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Posters too cre-AIDS-ive |
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Commentary Good intentions are not always enough. In the case of the group Cre-AIDS-ive’s bid in the StompAIDS Challenge 2006, the message has gone awry. An underlying agenda of moral concern clouds the issues that should rightly be addressed, such as actual prevention of AIDS. The group engages itself in an all-out scare campaign that, unfortunately, does little to actually inform people about safe sex. Just don’t have sex, seems to be the message, or as they put it themselves: “Abstinence adds assurance.” Advertising their event, Naked Revelation, which is taking place at the Science Foyer Oct. 25-27, the group has hung up three different posters on walls and boards all over the NUS campus. At first I barely noticed the posters in question. Just another AIDS campaign, I thought. It was not until I overheard a group of local Singaporeans debating the posters’ offensive character that I looked closer. One poster is showing a visibly naked couple in the midst of sexual intercourse. Another one portrays a woman - a prostitute, the viewer is led to believe – performing fellatio on a young man. Five young men touching each other intimately in a cluster adorn the third poster. The participants on all three posters emit obvious desire. Their flesh, however, is covered with unsettling black sores. I have to concede that I was slightly taken aback by their outright suggestive character. Had this been in my native country of Denmark, I probably would have thought nothing of it. It is hardly an uncommon sight there, which perhaps explains why I did not react to them at first. But here in Singapore? With an official stamp of approval by NUSSU? Really? “These [posters] are very raunchy and quite shocking. We are not used to seeing that,” said Antonia Chen, first-year engineering student, when she saw the posters. Jeremiah Tay, NUS business student and member of Cre-AIDS-ive, said the group would have achieved its aim if people were shocked and disgusted by the posters. “We want people to talk about it. We want it to disturb people,” he said. It is a way for people to know the event, he added. Scare campaign I do not like the sores on the actors’ bodies, or the way they are consciously used as a tool to frighten people. This is a cheap trick devised to hit the Singaporean youth of today where it hurts. What do they fear more than anything? To be an outcast, especially visibly so, like a leper – with sores. In my opinion, the posters are basically saying: “Have sex and you will get to look like a leper!” It’s as if it is the sexual act itself that is dangerous and should be avoided. It is true that some AIDS patients get sores or lesions due to Kaposi’s sarcoma, as the posters suggest, but it does not happen to all who contract AIDS. The posters present insensitive and distorted information, which does not enlighten people on safe sex. It just disgusts. Instead, the message ought to be: “Have unsafe sex and you risk becoming mortally ill.” This would be a more proper and sober statement, which should then be followed by actual instructions on safe sex. This brings me to my next point – where is the information on safe sex? On Wednesday I went to the Naked Revelation event. There, I was led through The Sexpo AIDS Trail, which sought to dramatise the experiences of a person contracting and living with AIDS. However, as was the case with the three posters, focus was on scaring people by zooming in on the potential physical consequences of AIDS. There was no detailed information on what constitutes safe sex and what does not. It would be useful to learn the facts about how you actually protect yourself and your partner(s). There is lots of valuable advice to give, and it often turns out that people do not know half as much as they think – or claim — they know about sex. Taboo or reality? “The running theme through these three posters is something that is not allowed in society, especially in our conservative society,” Antonia Chen said. In this way, the posters are insensitively stigmatising AIDS/HIV patients as sore-infected moral trespassers. Pryderi Diebschlag, an exchange student from England, shared this concern when I spoke to him. “It’s going to make them [people with AIDS] feel awful,” he said. They will feel like rejects, he said. Diebschlag went on to object to the five gay men poster, which he termed politically incorrect. “If that was released in Europe, there would be unbelievable outcry. It suggests that homosexuals are more likely to engage in group sexual activity,” he said. Thus, issues of sensitivity and political correctness aside, in spite of their graphic nature, the posters reflect that sex is a cultural taboo here in Singapore by depicting the sexual actors as deviants. Well, let me break it to you, once and for all: Young people have sex, whether it is culturally taboo or not. In Singapore, too, oh yes! Of course some youths choose abstinence for a variety of reasons, which is all well and good, but they are outnumbered by the ones enjoying an active sex life. The crucial need is to inform and educate, if one truly wants to prevent the spread of sexually transmitted diseases such as AIDS – and avoid unwanted pregnancies for that matter. Bans, denials and taboos do not work. “I think young people are going to do what they want to do. It’s better to promote safe sex, rather than tell them that sex is awful,” Diebschlag said. Now a lot of people out there will rush to point out that things are different here in Singapore, and Diebschlag and I, as “Westerners,” are transferring our own values and perceptions to this society. Well, we do have eyes and ears. Young people are having sex here too. Before coming to Singapore, I lived in both Guatemala and Indonesia. In both of these societies, sex is also taboo and pre-marital sex is to be shunned. Nevertheless, I have seen and heard enough to know for a fact that young people have sex there too. The only difference is that they are often forced to do it under miserable and indecent circumstances, such as in rice fields or wherever they can find an inch of privacy. These youngsters have received little or no sexual education, because sex is taboo. The knowledge they have about sex is based on myths and assumptions. The result: unwanted pregnancies and spread of STDs. Clearly, taboos do not work. Education does. Sex among young people will happen regardless, so focus should be on making sure they know how to protect themselves. Moral judges Everyone is entitled to his or her own set of moral standards, but it is wrong to try to assert those on others. Tay of Cre-AIDS-ive said that he did not agree that the group was moralising, but said it was merely trying to tell people about possible consequences of high-risk sexual activity. “We’re not passing judgment. We’re just saying that if you engage in this, then you are exposing yourself to risks,” he said. I then inquired why the condom message in the posters was not highlighted more. “The condom message is a smaller message. The main message is abstinence. That’s the message that [the] Health Promotion Board wants us to convey to the population. We are helping them convey the message,” Tay said. The Health Promotion Board declined to comment on this when I called it on Thursday. “Abstinence is unrealistic,“ Diebschlag said, adding that one cannot expect people to follow the same social standard in a multi-cultural society as Singapore. Do not get me wrong, though. I am all for AIDS prevention. It is still a very serious disease on the rise in many parts of the world. My point is just that there are more subtle ways of doing it than the approach taken by Cre-AIDS-ive. For all their good intentions, the group’s attempt ends up as a moralising and stigmatising endeavour, preaching abstinence above all. NUS students will have to look elsewhere for information on how to avoid AIDS by practising safe sex. |
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