www.dir.ca.gov/DOSH/AdultFilmIndustry.html#hh
Examples of …controls used in the adult film industry include:
• Simulation of sex acts using acting, production and post-production techniques
• Ejaculation outside the partner’s body
• Use of barriers, which protect partner from contact with semen, vaginal fluids, mucous membranes, etc.
Examples of barriers include condoms and dental dams (Condoms and dental dams can also be considered personal protective equipment for the partner who uses them)
• Plastic and other disposable materials to clean up sets
• Sharps containers for disposal of any blades, wires or broken glass.
Personal protective equipment
If, after using all practical engineering and work practice controls, workers are still exposed to hazards, employers must provide, and ensure employees use, appropriate personal protective equipment. Personal protective equipment can include:
• Condoms
• Dental dams
• Gloves
• Eye protection.
CAL OSHA can keep on issueing these rules for as long as they want, but they can never execute and/ or regulate them in reality. The porn industry is mostly an underground business, deals and productions are being conducted over the cell phones, in privacy of homes, between individuals who usually don’t keep any particular records of their activities, of course except for 2257 forms. Some scumbags who claim to be producers because they have a video camera shoot cheap scenes anywhere they can, in their crusty apartments, in their crumbling warehouses, in distant outdoor spots, and every once in a blue moon, some of them might throw his fellow scumbag under the bus and report him to CAL OSHA. Other than that, there is no way, no sir, no fucking way to regulate and execute any rules whatsoever in the porn industry.
If there is …”no fucking way to regulate and execute any rules whatsoever…” then why did TTboy PAY the $30,000.00 fine he got for the HIV outbreak in 2004, and why has CAL-OSHA now have 3 full time employees assigned exclusively to the adult biz in California? Those pesky film permits are very good sources for finding those “porn houses”. Just ask the owner of that particular location near Plummer and DeSoto and the now defunct Hustler Studio. The beautiful thing is that the blood borne pathogen violations are right there on tape.
And here is where they get nailed….”Employers are required to have WRITTEN procedures for PREVENTING disease transmission” That is the law for every buissness. Even if they dont nail them for a particular violation, they get them for not have a valid IIPP(injury and illness prevention program)
These regulations, though very seldom enforced, untilnow, are very EASY to enforce. Never has any porn company successfully fought and won an appeal to a citation. There have been 43 citations issued this year alone compared to 7 for all of the last two years combined.
p.s. The Brooke Ashley case set the precedent in California that porn performers are employees, even if the are paid as a 1099 IC.
The reality is that Califonia is broke and they are looking for any streams of revenue. This was just to easy to pass up. the powers that be at OSHA know their heads are on the line and need to increase the amount of fines they collect. There is no easier target than the porn industry, and the porn industry sure doesnt make it very difficult for the OSHA guys.
Interesting post GNO. Sounds like you are a porn industry lawyer, or someone who has gotten snagged by these rules.
GNO, keep on preaching, sister, but in reality, CAL O
CAL OSHA is as powerless against the porn industry as the immigration department is against the cheap labor provided by illegal immegrants. Every once in a while these so called producers rat out their colleagues, but what does that prove? What authority and power 3 CAL OSHA employees have in a state where every scumbag and drug junkie shoots his wife sucking stranger’s cock for cold hard cash? Who cares for a shooting permit in the porn valley? You name 10 companies who have shooting permit, and I’ll name 50 companies that don’t, and never will. You sound like someone who’s never been involved in the production aspects of porn, you might have read some law books and porn gossip, but you don’t know the reality of this god forsaken industry, and I don’t care to lecture you.
Colonel, with all due respect, I am intimetly aware of the day to day activities on the streets of the San Fernando Valley. I agree, this is a god forsaken industry. There is nothing you could lecture me about that I dont already know. Thats the strange thing about reality. It means something different to each individual.
“Reality In The San Fernando Valley”
by The Colonel
Chapter one: See Dick Run
GNO, thank you for the words of wisdom. For the record, and for the last time, let’s see if I get this right: according to your version of reality, three stooges assigned by CAL OSHA will rule the entire adult industry and 1000+ companies that release about 400 titles per week with an iron fist, and impose their regulations on every jackass who shoots porn scenes in his exclusive location which in fact is his apartment, because California is broke. You know, I used to belive the U.S government puts chips inside $20.00 bills to spy on American citizens. I thought I was delusional, untill I ran into you. Life is full of two things: shit, and surprises.
Without resorting to the level of the Colonel, the end result after all is said and done is going to be a sex regulated industry in california very similar to, if not almost identical, to that of Nevada. The wheels are already in motion. Too bad the “industry” didnt have anybody at the table.
The obvious difference between California and Nevada is that California is the center of porn production in North America, in California, everybody with a crack whore girl friend/ wife and a camera claims to be a producer and shoots porn in his bedroom, and these free lancers license every cheap scene they shoot to several companies at the same time, that’s why the market is over saturated and wholesale prices are so low most companies hardly break even on their costs, let alone making any profit. There is too much content, too many producers and too many companies in California, it’s out of control; while things in Nevada and other states are not as bad and crazy as California, hence imposing rules and regulations in those states is easier and more plausible. The only way we can have a regulated sex industry in California is if many of today’s companies and producers go out of business and stop saturating the market with recycled content, and I don’t see that happening anytime soon.
Colonel, I agree with alot of what you say about things being “out of control”.
If I may make an anology…..Many of the same arguments were made about how to oversee safety in the construction industry…so many companies, spread everywhere, working in literally thousands(tens of thousands) of locations. And this was accomplished many years ago. It didnt happen overnight. But it is precisely the things you mention,so many producers, so many companies, that makes these steps NECESSARY, not impossible. The beginning of more stringent enforcement of OSHA regulations is just the start, and several subcommittees in the California legislature are very busy working on finally moving forward in regards to regulating this “out of control” industry.
Regarding your analysis of the economic situaltion in the porn biz, oversaturation, plummeting wholesale prices etc.etc. I agree.