(Originally I was not going to post this series here but by popular demand---okay, 2 other mybloggers bloggers--it was requested that I do. While I felt it was appropriate at another web site I wasn't sure about mybloggers.com  Please let me know if you want me to continue the series here or not.)

I am doing a series based on my experiences, observations, friends and knowledge about gay life after 63 years living as a gay man.
I will be talking about various subjects and will gladly touch on any
topics that other bloggers might be interested in--just e-mail them to
me at GreatMartin2003@yahoo.com . I have no objections to people voicing
opposing/other views but I will delete any comments hostile, insulting
or negative regarding gay people or attacks against them.
I am not naturally a vulgar person but here and there I may get into
street/crude language which is the only reason I think this might be
'controversial' as I don't think sex has to be, or is, a gutter subject.

WORLD
AIDS DAY is observed on December 1 and has been since 1988. More than
33 million people are living with HIV across the globe and more than 2
million of them are children.

I was watching this 'special on BET cable the other night regarding
black men cheating on their partners and referring it as ‘men on the
down low‘. Am I missing something here? This is far from a 'new'
phenomenon--I have been gay for 63+ years--the first man I went to bed
with was married--and I have gone to bed with married men of ALL
colors--why is it a 'special' when black men do it? Since Oprah did a
show on the subject it seems to have become ‘chic’. As an example, in
Tyler Perry’s film, “For Colored Girls” , one of the themes is a married
man on the down low though when  the play was on Broadway in 1978 there
was no mention of it. Most of E. Lynn Harris’s books are about the same
subject and they were all best sellers.

Also, not surprising to me, none of the men said they were gay--there is
a line from a movie that goes "Only gay men say they are bisexual"--so
true in most cases. For many reasons, and I will blog about that at
another time, I don’t believe men are bisexual and most married men,
with children, that I know identify as gay. I NEVER heard of a man
leaving his male partner to live with a female! Another blog that I will
be posting is that most, if not all, married men who have sex with
other men are the receivers in anal sex, the quickest way HIV is passed.

As I said what am I missing here? What's 'new' about all this?

In
any case, unless you have been with your mate, spouse, husband, etc.,
24/7 for the past year, I don’t care if you are opposite or same gender,
I don’t care what age you are,  GET AN HIV TEST NOW!!  If he has been
faithful, as he claims he has been, he has nothing to worry about and
neither will you.

I won’t get into the use of condoms in this post but married or not,
known your partner for years or not, again unless you are with them
24/7, MAKE HIM WEAR A CONDOM!!!  And, please, don’t believe the BS he
will tell you about it doesn’t feel right or he can’t perform with one
because when YOU get AIDS it won’t feel right!!

Men who have sex with men and women are a "significant bridge for HIV to women," a CDC study suggested.

******************************************************

The following are from Google and Wikipedia which I suggest you pursue for more information.

What are the origins of this term down low and what does it refer to?


The
term is often used to describe the behavior of men who have sex with
other men as well as women and who do not identify as gay or bisexual.
These men may refer to themselves as being “on the down low,” “on the
DL,” or “on the low low.” The term has most often been associated with
African American men. Although the term originated in the African
American community, the behaviors associated with the term are not new
and not specific to black men who have sex with men.

In his book
Beyond the Down Low: Sex, Lies and Denial in Black America Keith Boykin
explains that secret homosexual relations are not unique to African
American men, and in fact occur in many societies and among all races.

In
"Power Plays, Power Works" John Fiske suggests that closeted
homosexuality may be more common in American communities suffering from
widespread poverty, in which members reportedly depend heavily on
traditional family networks (and often religious institutions) for
financial and emotional support.



Men who have sex with
men and women are a "significant bridge for HIV to women," a CDC study
suggested. The CDC's Young Men's Survey shows that about one in 10 men
reporting sex with men also has sex with women. And more than one in
four of these  men has unsafe sex with both kinds of partners. "Men who
also had sex with women had similar levels of HIV and STDs [as
exclusively homosexual men] and higher levels of many risk behaviors,".

The CDC cited findings that relate to men who operate on the down-low (engage in MSM activity but don't disclose to others):
Men
who have sex with men (MSM), but who do not disclose their sexual
orientation (nondisclosers), have a high prevalence of HIV infection
(14%); nearly three times higher than nondisclosing MSMs of all other
races/ethnicities combined (5%).
Confirming previous research, the
study of 5,589 MSM, aged 15–29 years, in six U.S. cities found that
African American MSM were more likely not to disclose their sexual
orientation compared with white MSM (18% vs. 8%).
HIV-infected
nondisclosers were less likely to know their HIV status (98% were
unaware of their infection compared with 75% of HIV-positive
disclosers), and more likely to have had recent female sex partners.

"The
high prevalence of HIV in the black community and the greater
likelihood of bisexuality among black men place heterosexual black women
at risk for HIV infection. However, the contribution of high-risk
heterosexual black men to the rising HIV caseload among black women has
been largely ignored. Future research must evaluate the relative
contributions of bisexual men and exclusively heterosexual black men to
HIV cases among black women."