Sexuality and Desire
While it cannot be denied that women are disproportionately affected by HIV for the reasons outlined above, a "discourse of vulnerability" can advance dangerous and disempowering gender stereotypes about women and HIV.
Jonathan Berger warns that using women's vulnerability as the sole consideration for what drives the epidemic is "telling part of the story as if it were the whole story" (2004:p46). Finding a single theory to explain a complex phenomenon tends to overplay vulnerability — this kind of analysis must be complemented with a focus on the ways in which sexuality and desire also impact on people's behaviour and practices. We must recognise that:
- Sexuality is fluid, changes and doesn't always fit into the strict binaries of heterosexual and homosexual practices
- There is great variation in our sexual practices — women too enjoy sex, can also be unfaithful to their partners and also can engage in various sexual practices that are normatively seen as "deviant" or "dirty"
In order to have a full understanding of the epidemic we should acknowledge that sex, sexuality and desire drive the epidemic as well as issues of vulnerability. There is no doubt that the HIV pandemic is one driven by poverty and gender inequality, yet is it also "an epidemic of desire" (Berer in Berger: p48).
Re-sexualising the Epidemic: Desire, Risk and Prevention. Development Update 5.3. 45-67.
