FAMILY RESEARCH REPORT	Journal of the Family Research Institute Founded 1982
More Evidence of Lesbian Risk-Taking			Vol. 15 No. 8 Dec 2000

In the largest study ever conducted of lesbians, researchers in Sydney, Australia interviewed 1,432 women who had sex with women [WSW] and who visited a Sexually Transmitted Infections [STI] clinic between 1991 and 1998. These subjects were individually matched to a set of controls, namely, the next woman patient at the clinic who said she had never had sex with a woman.

All of the women were routinely given a battery of tests for a variety of STIs, including Neisseria gonorrhoeae, Chlamydia trachomatis, Trichomonas vaginalis, Candida, and bacterial vaginosis. Genital herpes and genital warts were diagnosed clinically. In addition, each of the patients was given an extensive sexual history.

Contrary to the standard liberal refrain about lesbians, women who had sex with women [WSW] were rather different from the group of controls, even though the controls - having come to the STI clinic out of personal concern about STIs and residing in the central city - were probably atypical of heterosexual women in general.

Stability of Sexual Orientation

283 (20%) of the 1432 WSW reported that they had only had sex with women in the last 12 months. Overall, 93% of the 1432 WSW “reported previous sexual contact with a man.” That is only 7% of ‘lesbians’ had not had sex with a man. This finding jibes closely with both the 1983-84 FRI survey and the 1994 Univ. of Chicago study, both conducted in the U.S., where only about 5% of lesbians hadn’t had sex with a man.

Age Distribution

The WSW had an age range of 14-56, while the controls ranged from 16 to 78. Though the median age of the two groups did not differ, there were very few older WSW, none even in their 60s. In most studies, it is difficult to find homosexually active WSWs who are in their 50s. A 1996 U.S. government sex survey found that the oldest woman who reported sex with another woman was aged 49. It is even rarer to find those who are homosexually active into their 60s. This new study was no exception. Nor do the results from Sydney contradict FRI’s finding that WSW have a median age of death somewhere in their 50s.

Number of Sex Partners

Besides the obvious fact that WSW had more female sex partners than the control group (by definition), the median number of male sex partners for WSW was also statistically greater than for the controls (12 v. 6). 9% of WSW v. 2% of controls reported more than 50 lifetime male sex partners. 15% of WSW v. 5% of the controls furthermore said that they had had sex with a homosexual or bisexual male.

Sex with an injection-drug user was reported by 21% of WSW v. 6% of controls. Additionally, WSW more frequently reported sex with a heterosexual man who had had multiple partners (19% v. 17%).

As to lesbian partners, 80% of WSW reported 5 or fewer female lifetime partners, while 8% reported more than 10 lifetime female partners. By comparison in the FRI study, the median number of sex partners (both male and female combined) for self-avowed lesbians was 9 and the mean number was 78. It cannot be determined from the published report for sure, but it appears that the set of WSW from Sydney may have reported more total lifetime sexual partners than the FRI sample of lesbians. Quite possibly this was because the Sydney sample came from an STD clinic. But maybe lesbians as a whole have expanded their sexual activities over the last 10-15 years.

Sexually Transmitted Infections

Compared to the controls, WSW were statistically more apt to have bacterial vaginosis (8% v. 5%) [WSW who reported sex only with women in the past 12 months had 10%], hepatitis C (5% v. <1%), hepatitis B (5% v. 3%), and to report a past history of STIs (44% v. 32%) than the controls (see Figure 1). The controls were more apt to currently have genital warts (11% v. 8%) than WSWs, but WSW were more apt to report a history of having had genital warts. Interestingly, these findings confirm what the 1983-84 FRI survey first found: that the incidence of STDs is greater among lesbians than heterosexual women.

Other Risky Behaviors

WSW were more apt to be smokers (49% v. 38%), more apt to have ever injected drugs (23% v. 4%), more apt to be a ‘sex worker’ (i.e., prostitute) (22% v. 11%), more apt to have gotten pregnant (52% v. 44%), and more apt to have gotten an abortion (38% v. 27%) (see Figure 2). WSW also tended to more frequently consume large amounts of alcohol per week (12% v. 10%). The FRI study also found that lesbians more frequently reported an abortion, and were more apt to get ‘high’ on various substances.

Those lesbians who said that - during the last 12 months - they had only had sex with women were broadly similar to other WSW. Only 25% of these ‘pure’ lesbians had never had sex with a man. Indeed, 4% of the ‘exclusive’ WSW v. only 2% of the heterosexual controls reported sex with more than 50 lifetime male sex partners. This same subset of the WSW was more apt to report sex with a homosexual/bisexual man or with a person who shot drugs. They were also more apt than the controls to have shot drugs (22% v. 11%) and to have engaged in prostitution (16% v. 11%).

The picture painted by this study is in broad agreement with FRI’s nationwide survey conducted in the early 1980s. In the FRI study, women who called themselves lesbians or bisexuals reported more lifetime sexual partners than women who called themselves heterosexual. Similarly, lesbians in the FRI study reported more criminality and involvement with prostitution. Other studies of lesbians - when compared to a reasonably well-matched set of controls - have come to the same general conclusion: lesbians are more criminal and more involved in prostitution. Even a recent U.S. government study found the same general outcomes. WSW reported more risky sexual behavior, more sexual partners, more substance abuse, and more socially disruptive behavior than their heterosexual counterparts.

Pity the children who are adopted or foster-parented by lesbians! Not only will their ‘parent’ often be a disturbed individual who tends to do more socially disruptive things, but their lesbian parent’s associates are likely to be the same.

Reference:
Fethers K, Marks C., Mindel A, Estcourt CS. Sexually transmitted infections and risk behaviours in women who have sex with women. Sexually Transmitted Infections 2000;76:345-349.

The moral and political fabric of the United States continues to split. From the time of Plato, political philosophers have warned that democracies eventually tend to pit the non- or less productive members of society against the productive, the rebellious against the traditional, more responsible, more conservative members. The latest presidential election reveals further evidence of this split and suggests rough sledding in the coming decades.

The U.S. is not a pure democracy like the ancient Greeks envisioned, with everybody participating in every societal debate and having an equal vote in the resolution of disputes. But we are - slowly but surely - more closely approximating a true democracy. With the growth in size of the less productive and more rebellious class, the conflict between the two poles is growing.

The 2000 presidential vote reflects this split. In many respects, the Democratic party champions the less productive and less conforming, while the Republican party favors the more productive and more traditional. Democrats promise to take more wealth from the productive (especially the “wealthy”) and give it to the less productive; the Republicans promise a smaller transfer (e.g., via cuts in tax rates). Democrats solidly support abortion and gay rights; Republicans tend to be opposed.

Age and Education

Generally speaking, people tend to be more productive if they are better educated. In addition, the older one is, the more productive they tend to become... until around age 60 or so, when retirement and disability reduce productivity. In the presidential vote, as broken down by the Voter News Service from their exit polling (Wall Street Journal 11/9/00), the youngest (aged 18-29) and oldest (aged 60 and above) voters tended to side with the Democrats, while those in-between (30-59) voted more frequently Republican.

Educational attainment traced a similar pattern. Those with less than a high school education voted 21% points more for Gore, while those with a college degree voted 6% points more for Bush. However, liberals remain firmly entrenched in the upper echelons of academia. Those with post-graduate degrees voted 8% more for Gore.

Income, Marriage/Family

Yearly income was strongly correlated with voting for Bush: those making less than $15,000 voted 20% more for Gore, but those making over $100,000 voted 11% more for Bush.

And those who were married or parents voted strongly for Bush. The married voted 9% more for Bush, the unmarried 19 percentage points more for Gore. Those with children under the age of 18 voted 7% more for Bush, while the childless sided 4% more for Gore. Those who said they were homosexual or bisexual voted 45 percentage points more for Gore.

Religion

Finally, as indexed by religious attendance, those who attended weekly or more voted about 20 percentage points more for Bush, and those who never attended voted about 29% more for Gore. Among whites, Protestants were almost 2:1 for Bush, while Catholics voted 7% more for Bush. Jews, conversely, were 4:1 and the irreligious almost 2:1 for Gore.

Those currently infected with the virus that causes AIDS are probably destined to die before their time. Many have AIDS now, and many of the rest will eventually get AIDS. Even many of those who do not contract AIDS will die first from other causes, but still prematurely. Given the tremendous efforts our public health establishment has put into studying and treating HIV/AIDS, and the fact that AIDS was first documented in homosexuals almost 20 years ago, what have our public health officials learned about homosexuality after all this time? A new study of the HIV+ offers some glimpes.

About 230,000 people are currently living with HIV infection in the U.S. Their living conditions, health, and the costs associated with them are of interest to everyone in the nation. So many researchers are trying to answer these and related questions. In fact, a cooperative effort between 11 researchers at Brown University, UCLA, the RAND corporation, Rutgers University, and Jefferson Medical College was recently published in the American Journal of Public Health. The research itself was sponsored by the National Institute for Mental Health, the National Institute on Drug Abuse, and other governmental and private agencies, including the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and Merck corporation.

Sexual Identity Crisis

Not surprisingly, most (131,000 or 57%) of those infected with HIV were men who said that they had engaged in sex with men. Very recently, these men might have been called ‘homosexuals.’ But ‘homosexuals’ has almost disappeared from the scientific literature on AIDS. Why? Because the term isn’t very descriptive of men who have sex with men. And, similarly, ‘lesbians’ isn’t very descriptive of women who have sex with women.

So how were these men labeled? These researchers from the heart of the public health establishment, apparently aware of the uncertainty of terms like ‘homosexual’ or ‘gay,’ and also aware that people on the sexual fringe change their sexual orientations from time to time, put them under the heading “Current sexual orientation.” Then, under ‘Current sexual orientation’ were the subcategories “Gay/lesbian/bisexual,” “Heterosexual,” and “Celibate/transexual, other.”

The most interesting and perhaps most important thing to look at here is the authors’ choice of “Current sexual orientation.” As it turns out, 88% of those men who presumably got their HIV infection via sex with other men currently called themselves “gay or bisexual,” 7% said that they were currently “Celibate/transexual, other,” and another 4% said that they were currently “heterosexual.”

The terms ‘homosexual’ and ‘gay’ were used for a time in the medical literature. But then the evidence slowly built up that many men who had sex with men were married or had girlfriends. The psychiatric notion that ‘homosexuals are people who can only have sex with members of their sex’ was accepted at first, but the cold clear reality of empirical findings has quashed it. So the rather awkward ‘men who have sex with men’ has often taken its place.

As to ‘sexual identity,’ consider the results above. We don’t know whether some of the men once considered themselves ‘gay’ and now consider themselves ‘heterosexual,’ or whether we are just looking at ‘heterosexuals’ who included sex with men in their sexual repertoire. Likewise, one might think that the “celibates” decided upon celibacy after their HIV infection (but you never know). Further, more men were living with their wives or female partners than claimed to be ‘heterosexual’ - and there were even a few men who reported not having sex with men, but who lived with a man. One thing is clear: scientists will be in much better shape concentrating on behavior than in concentrating on ‘sexual orientation labels.’

Violence and HIV

A large sample of the HIV+ were asked, “Since your HIV diagnosis, have you ever been physically hurt by your partner or someone important to you?” 11.5% of the men who had engaged in homosexuality, but only 7.5% of the men who said they had not, responded ‘yes.’ 20.5% of the women said they had been “physically hurt.”

The question does not specify who did the ‘hurting,’ but if we assume that the partner with whom the HIV+ person lived was the most likely culprit, we can construct Figure 3.

Again assuming that the bulk of the physical hurt was delivered by their living partner, it was worse to cohabit with a member of the opposite sex than to be married to them. On the other hand, women living with a woman reported only one-third the frequency of having been subjected to physical hurt than women ‘shacking up’ with a man. But men who lived with a man were more apt to report physical hurt than men who lived with a wife.

In national random surveys, about 6% of younger women with lower incomes report having been physically hurt by someone in the past 12 months. So it seems likely that women who are HIV infected are considerably more apt to be hurt than those who are not infected. Comparable figures for men or for those who engage in homosexuality are not available.

Reference:
Zierler S, Cunningham WE et al Violence victimization after HIV infection in a U.S. probability sample of adult patients in primary care. American Journal of Public Health 2000;90:208-215.

Much of the homosexual ‘action’ in Great Britain takes place in London. All the accouterments of the ‘gay community’ are there - including ‘health clubs’ for homosexuals.

Researchers went to ‘health clubs’ for gays and others, and asked about a thousand homosexuals whether they had had anal sex without using a condom in the previous three months. Among the 779 gays who responded, things have not changed much. Of 124 men who knew that they were infected with HIV, 31% said that they had had anal sex without a condom. Of 452 men who said they were not infected, 26% also made this claim. But only 17% of 203 homosexuals who said that they had never been tested for HIV said that they had engaged in such dangerous behavior.

In other words, gays who knew that they were HIV+ reported the highest degree of high risk homosexual behavior, more so than gays who said that they knew that they were “safe.” Those who had never been tested for HIV reported the lowest rate of high-risk behavior.

No figures about anal sex with a condom were reported, so we can’t really compare the three groups completely. But one thing is clear - the infected were more, not less, apt to engage in high-risk behavior and thus to endanger their sex partners.

Reference:
Elford J, et al. Combination therapies for HIV and sexual risk behavior among gay men. Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes 2000;23:266-271.

Corner

Things to Be Thankful For

Count your blessings. The U.S. in 1900 was not too dissimilar to third world countries today. Consider the census.

Based on information collected during the 12th census in 1900, the census bureau reported that many female “breadwinners” were aged 10 to 15. That is, girls who worked full-time at non-farm jobs for 40-60 hours per week. Indeed, the census bureau said that “without doubt, a small number of the breadwinners 10 to 15 years of age were married.” Think of it, not only were many 10 to 15 year old girls working as ‘breadwinners,’ but apparently at least some of them were also married!

Where were the Hollywood liberals then? Who was boycotting products made by ‘child labor’ then?

In the intervening hundred years since our grandparents and great-grandparents worked in their youth, we have elongated childhood and created ‘adolescence’ - where people are considered ‘children’ until they are 18 for voting, 21 for drinking alcohol, and (usually) 16 if they murder!

Since the whole idea of extended childhood and the presumed ‘innocence’ of children is a recent invention, at some point we may decide this experiment ‘didn’t work out.’ But it seems unlikely that we will revert to 10-15 year-old girls marrying and working 50 or 60 hours per week. As noted in the April/June 1999 Family Research Report, girls aged 10 or above could give their consent to sexual relations under old English law, and girls as young as 10 could marry under certain circumstances in some American States.

Then again, a growing proportion of current 10 year-old girls are being stimulated by capitalist America to buy cosmetics and other ‘boy attractants.’ Furthermore, on average, girls are reaching puberty younger today in the U.S. than in 1900 or 1800, and it appears that a growing proportion of pre-pubescent and pubescent girls are having sexual relations by age 10. So who knows where it will all end up?

In any case, employment practices of third world countries today are not dissimilar to what happened in the U.S. just one hundred years ago. So no matter how ‘enlightened’ the Hollywood elite thinks itself to be with its ‘anti-sweatshop, anti-child labor’ campaign, their target would have been our grandparents and great-grandparents had the Hollywood elite been around 100 years ago!.

But that was then, and now is now. So count your many blessings!

Reference: Statistics of women at work. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1907, p. 13.

Family Research Report critically examines empirical data on families, sexual social policy, AIDS, drug addiction, and homosexuality, digging behind the 'headlines' and breaking new scientific ground.

FRR is published 8 times/year by the Family Research Institute.

Dr. Paul Cameron, Publisher

Dr. Kirk Cameron, Editor

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