(From adultbeat, reprinted from adultfyi, from ABC News)

Former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop on ABC news calls for Congressional reform of the adult industry.

Koop rails against certain adult industry sex practices with the ABC report noting that "[adult industry] producers hire, men and women as young as 18, for sex that is often unprotected."

"We have an industry that is making billions of dollars a year, is spreading to cable television and to the Internet, and yet their employees are considered to be throwaway people," Koop told ABC.

The report goes on to say that "only a handful of 'high end' production companies require condoms, leaving the majority of performers vulnerable to AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases. While some companies require performers to take HIV tests, there is no government regulation mandating tests across the industry.

Koop — noting that performers' sexual activity off the set, with spouses or lovers, can spread disease beyond the industry — says America's big corporations which profit from porn via hotel and cable revenues are also complicit in a public health hazard: They want the profits from pornography but "they don't want to get involved."

Nor do the fans, according to Koop. "Even the people who enjoy looking at pornography really despise the people they're watching, and they have no sense of protection for them," he said.

According to the ABC report, few of the adult companies provide health insurance, and most performers find they must work without condoms if they want to keep getting jobs. "The fans don't like to see condoms," said performer Belladonna, reflecting a belief that is widely held in the industry. Like many other performers, Belladonna started in the business when she was 18, the legal minimum.

According to Koop, many producers and distributors argue that performers are independent contractors, not their employees, so they don't have any responsibility for them. But Koop calls that a "copout."

"These youngsters are not unionized, they don't know how to do anything for themselves, and they're really stuck," he said.

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Gosh, I hate to say 'I told ya so', but 'I told ya so'.

Does everyone still think I'm an asshole for suggesting 'Day of Shoot Testing and Results' (DOSTAR)?

Go Mr. Koop, go.

He doesn't want to shut you folks down, he justs wants to keep you people from hurting the high school kids.

I would agree with him.

Isn't it time you people start listening to The Outsider?

The Outsider

koop is a nutcase, and day of shoot testing would not work when you have girls and guys working 5 days a week, sometimes multiple scenes a day.... not to mention the outrageous cost to the performers... and the fact that testing takes time,... you would need a full size hospital to handle the tests alone if you had everyone doing day of shoot testing. he is a moron for even believing the tripe that spews from his mouth.

Just because people shoot 5 times a week doesn't mean it can't be done, or it can't work.

As for costs, the producers of the porn will simply have to pay them. Since they'll all have to pay them, the costs will be shared.

Also, when Congress starts to regulate all this, there will be many, many companies that will come in and bid on DOSTAR.

In other words, AIM will have to COMPETE with a bid.

AIM won't be a monopoly anymore.

If AIM had to bid against 20 other companies on the prices of tests for AIDS, chlamydia, herpes, Hepatitis C, and so forth, they'd lose, unless they brought their prices down.

Thus, with the notion of COMPETITION introduced among testing companies, odds are the prices would go DOWN.

First will come the hearings.

Owners of porn companies will be asked to talk to Congress, on C-Span, and they will be asked about all this.

They aren't going to be sued, or held liable for the way things are or have been, but they will be told that things are going to change.

The porn makers, if they are smart, will not argue with the Congressional panel.

Instead, people like Jeff Steward, who are intelligent, will probably take this approach:

"Yes, it's a mess. We need help fixing it. We need funding for tests, so we can get the system in place to protect the performers."

If Mr. Steward and others take this approach, while talking to Congress, instead of attempting to defend themselves, I'd put money on Congress helping out with initial expenses, as well as providing a long list of service provider bids.

In the end, after it's all said and done, the price of DVD's will only rise by about 5 bucks, and the consumer won't mind.

If Mr. Koop is making this an issue, you can bet that many of the porn makers on this board will be getting invitations to Washington pretty soon.

But...

If I were them, I wouldn't look at it as a bad thing.

Fixing this broken system benefits EVERYONE, including them.

Funny thing is, I think Mr. Koop may having be reading my writing. Most of the stuff he said in there is stuff I've been bitching about here for months.

Just because something seems hard to do, don't mean it shouldn't be done.

The Outsider

Gee, Mr. Koop, do you have anything to say about the securities fraud at your company drkoop.com? Anything about about the illegal stock trading? Maybe your hat isn't so white after all?

outsider... dont get a big head. koop said those statements over a year ago on primetime live during the hatchet job story they did about belladonna, they just rehashed them in this recent story.

It isn't just Mr. Koop that's interested in this issue.

Can you imagine the winner of the testing bid, and how much money they'd make if they beat AIM?

Especially if the testing becomes daily?

We're talking MILLIONS.

When something gets regulated, someone else makes MONEY.

The Outsider

the truth is outsider, that they will never regulate us, just like they don't regulate pro-wrestling.
i come from the world of wrestling i spent 2yrs working as ring crew/cameraman/booker and 3 yrs in the ring. that business needs regulated more as far as health goes. no insurance, no pension, no anything, plus i was making BLOOD to BLOOD contact with other people on a nightly basis, many of whom enjoied sex with random women and strippers and others who had heavy drug addicts, and many of whom were bi-sexual... but, it will never happen, same with porn. they will shut us down before they regulate us... and those who survive will just go elsewhere to make it.

I see your point, Rob, but I think that when they start parading 18 year old girls up in front of cameras on C-Span...

...girls that got STD's from working in porn, and then 'retired' because no one would work with them...

'Retired' is code for "I got an STD".

When the Brook Ashley's start talking, Congress isn't going to look at it like wrestlers.

People don't have a lot of sympathy for wrestlers.

People do have a lot of sympathy for fresh out of high school girls who get conned into porn with the beleif that since they get 'tested', they're somehow magically protected.

You can call them dumb, but that's how the American public will see it.

They're going to see these girls as victims, and they're going to want to stop the class of '05 from getting fucked over.

As for you and others thinking that people are trying to 'shut down' porn, it just isn't true. No one is trying to shut down anything. There's no reason to. However, the government DOES have a responsibility to step in when people are getting HURT...

...or should I say...'retired'...?

The Outsider

you really do not understand the underlying argument i have against you... do you?

same day testing is not only monetairly unfeasible, but scientifically as well.. and no corporation in the world will take on that venture... because immidiately the right will brand them as "associating with, and enabling pornographers" and they will have to undergo a public scrutiny to do that.
AIM works closley with the health dept. and does the best that can feasibly be done. if you understood anything about the pathology of infectious diseases, then you would understand how long it takes for enough of the virus to become present in testable samples. it would be pointless and fruitless to attempt such a thing because it would not catch anything much sooner than the current system. go pick up a fucking biology book before you start speaking out of your ass. herpes is another story, herpes can only be detected by testing currently availible DURING an outbreak... so once again... it would be POINTLESS. i want you to do me a favor outsider, go... read some books, some simple science to start, and then try your hand at some biology and chemistry. also i want you to take some courses in economics, psychology, and sociology... and then come back and try to argue this point, although then you will find yourself on my side of the fence instead.

C. Everett Koop is as much a danger to social freedom today as he was twenty years ago,with his truly insane,and inane,attacks against rock music,violent entertainment,and(most of all)the adult industry,and his latest verbal slam against the industry shows that he hasn't changed in the last tens to fifteen years.
People of his kind are not welcome around here,and aren't welcome around me,that's for sure!!!

,Koop!!!! and...

,Ashcroft,Bush,and anybody who supports the recent insanity that been's pouring out from them,lately(gay marriage and Howard Stern,we've got your back here!!!).

also... think about the PHYSICAL toll on the talent from same day testing...
a girl being tested 5 days a week would begetting blood drawn 5 times a week, ever seen a junkies arm... collapsed veins, the whole bit... thats real fuckin attractive. that is really taking care of the performers.

Quote:

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People of his kind are not welcome around here,and aren't welcome around me,that's for sure!!!

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First of all, I don't think getting your blood drawn five times a week is a problem.

When I was in college, I was a guinea pig for a study at a local hospital. I got my blood drawn 50 times in one week, and to tell you the truth, it was no big deal.

Second of all, people don't have to work 5 times a week. I'd call that insane, and doing damage to a body, presumably the body of an 18 year old girl.

If people need to work twice a day, they wouldn't need to get tested twice in one day, it seems to me. That would be silly.

As for the ability to detect viral diseases, technology is always evolving, and improving. Soon there will be a test that can detect Herpes from taking a skin sample- uninfected. It's only months away.

As for companies not wanting to bid against AIM, that's crazy.

Shit, if I had the money, I'd put up a company to bid for that contract, and I wouldn't care about what anyone says about me.

You come at this from a very negative viewpoint, which is odd, since you claim to be a performer. I always find that odd about you.

We're at odds, I guess. I won't get into porn since I could get a disease, and you don't want a stricter regimine that might be tough to get used to.

Shit man, if I had a choice of getting my blood drawn 5 times a week versus Herpes, Chlamydia, Hepatitis C, Gonnorea, Warts, and Syphillis...I'd surrender my arm in a fucking second.

Or, maybe it wouldn't have to be an arm...can't a nurse draw from in between the toes?

Anyway, yes, it wouldn't be a bit 'inconvenient', and yes, there are some diseases that are harder to get results from quickly than others. However, when it comes to DOSTAR (Day Of Shoot Testing And Results), the need, I think, will propel the cure.

I'd be happy to get my blood drawn 5 times a week to know I'm disease free.

I'd also be happier watching those lovely, recently graduated 18 year olds, knowing that they're not getting hurt.

Once upon a time, a man dreamed of making a city in the desert. Of course, there was no fresh water there, and the wells wouldn't last long. So the man dreamed of creating a long, long pipeline, like a great big straw, that brought water down from the mountains, far, far away.

Everyone said he was crazy, too.

And now you live in LA, and don't even think about it.

The Outsider