Bareback sex: Breaking the rules of sexual health and the assumption of risks

Abstract

Many studies have provided information about different individual, social and cultural factors underlying the assumption of risk in sexual practices among men who have sex with other men (MSM). However, there has been little analysis of the role of sexual health programmes in the understanding of bareback sex. Following sociological debates about the effects of governmentality in health promotion, this article examines the extent to which HIV prevention campaigns addressed to MSM in Spain are implicated in the construction of a social context where bareback sex is possible. It argues that the implication of Spanish LGBTI activism and the social link between AIDS and masculine homosexuality from the outset of the epidemic have given safer sex a moral value. At the same time, the creation of a scenario where sexual care is perceived as desirable also raises a subjection process where individuals are urged to answer whether they engage in safer sex practices or not. This article concludes that a new perspective on intervention is necessary to address the realities of HIV infections among MSM in contemporary western culture.