BootmanLA

I'll also add: this is a reverse variation of the "one drop of black blood" that marked all mixed-race people in the US as "black", because you're suggesting that as long as someone in Central or South America has some white ancestry, they're white.

To make things clearer: No one would look at Ted Cruz's father and think of him as "white". Ted's grandfather on his father's side (Rafael) came from the Canary Islands - the population of which is heavily mixed with Spanish, Berber, Moroccan, and other ethnic strands blended together for centuries. He emigrated to Cuba in the early 20th century where his son, also named Rafael (Ted's father), was born. If you look at any photograph of his father, it's hard to see how Rafael Cruz would be classified as "white" by anyone with an understanding of how racial/ethnic categories were understood either at the time of his birth or even at the time of Ted's birth. Ted's mother, Eleanor, is where most of Ted's "whiteness" comes from, because she's about as white bread (mostly Irish) as they come. She was from Delaware, as I recall, and was the daughter of a DuPont company executive. Her family moved to Baton Rouge, LA, while she was a youngster and she grew up here, attending a socially prominent Catholic girl's high school. Somehow, after marrying and divorcing in Texas, she met Ted's father (also a divorcee, who worked in the oil industry) and married him, later giving birth to "Ted" (real name: Rafael Eduardo Cruz). He ditched his given names in favor of "Ted" (for whatever reason). That's not to say that his mother's Irish genetics are overwhelmed by his father's Canary-Cubano genetics. It IS to point out that Cruz doesn't just "happen to have" a Spanish name. (Also worth noting: Ted Cruz is vehemently anti-Communist but his father was jailed by the Battista regime in his youth for his work with the Cuban revolutionaries, and after his college career he advocated strongly for the new Castro regime - only changing his tune when Castro seized some of his relatives' property. And Ted Cruz is also vehemently anti-illegal immigration, but his father only got a student visa to the US by bribing officials to get an exit permit. Apparently with the Cruz family what's good/bad, right/wrong vary depending on whether a Cruz is benefiting or being harmed.) Also: Geraldo Rivera is also very much not just someone who "happens to have a Spanish name". His father was Puerto Rican; his mother a Russian Jew. His actual name is "Gerald", not "Geraldo"; he changed it when TV producers felt he was more marketable as an identifiable Latino, even though his family had done as much as they could to hide their ethnicity as he was growing up. Names are often more complex than we give them credit for.

I think the contempt you feel for those less fortunate than you are shines through loudly and clearly here. You can deflect by calling it "virtue signaling", but I'm not sure what you would call advocating for a system where if you're poor and can't afford health care, you die. And I love how people use "meritocracy" to mean "people who have more money than others", as though more wealth automatically means a better person. Some of the shittiest human beings I know are exceptionally rich materially, through no effort whatsoever of their own other than being born to wealthy parents, who themselves were born to wealthy parents. And best of all is the attribution of "stupidity" to people who disagree with any of these positions you've taken.

Bear in mind that if the story involves "knocking someone up", it belongs in the Backroom pozing fiction section, not here in the porn discussion forum (which is for discussing porn video and related topics).

I'd like to point out that this is the help and tips section, where we can raise questions about what is permitted where, hence the op's query about whether there is too much incest discussed on this site. There are extant topics in the general discussion area about incest experiences and that's where you should discuss what you've done (within the site's policies), not here.

It almost certainly won't be "one and done", but I don't think that's a big deal, as long as it's a reasonably priced vaccine. If I were HIV-negative I'd happily pay a $25 copay every year to get an HIV vaccine booster. I get a flu vaccine shot every year as it is, and I've got a feeling we'll need Covid boosters for years.

Lyndon Johnson once observed to Bill Moyers, "If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you." The Hispanic people you're talking about lump themselves into that "lowest white man" group to avoid being tagged as a person of color. Considerable numbers of Hispanics (especially Cubans) and Asians figure they're better off throwing in their lot with the white majority that looks down on them, rather than with the white minority that doesn't and which is allied with black people and other minorities who don't, in large measure because they think they'll benefit by association.

As they say.... Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.

Just to be clear: you're asking people on here to speculate, without any basis beyond "I heard", on the health status of prominent people? I thought this was Breeding Zone, not Teen Idol Gossip.

Have you checked dumpsters and trash heaps?

If you can't define what that "certain aspect" includes, then your point is useless. But I'm more curious as to why you think this. The "entire society" is responsible (via our laws, legal system, regulations, etc.) for providing clean air and water as essentials for life. We don't tell the people who live downstream from a chemical plant that they're responsible for taxing themselves enough to keep the chemical plant under control. The U.S., unlike Canada, primarily uses the private sector as a means of paying for health care. Result: despite spending more than twice per capita what Canada does, we have somewhere around 10% of our population with no coverage whatsoever, and with a considerable number of the rest getting substandard - that is, far below the level you get in Canada - care. Join the club. We had just as strict a lockdown early on, and longer ones in many places, and that, too, was to protect our health care system. So our private system fared no better than your universal one, AND it fails to deliver care to millions on top of that. The idea that you consider health care a "luxury of life" tells me all I need to know about your outlook, and it's not a pretty picture.

Yes, you're missing something (a lot of somethings, actually), and unlike Cosmaz above, I'm willing to spell them out for you. 1. It's probably true that relative to the overall population in the world, or in the US, or even just among gay men, gifters and chasers are a relatively small community (though I would not say "miniscule". That said, there are plenty of them who are not on this site. 2. You find it "hard to believe" there are lots of guys who are negative but not on PrEP. You live in Canada, a place which has universal health care. Until this year's determination in the U.S. that PrEP is a recommended preventative measure (and thus must be covered without copay by insurance under the terms of the ACA), many insurance companies did not cover PrEP, and those that did frequently had a large copay (sometimes hundreds of dollars per month). And of course, there are still plenty of people in the United States who (a) live in places where the state has not expanded Medicaid and (b) they make too much for traditional Medicaid, and (c) work for an employer who doesn't offer health benefits or who has them priced so high they're not affordable. Millions of people in the United States still lack any health insurance coverage at all - somewhere between 25 and 30 million people, the vast majority of whom are adults. If we guess that 5% of those are LGBT people (I'd wager it's higher, as we tend to be overrepresented in marginal occupations in the service industry) - that would still be over a million LGBT people at a minimum with no insurance coverage. Those people are far less likely to be on PrEP strictly due to cost concerns. Your Canada-induced myopia is perhaps keeping you from seeing what your large neighbor to the south experiences. Beyond that, a certain number of people prefer condoms over bareback sex, even PrEP-protected bareback sex, because condoms offer additional protection to other STI's. Not to all of them, and not in every case, but still - it's their call to make and they make it that way. What you or I or anyone else thinks about the desirability of bareback sex over condom sex, a lot of people are still making that decision every day. And beyond THAT - if an undetectable-poz top bareback fucks a bottom who's not on PrEP, he's almost certainly not going to infect the bottom. That means that in sharp contrast from our community experience in the 1990s - where fucking assorted guys bareback was almost a guarantee towards getting pozzed, eventually - in 2021 as long as one of the two participants is undetectable OR on PrEP, the chances of transmission are negligible. While I think it's still crazy to roll the dice that way, the odds of getting pozzed have gone way, way down (as evidenced by the frustration of so many chasers on this site). 3. Once a person recovers from the initial "fuck flu" - if he experiences that - health complications from HIV take a pretty long time to develop for most guys. Some don't want even the minor complications that HIV treatment regimens can produce. And even in later stages of infection, when HIV begins multiplying rapidly in the system, opting into treatment at that point is frequently successful at reversing the effects of years of not being treated, although such a patient has fewer options for "med holidays". So yes, it's entirely possible to believe some people would rather wait until it's absolutely necessary to begin treatment. Beyond that, there are some guys who figure "Live hard, die young" and take that seriously - they don't want to be 80 years old with joint problems, unable to walk up a flight of stairs and unable to remember what they had for lunch yesterday. They would rather live a shorter but fuller life, and that's their choice to make. 4. What *you* believe is "criminal" and what actually *is* criminal are highly likely to be two different things, so let's make sure we define our terms. Canadian law - which covers where you are - is somewhat murky in that exposure to HIV is covered under general sexual assault law. "Criminal exposure to HIV" is defined as a "realistic possibility of transmission" of HIV during sexual intercourse. "Realistic possibility" is not spelled out in Canadian statutes, but the Supreme Court of Canada has held that it does not include sex with a condom OR sex where the infected person has a sufficiently low viral load. There are proposals floating around that would codify "no realistic possibility of transmission" to cover four situations: when the infected person is undetectable, when condoms are used, when the non-infected person is on PrEP, or when the particular sex act (e.g. oral sex) is itself very low-risk - but those proposals haven't been adopted into legislation yet. In some (not all) jurisdictions in the United States, by contrast, you have 50 different sets of laws, because this is a state, not federal, matter, and while the laws in one state may resemble those in another, none are identical. In some states there is no specific criminal provision at all. Now, if you mean "morally wrong" and not "criminal", that's a different kettle of fish entirely. But in that case, you shouldn't use words like "criminal" that have a very specific meaning, especially not tossed around willy-nilly with no understanding of what is actually criminal and what isn't.

Oh boy. This is a can of worms if ever I saw one. Let me preface by saying I understand the issue with the previous roommate - when you live with someone who's negative all the time, especially if they hold you accountable for it, there's just no way to even relax at home. That said: unless you're an Oscar-worthy actor, this potential roommate is likely to figure out you're ogling him, sooner or later, and that could go bad really, really fast. There are guys (both gay and straight) who don't mind being ogled as eye candy, but even so, they might well get tired of it from a roommate, particularly one who controls the lease. There's a whiff of exploitation there - the same kind of thinking that led, say, Donald Trump to hire an endless stream of bleached blond big-boobed women to work in public-facing roles. If he notices you're "looking" at him, it won't take much for him to wonder if you're, say, listening to him when he's got someone staying over for sex, or whatever. I'm not saying you shouldn't look for the kind of roommate you want - just be aware it's not so much "hoping for a fantasy" as it is "planning to live life balanced on a tightrope".

I'd advise some rethinking on this. As someone noted above, four bottoms is a LOT of bottoms for something like this. Assuming you want each one to get bred by at least three guys, that's 12 tops you need to find, and while NYC is obviously a huge city, it's also famous for guys not wanting to travel more than a subway stop or two for sex. If you want the real "gang bang" experience, where a guy takes on multiple tops to the point where he's really sore from the experience, I think this plan has a high likelihood of ending with a LOT of disappointment.

I'm not sure why you think working in a sex shop or sleazy motel would give you more time to have sex, unless you're planning to be having sex while on the clock supposedly doing other things. Given how leanly such places are staffed, I'm fairly certain most employers would be distressed to learn that, say, their desk clerk (often one of the only people on duty in the late evenings) is abandoning the desk to go suck off a guest. And frankly, if you define sex worker as "someone who's getting paid for sex", and you're slipping out from your regular job to have sex, then you are, by definition, a sex worker. It's just that it's your regular employer paying you for the sex you're having, rather than the guy you're having sex with. If you're talking about hanging around after work for it: you could do that anyway, right? Even if you had some other, non-sex-related job.

I certainly am not in a position to advise you "yes or no" on that, but I will say it's good that you're aware of this potentially turbulent situation. What I would do, if *I* were in your situation, is talk with them - individually, and together - about what they see happening in the relationship, what they want from it and from you, and what they think they can bring to this "enhanced" relationship. And then I'd listen very closely to their responses. For instance, try to get a feel for whether the older guy is looking for an ally in his "management" of his partner, or is looking for someone less volatile to enjoy doing certain things with (in or out of bed). Is the younger one looking for a partner who WON'T be "managing" him? In other words, there's a chance each is looking for a new partner that will be "different" in some ways from the partner he has; that's ok on its face, but if the issues where they want "different from what they have" are the same, and one expects you to be X and the other expects you to be Y, that's a potential disaster in the making.

I'd personally think it was really contrived.

Not necessarily, or we wouldn't have a need for phrases like "high functioning addict" (or "high functioning alcoholic", for when the addiction is alcohol). Addiction can be defined (in plain English) as "a compulsive, chronic, physiological or psychological need for a habit-forming substance, behavior, or activity having harmful physical, psychological, or social effects and typically causing well-defined symptoms upon withdrawal or abstinence." In psychological terms, it's defined as "a biopsychosocial disorder characterized by compulsive engagement in rewarding stimuli despite adverse consequences" (for those who follow the "brain disease" model of addiction. Going by the plain English definition, there are several elements: -the need (whether it's compulsive, chronic, physiological, or psychological); -for something (substance, behavior, or activity); -that is habit-forming; -that has harmful effects (whether those are physical, psychological, or social effects); and -typically causing well-defined (ie predictable) symptoms when you stop the substance, behavior, or activity. Under this model, certainly, "sex addiction" is possible - if you regularly feel the need for sex, AND indulging in it has a harmful effect (like, say, you lose your job because you keep missing work to hook up, or you've been dumped by partners in the past because you can't stop having sex with other people), AND you have issues when you try to do without - like, say, getting highly irritable, breaking off otherwise good relationships with friends because you're in a shitty mood from not getting sex, etc. But based on most of what I'm seeing posted here, I don't think most of you are "sex addicts". You may be hypersexual, and that's fine, but I've never known an addict (to anything) who was self-aware enough to recognize his addiction and actually bragged about it.

I respectfully disagree. Many people, especially before they have much experience, do NOT "know what we are". That much should be evident to anyone who's ever dealt with someone just coming out. I know people who *think* about getting fucked who do not, in fact, "want to get fucked". I think about things all the time that I do not, myself, want to do.

THIS. "Use your words" fits so, so well here - if your friend doesn't know what to expect, he should use his words and ASK. Yes, it's probably the case that his "date" is actually just a meet-up for sex. But that's not definitely the case. I've had guys that I've talked with for an extended period of time, where it was clear we were into each other (as much as one can be, online), and we ended up with an actual date that followed up with sex that same night. That might be what he's thinking. But whatever the case: he's clearly thinking sex is on the table. If your friend doesn't see it that way, he should probably make it clear, to avoid anyone's feelings getting hurt.

I will add this: Leaving aside all the contortions of life caused by the pandemic, in the United States at least, for the past 30-40 years we've been edging towards having less and less free time to pursue old-fashioned concepts like friendship hangouts, especially as we become more and more urbanized (and this is the case for both straight and gay people). For instance, young adults used to be able to live fairly close to their workplaces, even if not in ideal housing. In big cities, that meant you could get on transit and be at work in 20-25 minutes, and home in about the same. In smaller cities, it was a 20 minute drive or so. As housing costs have skyrocketed, in a big city young adults need to live 3 and 4 to an apartment that's 90 minutes outside of work by transit. In smaller but booming cities, affordable housing has come to mean a suburb with an hour's commute each way by car on days when there's no breakdown or other traffic issue slowing down the journey. All the funky places that used to be affordable close-in have been gentrified far beyond the budget of the young adult. They may have to work a second job (or lots of overtime) just to make ends meet. Increasingly, employers require a significant overtime investment each week for professionals, too, which further limits available time. Then, too, a lot of people have significant time commitments for things like exercise/working out, sometimes just to keep themselves sane. Even if all these things don't happen every workday, they average out to a lot. Add an 8-hour workday, half an hour for lunch, 2 hours for commuting, half an hour of exercise, an hour of second job/overtime, maybe an hour and a half combined for morning shower/prep/breakfast and evening dinner/relaxing, and you're already pushing against the available time after allowing 8 hours for sleep - before you account for any errands, cleaning, laundry, or whatever else might fill a typical day. Modern life is exhausting. And the number one driver of that is housing costs - both in terms of creating the need for overtime and second jobs (which suck up time) and the commuting required to find a place to live affordably. If we solved the housing issue, the return in terms of leisure time would be astronomical. Then maybe people would have time to make friends and do things with them.

Except it's not, RawTop. The CDC *acknowledges* that it's being used this way. But right on the page you cite, it says, clearly: "This type of use is not currently part of CDC’s guidelines for PrEP use, which still recommends daily use for those at risk for HIV. Taking PrEP once a day is currently the only FDA-approved schedule for taking PrEP to prevent HIV. When taken as prescribed, PrEP is highly effective for preventing HIV." I'm not sure how much clearer "not currently part of CDC's guidelines for PrEP use" could be. And it says, point blank, that daily dosing is the only FDA-approved schedule - and WHEN TAKEN AS PRESCRIBED - which means daily, because any other use is off-label - it's highly effective. I'm not saying it's useless - obviously, there's evidence that IF you take it exactly as the off-label guidelines say (at least 2, no more than 24 hours before sex; and 24 and 48 hours after sex) it has a good track record. But that glosses over the reality of a lot of gay sex: -guys who decide on the spur of the moment to have sex, and take the pills right before, without giving them time to start taking effect; -guys who concurrently are using IV drugs; -guys who have 3 or 4 hours of sex during the "bout" of sex and then misjudge when to start the 24 hour and 48 hour doses; -guys who know the timing but still miss-time one or both of the follow-up doses; -guys who have additional sex during the same period but do not alter the dosage schedule; and so on. The point is that "on demand" has far more potential failure points than daily does - especially since taking it daily isn't tied to the frequency or amount of sex you're having. In fact, if you have sex more than a couple of times a week, you're actually putting MORE PrEP meds into your system than if you just took it daily and maintained a steady level, because of all the days you have to "double dose" before sex. I get the point that "on demand" is better than "never". But the studies show it's effective, though not as effective as daily dosing, even if taken exactly on the 2-1-1 schedule; it's got more avenues to fail; and for a guy who's reasonably sexually active (sex 3 times a week) he's taking higher doses of the drug than daily would provide. At one time, when lots of insurance in the US didn't cover it, I could understand wanting to conserve pills. Now that it's required to be covered with no copay, it's a no-brainer to use daily for almost everyone.

Bear in mind there are many models for polyamorous relationships, none of which is intrinsically superior to any other (or to monogamous or open relationships or to being single). What matters is that you two - and any additional partner(s) you bring into your relationship - all understand and agree on how the relationship is going to work. For instance, I know of triads where there's a dominant guy (not in the BDSM sense), who has a husband as well as a boy, the boy being primarily attached to the dominant (sort of like a junior husband). I know of triads where all three partners consider each other equals in all senses. I know of poly situations where there's a core married couple, and each partner has one or more other partners of varying descriptions - One such couple, one husband has a boyfriend in addition to his husband, while the other husband has a pup/boy, The husband with the boyfriend goes on dates, occasionally, with the boyfriend, who nonetheless knows the husbands are primary to each other; the pup/boy is strictly there for fun and play, and neither of them live with the couple. And so on. What matters is what YOU two want. For instance, if you want three equal partners in the relationship, how would you plan to handle things like spousal benefits at work, where likely only the worker and one of his partners is likely to be recognized? If you two own a house, and you bring in a third, are you willing to sell him a partial interest in your home? Will his contributions to the household count towards equity in what you all jointly own? There are a lot of questions like this that will come up if things get serious, and you probably ought to consult a gay-friendly lawyer with legal experience in such relationships, if for no other reason than to be aware of the things you should be watching for.

THIS. A thousand times this. When a guy says he wants to "impregnate you" and "make him part of you forever", that could just be generic bare-fuck talk, or it might be that he's coyly telling you he's poz and is hoping you convert as a result of sex with him. Without passing judgment on that - you really, really need to know what the score is. 1. Assuming you're negative, and you want to remain that way, and you want to bareback, you should be on PrEP. Actually, because it takes a while to become an effective shield against infection, you need to be on it well before you have bareback sex. 2. And if you're NOT on PrEP, you need to get over any shyness you might have about asking, point blank, what his HIV status is.

I'm like you in that I generally prefer to be alone, but there are times when it's not only nice, but advisable, to spend time with others. While I'm fine with eating lunch alone almost anywhere, and I'll eat dinner alone in anything no fancier than a Chili's, I just don't like to eat out for dinner in a nicer place. For starters, it takes almost as long to take my order and serve me as it would for a table of two, but the server's going to make less because the tab is lower. I also am fine with reading on my phone or working an electronic crossword puzzle in a casual place, but not so much in a white-tablecloth kind of place. Having a dinner companion makes it possible to pass the time waiting in conversation. I also enjoy birding, but that sometimes involves a few hours' drive to a good (often remote) location, spending time observing, and heading back. Having another person who shares my interests along - to split the driving, to help spot something good in the trees, etc. - is a great thing. So in one sense, the answer seems to be - look for others who share the interest where you want company, and do some open-ended inviting - "I'm thinking of checking out the new billiard hall on 4th soon - feel like coming with?". But even if you find someone whose company you enjoy (and it's reciprocated), bear in mind this will likely end up as a casual friendship - the kind of guy you call when you want to do something fun. And bear in mind, a friendship based in a shared activity isn't necessarily going to lead to a friendship where you can just hang out doing nothing. If what you're looking for is a deeper sort of friendship - the kind you can call when things are NOT going well, and you just want someone who'll tolerate you being morose for a bit and cheer you up with a fun lunch and/or movie - then you may need a different approach. There's nothing wrong, inherently, with "fair weather" friends - the kind who are happy to spend good times with you, but who don't have the available emotional bandwidth to help you through less joyous events. But the friends who do - or at least, are willing to make that bandwidth available to you - are fewer and farther between.