuum, albeit at one extreme. There are reasonable precautions and extreme precautions that can be taken. Some might say that assuming your partner, even your spouse, is monogamous during your entire marriage is being naive.
Well, Christ, not no one, but it will be that much harder to sell the (true) message that the best way to protect your health is to go get tested, even if you turn out to be positive (because then you can start treatments – which, btw, because they reduce viral load, reduce the risk of transmission [1]).
When this is complicated by the fact that if you turn out to be positive, you get to choose between disclosure and much greater chance of rejection, or being a criminal, many people will simply choose not to get tested.
And that will result in more people getting HIV, not fewer.
And you’re right, criminal penalties won’t make a difference to the people they spread it to. The way to reduce the spread of HIV is not by criminal sanctions, but by making it so that people 1) are tested – a person who tests positive for HIV is far more likely to practise safer sex than a person who is HIV positive but unaware of that fact[2]; 2) have access to medication that reduces viral load, 3) have broad access to safer sex information and equipment, as well as realistic information about what an HIV-positive diagnosis entails, so that they are more likely to get tested; 4) face less discrimination as a result of testing positive.
[1] Vernazza P, Hirschel B, Bernasconi E, Flepp M. (2008). Les personnes séropositives ne souffrant d’aucune autre MST et suivant un traitement antirétroviral efficace ne transmettent pas le VIH par voie sexuelle. Commission fédérale pour les problèmes liés au sida (CFS), Commission d’experts clinique et thérapie VIH et sida de l’Office fédéral de la santé publique (OFSP). On the web: http://www.saez.ch/pdf_f/2008/2008-05/2008-05-089.pdf
[2] Burman W, Grund B, Neuhaus J, Douglas J, Friedland G, Telzak E, Colebunders E, Paton N, Fisher M, Rietmeijer C. (2008). Episodic antiretroviral therapy increases HIV transmission risk compared with continuous therapy: results of a randomized controlled trial. J Acquir Immune Defic Syndr, 49, p. 142–150.
(bolding mine)
I would agree with this. For those asking of whom, or where’s the body - fair enough, we’ll just keep them in custody until one shows up. After all, we’re going to have a lot of vacant space in Guantanamo soon.