[at_a_remove]

I remember how little was known in the beginning, when it was called GRID. For a while it was theorized in the media that semen hitting the bloodstream was causing the immune system to freak out; my friends, who had just started puberty, asked me (as the designated science nerd) what I thought of that, as they had somewhat random scenarios of nocturnal emissions striking road rash from skateboarding. I thought it unlikely, given what I knew of history.

We had very little idea of what constituted "transmissible" and what did not for a period of time, and so while our parents had "free love" and The Pill, with the biggest risk being herpes, at least a section of my generation got "sex = death" internalized on top of all of the other apocalyptic gloom.

Of course, even what would be transmissible was subject to propaganda: on one side, you had people arguing for any gay sex being a risk, but on the other side, some activists insisted that heterosexual intercourse was exactly and precisely as risky as homosexual (male) intercourse. Quite a lot of misinformation floating around.

[ngold]

Grew up at the tale end of that, during reagan 80's. Learned how to hide under a desk for nukes. Hide under a doorframe for quakes. But Ghostbusters was good.

[koheripbal]

There are still a lot people spreading the misinformation that hetero sex is as risky as anal sex, because they have some odd agenda to push.

[NelsonMinar]

You understand heterosexual people have anal sex too, right? It's become quite trendy.

[at_a_remove]

Everyone here knows precisely what was being discussed. Me, the writer, you. Why quibble?

[koheripbal]

I suppose I should have written "vaginal sex". ...but the majority of hetero sex is still penis-in-vagina so I think my comment is still mostly correct.

The fact that it was downvoted sort of underscores my point, that people prefer reinforcing their feelings, rather than know the truth.

[bagacrap]

s/hetero/vanilla and the point stands

[slim]

do you mean that vaginal sex is less risky than anal sex? Wikipedia says otherwise https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/HIV/AIDS#Transmission

do you have any source for what you believe?

[at_a_remove]

You may wish to try https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/HIV/AIDS#Transmission

Receptive penile-vaginal intercourse* at 0.05–0.30% Receptive anal intercourse* at 0.04–3.0%

Given the error bars ...