Dennis RomeroFollowing this week's state workplace health meeting on requiring condoms in porn, adult stars spoke out against the proposed practice.
An interesting theme among some of the women:
It's a reproductive rights issue.
“Keep your laws off my body,” former Penthouse Pet Ryan Keely said in a statement sent out to the media today (which happens to be 6/9, if anyone cares).
As Tuesday's meeting made clear, California's Division of Occupational Health and Safety (Cal/OSHA) is moving toward a rule that would specifically require condom use at porn shoots in the state.
Keely.; Credit: ryankeely.com
As it stands, Cal/OSHA officials say condoms are already required via federal rules that seek to protect workers from exposure to bloodborne pathogens.
But state officials have said they don't have the resources to fully enforce the rules. So big producers like Larry Flynt's Hustler video get raided and cited occasionally, and they seem to chalk it up to the price of doing business.
A rule specifically naming adult video and condoms wouldn't seem to change this situation.
Still, porn stars are pissed. While industry leaders say the requirement, if enforced, would push production out of state and underground — into even less-safe terrain — performers say they don't want California all up in their genitals.
Porn star Ela Darling says the industry's system of having performers regularly tested works:
Ela Darling.; Credit: darlingela.com
As an individual and as a performer, I would rather have unprotected sex with someone whom I know for sure has been tested for HIV, Gonorrhea and Chlamydia in the past thirty days, than have barrier-protected sex with someone whose STD status is either unknown or positive.
Lily Cade:
Lily Cade.; Credit: lilycade.com
These proposed regulations are so absurd that, if actually enforced, they would drive the porn industry out of California. Taking my job away doesn't make me safer – it makes me unemployed. I absolutely, unequivocally, love what I do, and I do not want that taken away from me because of misguided concerns about my safety. We are not a hazmat team. We are not radioactive. We are fucking, something almost everyone does, and almost no one encases themselves in plastic wrap to do.
And last, but certainly not least, Justine Joli (who calls herself a “girl-on-girl performer”):
Justine Joli.; Credit: justinejoli.com
Being required to use dental dams, plastic over labia, gloves and goggles instead of testing wont make me safer. It will only take my job away.
[@dennisjromero/djromero@laweekly.com]
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