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1. Mike, how is the union trying to fix that? I understand you look at it in totally good faith as a sort of last train for performers, but you are lacking in objectivity here. They have cheated, they are in disagreement on practically everything and let me also add that they have not informed performers on what prop60 is and consulted them on their thoughts about it. If many performers don’t trust the union there must be a reason? If the union is not capable of unionizing there must be a reason? They have divided people so far. That’s all they have done. I understand that someone in there is in favor of prop60 and that you are too, but that’s not enough to say that the union is trying to improve performers working conditions: just that you share the same thoughts as someone in the union about prop60. Again, I’m not talking about the merit of prop60: I’m talking about the fact that the union has so far failed in its first scope: unionizing. There is resistance because there is the feeling that the union has an agenda which little or nothing has to do with representing performers at the table of safety regulations. Nobody in the board has been elected by performers and no board has consulted the base on what to do: you tell me how performers should feel represented by and trust the union, because I have no idea. I’ll accept it if you say that in your opinion the union position on prop60 is the correct one, but you can’t dismiss performers who don’t align to that opinion as irresponsible. We have been fucked by every organization who sit by the table of safety regulations, union included, and it’s exactly why we think with our own brain that we are pretty suspicious when it comes to prop60, giving its supporters. Prop60 doesn’t lead to health clean sheets, it puts a thin barrier between stds and performers. There is nothing that I’m aware of (but correct me if I’m wrong) in prop60 which explains how performers tests get paid by producers: are they gonna build up a fund for testing? Who can access it? Can performers access it regularly (and hence get regularly tested) even if they don’t shoot, let’s say for a couple of months? Is treatment for performers paid only if the std has been contracted on set? Who decides that? Can producers sue performers who contracted std off set and spread it in set? Sorry, but for the way I have understood the prop60 papers, these regulations are just palliatives which have been put together with much superficiality. It looks like a political decision to regulate what they can and cannot do on set, not to protect their safety and wallets. You know I’m not against condoms, but this prop has been written with feet and it will open a pandora vase when enforced because it doesn’t offer the tools to make it viable on and off set. It’s a bad proposition and it shouldn’t be rushed to pass it like it is. Now, if we had a union…. Bookmark this comment 😉

2. I agree with Sabrina. Some say talent shouldn’t have to pay for testing, but no one has figured out how that can be done. I’m not going to pay for a test for a girl I want to shoot so she can then work with 10 other producers in the next month using the test I paid for. Certainly the other producers are going to send me their fair share. A money pool for testing? Try to get that to work. I might add that I’ve been in the business almost 25 years and worked with over 1500 women, many of them more than once, and in all that time I’ve gotten Chlamydia twice and Gonorrhea once. So much for rampant STDs.

   All this to try and control and industry that can’t be controlled. Anyone with a video camera and an internet connection and a willing partner can become a porn producer anywhere in the world. How can that be regulated.

   Just a handful of people have gotten HIV on set (which wouldn’t have happened if people didn’t shoot anal cream pies), all of them still alive (as far as I know) and the government wants to step in and control what we do.

   Meanwhile, guns kill thousands of people every year and the government doesn’t do a damn thing to stop it. Much more important to regulate porn than to regulate guns.

   Can’t wait to hear “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people.” Well, I could say “Condoms don’t protect people, people protect people.” So using the same logic, why have condom laws and not gun laws??

   Mike, why are you not a libertarian for porn?

3. Hey, Mike. I was out on vacation last week and had limited time to post things, but those words you wrote way back in 2004 have never been truer. This has nothing to do with porn, but is a truism of any industry: If you cannot regulate yourself, the government will do it for you. Again, that is true of every industry.

   I have been writing for several years now that the porn industry has more to fear from OSHA than the county of Los Angeles because the health of porn performers is a workplace safety issue. I don’t know how many times people told me I had my head up my ass and just didn’t understand the first amendment or understand that porn performers are contract employees and not subject to workplace safety rules, etc. All of that is just non-sense. One poster put up a comment last week that the Federal decision against Vivid didn’t really matter because it only applied to LA County, or only narrowly applied to condoms and didn’t address first amendment issues or some other non-sense. Its just not the case. One other point to note is the new ruling – which may be challenged – that corporations are responsible for employees even at an arms length. The way its being employed right now is that McDonald’s corporately may be responsible for wages, training and workplace issues that happen in their franchise establishments, even though the franchises are independently owned. The reasoning being that McDonald’s dictates how the franchisees operate their businesses.

   If you extrapolate that to porn, not only is a freelance director or producer that is hiring talent for a shoot for a production company – think Manuel Ferrara directing and producing a scene for Jules Jordan – so is Jules Jordan.

   None of this may matter unless and until a porn actor decides to make an issue out of it. But, things are not going in porn’s direction.

4. I’m sure porn stars have always escorted since the days of Seka and John Holmes but the number must have been relatively small. In these modern times the number of talent that escorts must be much much higher now. so a greater chance of the talent ending up with an unwanted gift to give to others also must be higher.

5. Here’s how you do it Rodney. Every major laboratory, and most smaller ones now have HIPPA compliant programs that allow patients access to their own test results. There is no need for any PASS system anymore.
   Technically it is illegal for producers to REQUIRE the test as a condition of employment. SO, if a producer wants a copy of the test, or to even see the test, he pays the performer directly and the performer can give access to their own results, or the performer can give written permission to their agent to do this. EVERY producer pays if they want a test for their records. Does this mean the performer may get a small windfall from their test, YES it does, and thats just too fucking bad for the producer. If any producer wants tests, they pay for it. This is a basic outline of the plan, there are a few more details to make it work properly. but with the HIPPA compliant technology now available it would be simple.
   Rodney, remember prior to 2004 producers didnt require tests,,,it was performers sharing their results with one another and deciding if they were comfortable with their scene partner. Producers didnt want to touch tests with a ten foot pole….And testing does not cover producer liability in any way, so dont for a minute think because you required these tests that you would be covered if something bad happened.
   You dont have to worry about the test YOU paid for being used by another producer,,,every producer pays the performer if they want to see the test that the performer paid for to begin with.

6. MIke,
   At the big meeting at the Hustler Studio in 2004, I stood in front of the audience and said the exact same thing, “If you folks don’t get your shit together, somebody will do it for you.” Dejavu all over again.

7. It’s one thing to predict it, another to embrace it.

8. Hi Jilted. Did I understand wrong or you are saying that producers might not require a test? Which translated means that performers might not need to produce a test and therefore to be tested? If I got it right, what are we talking about? Using condoms to get protected from untested people? What you guys think is gonna happen, knowing the kind of people that are part of this industry?

9. I guess I’ve written this so many times its seems redundant. Government isn’t regulating an industry per se. Government is regulating a workplace, which government does for every other industry. When someone says that its an industry that can’t be regulated that’s ignoring the fact that Nevada very effectively regulates the brothel industry even though, to continue the analogy that any moron with a camera and a partner can produce porn, any woman willing to provide access to one of her orifices can hook. You can’t control the guy holed up in his apartment with his girlfriend, or at least not effectively. What you can do is control the legitimate producers who want to build businesses, careers and livelihoods.

   Porn continues to want to have it both ways – it wants to claim the mantle of respectability by saying its a multi-billion dollar entertainment business yet at the same time operate like those bikers in Sons Of Anarchy. Remember what happened to the outlaws.

10. Sabrina,
    When the testing program was first formed, it was performers checking eachothers tests. Producers wanted nothing to do with it,they did not support it financially, and they never kept any records of the testing. It was ALL performers. It want until 2004, after the HIV outbreak that Producers announced that THEY were now requiring tests, even though it does nothing to protect them from any liability. Today, what producers are doing is illegal. Producers dont catch STD’s on set(unless of course they are banging their employees).

    When producers first announced that they now required tests, that is what opened the door fot the AHF and others to step in. Mitch tried to get them to back off this ‘requirement” but now that the employers were “requiring” it the door was opened for others to step in.

    WIth technology today, the system I have proposed, and it is not ALL laid out here, performers will be able to check eachothers tests, and decide if they want to work with the other performers, which is how it should have remained from the start. Agencies can play a part in this too, making it policy not to book a performer who is not up to date with their tests. It is up to performers to know that the person they are working with has up to date tests, and performers should be making the decisions.
    If you showed up on a set and the other performer could not produce a test would you work with them? Would you work with any performer who had a reputaion of working with untested people(well working with a John as an escort is kind of the same thing, but nobody in port seems to care about untested Johns, which in and of itself is a makes a joke out of the testing system.

    That being said, the testing system on its best day is still a joke, Untested johns, no anal or throat swabs(the biggest joke of all), and too many PERFORMERS willing to skirt the rules. The best the testing system can be described as is putting a band aid on a bullet wound,,yes it helps, but not much. Way to many performers put way to much stock in the testing to protect them. The funniest thing is, you get tested AFTER you have encounters to see if you caught anything,,,not before encounters as a form of protection. Testing isnt protetion, it is alarm bells that go off after you have caught something, it prevents nothing.

11. The system porn uses today, in medical terms, is a HARM REDUCTION program. That is, you accept that the people in the program are going to continue the unsafe practices that put them at risk. You accept that people will not follow rules, and you accept that others are willing to put you at risk, and you yourself are putting others at risk. You accept that your behaviors, and others in the program, will not change, so you have people tested, AFTER they have had multiple encounters, and remove those from the pool who test positive, until they are treated. Then you let them back in the pool with full knowledge that they will continue with the same risky behavior.

    This is what the multi billion dollar(lol) industry uses as their ‘health plan.’ This is the way it has always been since day one.

    Being in porn means you accept being exposed to a myriad of diseases, it is simply part of the job. Funny that those who make the most money, producers,pay absolutely ZERO part of the cost for this. Performers have been subsidizing producers since the testing began. My lab made millions, I made six figures every year off it, and every penny came out of the pockets of performers. We were worth every penny of it, just those pennies should have been coming from elsewhere.

12. @Jilted

    You’re correct that employers can’t make workers pay for mandated medical services…..doesn’t matter if its vaccines, health tests or drug tests the employer does voluntarily to get a cheaper insurance rate.

    Legality of requiring HIV/STD testing is a grey area, please check USSC rulings on exceptions to pre-employment medical services including antibody tests when the nature of the workers usual duties may subject them to harm. HIV doesn’t stop people from working, it allows them reasonable accommodations. That is the real reason behind the industry discriminatory practice of condom only gay productions and testing for straight people. The industry is stuck between a rock (HIV) and a hard place (GC, CT etc.) with respect to labor discrimination and safety regulations.

    Every HIPAA compliant lab already has software to do shared costing…insurance, third party and patient balance. Your idea opens the door to a regulator accusing labs of participating in a patient enumeration scheme by allowing unlimited access to patient records with the understanding that performers will be paid for that access.

    If …more like WHEN a situation arises a producer’s ass isn’t gonna be covered with general ledger notations of testing money added to performers checks the way it would be with billing statements from a lab as proof they paid for testing. I’ll leave the 1099 expense reimbursements accounting can of worms alone for now.

    Rodney is like most producers in that he’d pay his share but doesn’t want to give nine other stakeholders a free ride during the test panel validity. Labs are allowed to add an administrative fee for paperwork requests even if the paperwork is electronic so they wouldn’t be adding to their workload without a way to cover labor costs. If performers who work privates and Agents who take a booking fee are sharing costs as stakeholders those tests are 1/3 the cost plus a small admin fee for records…with the cost dropping lower for each additional access.

    Using a single use verification code and patient request process as the basis for shared costing would prevent the free ride scenario and give producers a code instead of actual medical records to safeguard.

    My idea lowers cost to actual use, leaves the actual records in the hands of the lab (medical provider) experienced with HIPAA compliance AND allows performers to know their medical status before the whole fucking industry and beyond depending on who’s accessing peoples twitter DM.

    Right now the industry and OSHA are still fighting over antibody vs RNA testing. Shared costing would allow producers to add RNA testing without compromising performer medical privacy on HIV, syphilis and Hepatitis etc. From a labor standpoint this plan is much better than Dr. Maio syphilis letters or FSC-PASS marking performers with a scarlet x as if it were a badge of honor.

13. Jilted nailed it and it could very well be that this is an idea that we should consider going back to, particularly if we are going to insist that the performer pay for testing.

    The only problem with it is that it will make The FSC look bad, their whole testing works we require tests mantra gets shot down…but why is the fsc in testing to begin with, they shouldnt be and it has been a quagmire…the industry’s own version of Viet Nam if you will.

    trying to answer some of the questions…remember I am not involved in the Union except in the case where they ask what I think…I am happy to give an opinion but they arent bound by it. It is my understanding that the Union is trying to fix the here today gone tomorrow nature of the biz for female performers and if they want a long career they can potentially have one. They appear to be trying to normalize the employment situation with the things that you would expect from any other job, insurance, savings, growth potential I think the idea being you get out of it what you put into it.

    As for Prop 60 I am at a bit of an advantage because I am pretty sure I have had a peek at what is coming IF prop 60 fails….I can live with Prop 60….what comes after that if it fails..not so much.

    In the end the industry is spending a LOT of money to avoid doing the right thing by performers…I would bet that if you added it all up it far outweighs the money that would have been lost by simply taking an honest condoms optional policy.

    Digging in our heels is going to bankrupt us, we simply should have complied, then spent our money to improve the situation over time, a tactic that would have been far more productive and far less costly.

    AHF has the ability to bankrupt every company in porn and not even feel a financial impact, they can fight this fight forver, they have deep coffers and they dont have an “executive director” sucking it dry to the tune of 75% of operating expenses per year.

14. I think you have the issue of patient access through laboratory data base wrong here Lurk. It is ALWAYS the performer providing the test to any third party, be it another performer, or a producer, or the man on the moon if thats what the performer wants to do. The performer can print copies, allow others to view the results on line. It is always the performer granting access. I may have intimated that the performer would give the producer the ability to access the resuts, that is wrong, sorry bout that. The performer simply says to the employer, DO you want to view my results, and would you like a copy for your records? If the producer says yes, then he pays the performer for that privlege. The performer has the RIGHT to share his medical records with anybody he or she see’s fit. The performers can check eachothers tests in the same manner. This is how it worked for many years, before producers got involved.
    Having producers and the FSC, which represents producers, not talent, involved in any way with the testing is like having the inmates run the assylum. It does not have to be complicated, the simplest solution is usually the best solutuion. Producers need to pay if they want to be part of the system, simple as that, and paying the performer directly is simplest way. Of course producers will compain about talent making a windfall off of testing if EVERY producer pays for the same test,,,Boo HOO, so sad, too bad,,the free ride is over.

15. You dont have to embrace it inorder to accept it. Very soon the free ride that producers have had for years regarding testing will come to an end, and it comes because producers opened the door by insisting that it is they who require performers to test….it used to be the performers requiring each other to test. If producers had just kept their mouths shut years ago, none of this would be happening today, AIM would probably still exist, and the wolves would still be kept at bay. Mitch warned of this the very first time a producer said he needed copies of tests, she asked, “Are you crazy, you cant keep copies of the tests.” Of couse like always, they ignored Mitch, and look what that got ’em.

16. Am I mistaken that ‘approved labs have been entering data into the FSC-PASS database? The labs cover their ass with a HIPAA release and tell their patients how great they are for helping prove their employer mandated labor eligibility by preventing forged tests.

    What I’m proposing using a verification code proves the performer passed the test panel without disclosing any medical records. The difference between entering data into FSC-PASS and Single use codes per patient request is improved patient privacy with a method to fairly assign shared cost per user.

    What you’re proposing is no different than the current standard performer release that states performers are required to provide a clean test. Producers won’t have any proof they met the burden of providing a safe workplace even if they did pay for the tests in part or whole nor any incentive to pony up their fair share. Kink isn’t paying for tests cuz they like subsidizing other productions… they’re paying for the proof that covers their ass.

    Proof they covered they covered their ass is why Costco was still selling food while Chipotle was forced to close their doors and culture every food contact surface to correct ecoli/sanitation issues. Proof costs money and without proof that will cover producers asses there is no incentive to pay.

17. The LABS do not enter info into PASS. The pysician that ordered the test does, and they do not input any test results,,,they merely provide a check mark that the selected tests were performed and the patient tested negative for any infections.

    Which is another reason that the FSC will never be able to prove that testing is equal to barrier protection. The FSC has no records of any tests to show as proof. The PASS system has no tests in it. DOnt know what youre talking bout with regards to a standard performer release that says a performer is required to provide a clean test,,,,no they arent, because it is an illegal contract, if this indeed how it is worded. Just like the AIM waiver was never worth the paper it was printed on, its provisions were illegal. And that is why they settled out of court with darren James. EVERY SINGLE PERFORMER who ever had a test result given to a third party by AIM could have sued AIM, and that was about 99.999% of all performers.
    Having copies of tests in no way covers a producers ass for anything, actually it exposes the producers ass to litigation.

18. Pardon me for using lab interchangeably with ‘Pass approved providers’ who also provide the scarlet x data aka performer didn’t pass one of the tests.

    Whether the contract clause is enforceable or not is a separate issue from my premise that producers will need proof they provided a safe workplace. I have NEVER said or hinted that producers ought to have copies of medical tests or proof beyond a traceable code or ‘limits form’ signed by a licensed medical professional….. either/both are accepted stakeholder CYA proof in labor situations precisely because they don’t compromise worker health privacy through the process of proving occupational risks have been measured and reduced to their lowest permissible level.

19. Lurk, once the testing becomes legally mandated, that mandate will include the provision of employers picking up the cost, and then they will be required to keep those medical records on file in accordance with HIPPA regulations. And we haven;t even begun to talk about employer mandated POST exposure testing, as required by law.

20. Guys, please, don’t roil the waters. Let’s try to be clear here. So,
    – Testing is not mandatory. But condoms are.
    – If performers want to keep exchanging each other tests, producers have to pay for them.
    – If on set safety regulations are violated, producers and agents can be “potentially” liable in certain situations (nothing more generic has ever been written).
    – Nowhere I have read that if performers contract stds (not given to know if on or off set or both, by the way), producers and agents can be liable and have to pay for medical expenses.

    If the above is not true, please, give some justice to information and write clearly where we stand, because if there is so much confusion around prop60 is exactly because everybody deliberately avoid to calrify the content of the proposition according to their agenda. If the above is true, let me anticipate you what the outcome is going to be:

    All performers will keep getting tested and producers will pay for the tests and performers will have the extra safety parachute by wearing condoms, right?. No. Anybody with a minimum of intellectually honesty who knows this industry knows that this is not going to happen, with mandatory condoms. We have had plenty of cases of performers faking their test and even of performers fucking colleagues clearly and visually affected by STDs. There are serious reasons to believe that not only mandatory condoms will not work as a deterrent for cheaters, but that it will rather encourage the cheaters to offend. Equally there will be performers who will not require their counterpart to be tested, satisfying wearing a condom the safety regulations.
    Furthermore, you will give crappy producers an instrument to ransom all those performers who are not part of the top 20 pool of super popular performers by pressuring them to not test, being the mandatory condom enough to respect the safety regulations on set, so that they can avoid to pay for testing.

    Another things that will happen is that performers rates will shrink to allow producers to “pay” for tests, condoms and licenses. Translated: performers will keep paying for tests, probably much more than they are doing right now.

    If this proposition seems to raise performers safety on set to you, I admire your optimism. To me it lowers it and that’s why I am against it, the way it is written and without a much wider legislation/regulations accompanying it. You (generic) guys are trading clean sheets for barriers, 150$ tests and regulations over (un)professionalism for a few cents condoms.

    By the way, Jilted, on a different note: here in Europe the full testing package (HIPPA compliant, in fact better and more secure than any system I’ve see using in the US) which features also epathitis B compared to let’s say talenttesting in the US, comprises also anal and throat swabs. The cost as I said other times is less than half than in the US.

21. All of the things you say here are true,,,That is why the industry has a HARM REDUCTION program. To be in porn you accept that people will cheat the system, people will work knowing they have an std, people will work with others who they know are infected, people will try to fake their tests, even though there are simple ways to verify the authenticity of any test.
    and regarding what tests get done, it isnt Talent Testing or CET who decides what tests get done, its the performers(or the FSC) who decide what tests they have. All of the testing centers are capable or running any test the talent wants done. TTS and CET do the tests that the performer requests.
    And irs great to hear that Europes testing includes anal and throat swabs. Not doing anal and throat swabs here in the US just proves what a joke the whole system is. And it is amazing that these performers, all adults who know the risk, dont voluntarily do it. You are an adult having massive amounts of unprotected oral and anal sex, and you dont demand that your partners are tested, and you dont get tested yourself,,,,These are the behaviors that make a HARM REDUCTION program you last resort. ONLY IN PORN

22. @Jilted

    you said “Technically it is illegal for producers to REQUIRE the test as a condition of employment”

    Employers are allowed to require all sorts of tests as a condition of employment ….AFTER the job offer has been made…not before. The grey area I keep mentioning is using the FSC-PASS database to screen applicants because other industries get away with using job recruiters to administer aptitude and pysch tests like the DISC profile to weed out potential applicants. They get away with it only because applicants aren’t forced to pay for those tests.

    None of what I say about shared costing is based on ‘what if’ Prop 60 passes or 5193 is amended as neither of those two scenarios would change the process and nothing the industry has put forth negates the evidence that shared costing works for multi/joint employer and intermittent worker situations.

    http://www.natlawreview.com/article/rights-hiv-positive-job-applicants-and-employees

    Article posted today is worth reading as are the three links in the first paragraph for anyone interested in the legality aka permissibility for employers to include HIV testing in pre-employment medical services. Beneath the DOL umbrella are several agencies with publications to back up employer requirement to pay for ANY pre-employment medical services (testing-physicals etc.) they expect workers to participate in.

    While the article and publications don’t draw a direct line to the oil rig worker and other USSC cases I’ve mentioned time and again over three years ….they are the policy (guidance) result of those cases.

23. ok. Now if we had a Union….. What?!?
    That had started ten years earlier? Then We wouldn’t of even be having this discussion now would we?…. And why do you go and say “knowing the kind of people that are in the industry?” You keep claiming your in the industry so what exactly is that saying about you?!

    The kind of people in this industry are just like the people in every industry. Some are shady, but unlike most industries, this one is made of the coolest, neatest, whole hearted people ever in the world. I LOVE the kind of people in this industry! (Whether or not they love me back 😉

    I wouldn’t change one damn day of my life in this industry. I’ve got to do things that people only could dream of.
    So don’t be pointing fingers at “the Kind of people that make up this industry”. Maybe perhaps you should consider some self help therapy.

    And even if it takes 5 more years to get this Union off its feet, well, you know what? That’s okay. Because when you and me are long gone. This Union will still be righttttttt here! ..,!.

    Knowing the kind of people that are this industry…. They are telling you the same thing.. You can kiss my f&@$:; ass!

    (( I always tell me self,…. Okay .. Look .. But just don’t say anything. Lol. )))). Never going to happen.

    Love Phyllisha Anne

24. I knew that! So, this industry is great. It always ends like that. I wonder what in hell are we talking about then and most of all what we need a Union for. Don’t criticize the industry or you need self help therapy (no idea what it means but I like the sound of it), if you are part of this industry you are not allowed to criticize it (I love the logic behind this), if you don’t like this industry, change job…In the meantime not a single proposal is made, not a single action is taken, nothing but jumping on the train of the richest sponsor. Yep, this industry must be definitely healthy. Sorry, Phyllisha: you don’t represent me. Love back.

25. Thats okay Sabrinia, we don’t represent you….yet….

    Proposals are working behind the scenes. And working hard everyday.
    At least, i got you guys to finally stop saying…

    “A Union.. is not ever going to happen, and I got you guys thinking, now that we got one…” That alone, is a huge accomplishment in itself.

    Hugs back Sabrina 🙂

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