AHF Amends Calif. Safer Sex Ballot Proposal

The kind of man who wants the government to adopt and enforce his ideas is always the kind of man whose ideas are idiotic. ~ H.L. Mencken

After failing to pass legislation last year, supporters of requiring adult-film actors to wear condoms have taken steps to put their proposal before voters in 2016.

Michael Weinstein, the president of the Los Angeles-based AIDS Healthcare Foundation and the proponent of the proposed California Safer Sex in the Adult Film Industry Act, has argued that condoms and other preventive measures would improve workplace safety for porn actors and prevent the spread of sexually transmitted diseases.

Opponents of the proposed condom requirement from within the pornography industry, though, have warned that statewide regulations would push a legal industry underground and drive the $6 billion industry out of California. Rigorous testing already protects porn performers, industry officials contend, and kept three actors who tested positive for HIV in 2013 from infecting other performers.

Tuesday’s filing by Weinstein is a revised version of a proposal submitted about a month ago. Bradley W. Hertz, a Los Angeles attorney for Weinstein, said the amendments clarify some of the measure’s provisions.

The proposed initiative is similar to last year’s unsuccessful legislation, Assembly Bill 1576 by then-Assemblyman Isadore Hall, D-Compton. It would take effect immediately, and film companies would have to be licensed and report to the state, under penalty of perjury, that actors used condoms in a film. Violators would face fines of up to $70,000 or more.

The measure also would require film productions to include a sign that state law “requires the use of condoms for all acts of vaginal or anal intercourse during the production of adult films to protect performers from sexually-transmitted infections and diseases.”