From http://www.xbiz.com/news/143297
L.A. Makes Condom Use Mandatory for Porn Performers
By Rhett Pardon
Tuesday, Jan 17, 2012
LOS ANGELES — The Los Angeles City Council, 9-1, approved a new ordinance Tuesday requiring that all adult film actors wear condoms when filming within the city limits.
The ordinance, when it goes into effect, will allow the LAPD to perform spot checks on any set once a film permit is issued.
Officials from LAPD, Cal/OSHA and the city attorney’s office will make recommendations on how to implement the ordinance.
The vote was a second procedural vote on the ordinance and required only a simple majority of the council to give final approval.
The Free Speech Coalition said that the adult industry trade group is in discussions with industry leaders and considering options for next steps.
The problem is the LAPD does not want the job. Who will step up to be the condom police? I wonder…
Also, this applies only to permitted shoots in the City of LA. Watch for FilmLA to suddenly lose a lot of money from permit applications. Similarly, this is going to hurt the folks who rent out their properties as locations for porn shoots. Those people pay taxes, and have mortgage payments.
This does not affect studio/soundstage shoots (that’s what the LA County measure AHF has started is meant to address.)
Watch also for L.A. taxpayers to foot the bill for the inevitable legal challenges.
I spoke with members of the staffs of three council members today (and left a message for a fourth). When it’s overturned, the City Council has political cover: they TRIED because they care. They only wanted to help protect public health, and AHF provided them with a legal opinion from their friends at Cal-OSHA saying they could do it. Blah blah blah…
Rather than get into a very public dick-measuring contest with the City Council, the City Attorney’s office cut a deal. They know what’s coming. And they despise Weinstein.
I’ve read elsewhere that the way the law has been written say a porn company films a scene and they do not wear condoms once the scene or film gets to the public the production company can get hauled into court because the visual evidence will show they aren’t wearing condoms.
I was hoping they would only get in trouble if an inspector spot checked on the set and they were not using condoms. Looks like it isn’t gonna be that simple…
Karmafan – That’s not an enforcement issue, that’s more along the lines of a Cal-OSHA complaint. That’s also quite beyond the reach of FilmLA.
The problem is, the condom peddlers’ (AHF, UCLS, et al) own argument has been that it would be easy for porn producers to digitally remove condoms in post production. If it’s so easy, then how could they be sure out wasn’t done in those videos?
As much as they’d like to, they can’t have it both ways.
Digitally removing the condoms in post production would probably cost more then what everyone on the set got paid (both in front of and behind the camera).
Most porn scenes are shooting as cheap as they can, they aren’t gonna pay that kind of money for a scene.
What I want to know is this??
Who exactly will be in these studios and shoots watching for the lack of a condom?? The LAPD?? Cal-OSHA?? (A state agency enforcing a local city ordinance??) A self-appointed “condom posse” of Shelley Lubben’s ex-porn sluts?? Pro-condom performers snitching on other performers??
And how nice that all this will be paid for by fees imposed on porn producers. Yeah, that’s the ticket…depend on the very industry you are driving out of the city to enforce the very law that drives them out of the city.
Also…do they know that most of the porn created even in LA is done at home via websites and Internet camshows?? Will AHF be consistent with their mandate to force everyone to promote condoms and extend the mandate to websites, too?? I can see it now: Nina Hartley performing her weekly camshow when…BAM, here come the cops invading to arrest her and Ernest for “performing sex without a condom”!!! Verrrry funny….NOT!!!
They need to seriously hasten the appeal of this law, like tomorrow morning.
Anthony
From the newswire:
LOS ANGELES — Some of the most prominent purveyors of porn say they’ll start packing up their sex toys and abandoning the nation’s porn capital if authorities carry through with a nascent effort to police adult film sets and order that every actor be outfitted with a condom.
That effort took a serious leap forward Tuesday when the Los Angeles city council voted 9-1 to grant final approval to an ordinance that would deny film permits to producers who do not comply with the condom requirement. The measure now goes to Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa for approval.
Before the measure can take effect, however, the council has called for the creation of a committee of police officials, the city attorney, state health officials and others to determine how it might be enforced.
“It’s going to be interesting to see how in fact they do try to enforce it and who’s going to fund it, and all of the time and effort they’re going to spend,” said Steven Hirsch, co-founder and co-chairman of Los Angeles-based Vivid, one of the largest makers of erotic movies.
“Ultimately I think what they will find is people will just stop shooting in the city of Los Angeles,” added Hirsch. “That’s a given.” His company, founded in 1984, would be among those that would consider leaving, he said.
Other industry officials condemned the measure as an unneeded exercise in political correctness that cannot be enforced in the city known in the industry as the porn capital of the country. Approximately 90 percent of U.S. porn films are made in Los Angeles, almost all of them in the city’s San Fernando Valley, said Mark Kernes, senior editor of Adult Video News.
When films, Internet downloads, sex toys and admission to dance clubs are counted, Kernes said, it’s an industry that produces about $8 billion a year in revenue. It has been battered in recent years, however, by the recession and the increased popularity of free Internet porn, and Kernes and others say requiring condoms would further erode business.
They say consumers, particularly those overseas, have made it clear they won’t watch films when the actors use condoms, complaining that it is distracting and ruins the fantasy.
“The only thing that the city could potentially achieve is losing some film permit money and driving some productions away, but you can’t actually compel an industry to create a product that the market doesn’t want,” said Christian Mann, general manager of Evil Angel, another of the industry’s largest production companies.
Ged Kenslea, spokesman for the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, said the measure is needed because the industry has failed to properly police itself. For years, he said, filmmakers have ignored state health laws mandating the use of condoms when workers are exposed to blood-borne pathogens.
“Let’s make one thing clear: Condom use on adult film sets is, and has been, the law in California under blood-borne pathogens regulations,” he said. “It is just a law that has not been uniformly enforced or followed. This film permit ordinance that the city council approved today provides another enforcement mechanism to make sure that adult film producers are complying with existing California law.”
The council’s final vote to approve the law was taken without public discussion, on a day when most of the porn industry’s major players were in Las Vegas preparing for Wednesday’s opening of the Adult Entertainment Expo, their industry’s largest trade event. They said they weren’t surprised by the news.
The industry already does its own policing, filmmakers say, requiring actors be tested for sexually transmitted diseases a minimum of every 30 days when they are working. They say no cases of HIV have been directly linked to porn films since 2004, adding they fear if the industry scatters to areas outside of Los Angeles, testing could fall by the wayside, exposing performers to more risk.
“If someone is going to catch an STD, it’s usually out of the business because we are tested so often,” said veteran porn actress and producer Tabitha Stevens. In her 17 years in the business, Stevens said, she has worked both with and without condoms. Although she prefers to use condoms, acknowledging they do increase safety, she said the choice should be left up to the performers and not mandated by a government agency. “If you want to wear them, wear them. If you don’t, don’t. That’s up to the talent to decide. It shouldn’t be up to the government to decide,” she said.
$8 billion a year? They might want to recheck those figures. I don’t think it has ever been anywhere near that figure.
@chichiladouche
It wasn’t written as clearly as it could have been but the $8 Billion they are referring to not only DVDs but also internet downloads, sex toy sales and cover charges and the like for strip clubs. Add all that together and it probably gets to that number.
A better piece on the government overreach spurred on by that megalomaniac Weinstein, entitled, “The State Has No Right to Make Anyone Wear a Condom”
http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2012/01/18/matt-gurney-the-state-has-no-right-to-make-anyone-wear-a-condom/
I hope Mike South reads this piece before someone comes and takes his Libertarian card away.
Let me pose this question to the smart industry folks:
How hard would it be to pack up shop and set up in some liberal, yet obscure part of the country?
@Guinness – In this depressed economy, not as hard as it used to be, but AHF will keep on coming. This will require actions in federal court.
But —
We already know their plan. What we didn’t read in the leaked emails we can intuit from their recent actions. My response is this:
Porn producers: if LAPD or any other condom nazis come to inspect your set, photograph & videotape them, take down their names, badge numbers or other IDs, and upload it all to YouTube and other websites.
We know that Weinstein has complained about how “the ick factor” has impeded action, particularly enforcement, in the past. Good — use that against them now.
Expose them in the light of day. If they are humiliated, that’s their fucking problem.
Your freedoms can defend freedom. Your rights can safeguard other rights.
We’ll see then how happy the City of LA will be with the city council’s butt-buddies at AHF.
Good answer, but I still think you guys should get the fuck out of L.A. In fact, everyone should at some point.
You can shoot in Miami and maybe consider moving to Nevada. They already have legal brothels there so the counties there are fairly liberal and at least have some common sense.
@Karmafan That would work, except for the facts that:
1) Weinstein has already said that he is going to attempt to pass the same kind of law in Florida;
2) The national branch of OSHA has already started hints of making their proposed “bloodborne pathogen/barrier” standards (which would include condoms and dental dams) that would be imposed on porn shoots by Cal-OSHA into a national standard that would apply everywhere in the US;
and,
3) Nevada state law already requires condoms at all brothels.
Anthony
Haven’t some of the questionable talent (Derrick Burts and other crossovers)that have been used in Florida (Bang Bros) been a big catalyst in getting the AHF going on this issue? We know Burts had major credibility issues, but geez you would have thought after the patient zeta scare they would have reevaluated who they used for talent but obviously they didn’t. Crossovers shooting with untested gay talent one day, working with tested gay talent the next, then with tested female talent the day after that.
It seems like the folks running the porn companies just want to squeeze as much profit from the scenes without putting themselves out any more then they have to. People knew Burts worked both sides and kept using him.
Common sense should dictate that crossover talent gets a life long ban from the straight side but guys like Christian just keep getting work. These greedy porn execs that can’t see past the end of their nose are to blame for most of this mess.
They threw away common sense and did not get together and develop a SOP (Standard Operating Procedure) for all porn makers to follow and now the State and Federal govt. is gonna do it for them. They have only themselves to blame.
Burts was a plain old fruit hustler and conman, he played with fire and got burnt. Trannyfucker is a businessman, though he seems to really like tranny sex. He acts as a professional, I have few doubts he probably got exiled from NA for some of that. Laura D should get credit for her making her gay performers test before shoots at NA and C3X held up that part. Even though most of us dont like him cause he’s mouthy and bitchy and we also have the unknown of whether he does privates or not we cannot question that he does take care of himself. Other crossovers I am not so sure of, as most recently we have seen with Seth Dickens, while not sure what kind of risks he takes health wise, he seems to treat women poorly, but that is away from work. He seems to deport himself well professionally. Neither C3X or Seth are Kurt Lockwood, an utter fucking train wreck. I bet we will find Burts running some kind of con somewhere sometime soon, unless he ends up in the joint.
@Anthony — That’s not precisely the way the OSHA process works, but generally speaking, yes, in my opinion, we are best served using a federal approach to combat this.
@chichiladouche — Yes, Florida was a major factor, but of course AHF (which also has offices in Florida) started its crusade in Hollywood. Why was that? PRESS.
The porn industry in Porn Valley, in the backyard of porn titans like Flynt and Hirsch, meant more press — and that is what this is all about. It’s all because of Weinstein’s ego.
And look at the rogues gallery he assembled — Burts, Lubben. Weinstein knows how to lie and distort and ,manipulate, and he has a goddamn “AIDS ADVOCATE” halo on his head so no one questions him, certainly not in Hollywood where liberals line up to look like they care about sick people somewhere in the world. It’s as simple as that
All you people telling the porn industry to move need to think clearly. There is really no other place than California. Going to Florida is kinda like rolling dice and no way will that state tolerate a massive Industry exodus.
I say stop overreacting to this decision…everything will be okay…
@Larry — Did you see the place in the leaked AHF emails where they refer to Burts as a “twink.” That was their own perception of him — quite different from the image they packaged and presented to the public, isn’t it?
If Burts ends up in the joint for one of his recent crimes (or a future one) it just might be one of the happiest times in his life.
origen — You’re correct. This can all be overcome. And it will.
You & Diane Duke are failures Ari! You Lost! Don’t have as much clout as you thought do you!
No one with any sense is interested in wasting resources on unwinnable battles, Monica. The adult industry offered only token protest because the LA City Council is comprised of politicians who can be (and were) bought and paid for — and also because it’s clear that the city lacks the legal authority to do this stuff. Not even the county is so authorized or empowered — there are court decisions on this. AHF and Cal-OSHA have lost every single court battle in this war.
Furthermore, these fights could go on from city to city, county to county. AHF calls this “a war of attrition” and now we see exactly what that means. AHF has all the financial resources it needs to launch those campaigns — political and media campaigns. We will let them. We’ll let AHF spend its resources on those campaigns. Tinhorn dictator Weinstein likes to see his name in the paper — so he’s buying his way onto the front page.
But cash is not all he’s spending; he’s also spending political capital. By the truckload. He’s chewing ’em up — politicians, bureaucrats, regulators and journalists, — and spitting ’em out.
Why fight city hall? Those are minor battles, and not decisive ones at that. I’m interested in the war. The war will be won elsewhere, on the battlefield of the adult industry’s choosing.
Every Elvis has his army, and every Napoleon his Waterloo.
There are so many things afoot right now, and a little birdy brings me good news.
PS – I love your exclamation marks! You seem so excited in your little Henderson hell hole! I hope you suffer every day you crazy bitch! Perhaps you’ll die alone choking on a pretzel you couldn’t wash down because you’d already finished all your box wine! Hey, you’re right: exclamation marks are fun!