“Condoms Are So 1985″
Devon Hunter, a “a career exotic dancer with formal, professional training in dance and theatre,” set out on the streets hit the clubs of D.C. last weekend in the hopes of launching a new safe-sex campaign. All the guys he approached thought Devon Hunter—who should call me, by the way—was totally lame.
“I’d asked three people if they’d like to be part of an advertising campaign to promote safe sex. All three rejected me,” he writes. “Two said, ‘Condoms are so 1985,’ and the third said, ‘Condoms are so 1980’s.’ It had never occurred to me that safe sex was trendy, much less that condoms were connected in some way to fashion.”
I agree with Hunter that this does not bode well for the future of the HIV epidemic in D.C. Still, I’m impressed that the condoms-are-lame trend is so specific! One respondent narrowed condom use down to the decade that it became uncool; two pinned the exact year.
Hunter posits that we should mix things up and reestablish condoms as “so 2009.” I say that fashion is cyclical. Now that AIDS is back, condoms can’t be too far behind.
Photo by Jeb Ro
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1:00 am
I hate to ask for this, but I have been misquoted by a person named Jonathan who calls himself the Condomologist. He has called me a liar on his blog, and I think the reason is because he thought I was giving out condoms in the middle of the day when I was rejected: http://condomologist.wordpress.com/2009/04/23/condoms-so-dont-belong-in-this-guys-hands/
I fear that he thinks this, because you write that I “set out on the streets.” Could you please consider changing this turn of phrase? I was in the club when I encountered “Condoms are so 1985.” Again, I’m sorry for having to even ask you this, since it’s Jonathan’s immaturity that has caused the issue in the first place.
8:41 am
Sure, I’ve crossed out the phrasing and re-worded it. Sorry if it’s caused any trouble. Let me know if anything else is inaccurate.