"More often than not, it is a gay or trans person just because of life circumstances and lifestyle stuff, and thats totally fine," Sartre says,"But I think if you want to be nervous about working with someone because of an HIV risk, you have to treat everybody with the same amount of risk, because you don't know what people are doing in their personal lives."
For his part, Zeischegg agrees with Sartre's sentiment and says this issue has more to do with your sexual practice than your sexual identity."During my career, it did seem like fluid men were singled out," Zeischegg says."There are other risk factors for HIV like intravenous drug use or sex without a condom, but rumors would circulate about all sorts of thing… but you never saw a girl dropped for any of those reason. It was only men who had sex with other men.
However, Sartre has a slightly different view of the issue and argues that there's a possibility for that rationale to act as a cover for latent prejudice — something she says is a problem for performers of other races, sexualities, and gender identities at times. "I don't know if it was greater in porn than any other part of the culture," Zeischegg says."The AIDS crisis of the 80s has lingering effects on the culture. I understand why people are freaked out, and I think information about PrEP and things like that just moves slowly across the general culture."