Porn actors and producers aren’t taking a proposed workplace regulation lying down. The new rule would require that producers “shall ensure that the employee uses appropriate personal protective equipment” and provide a barrier for “the eyes, skin, mouth, and mucous membranes.”
“These fluids include, but are not limited to, pre-ejaculate, ejaculate, semen, vaginal secretions, fecal matter and rectal secretions,” according to the draft regulations issued by the California Division of Occupational Safety and Health.
Porn trade group The Free Speech Coalition is making a last minute effort to prevent the rules from becoming law. They say the proposed regulations go too far. Adult film companies would simply move their operations to another state with less safety protections, the group is warning.
“I have personally never seen porn where someone used dental dams, goggles, and condoms during oral,” Eric Paul Leue, the group’s executive director, told BuzzFeed. “There are people who have a medical fetish. But I don’t think that porn will be shot that way.”
Porn production is a huge industry in California and many companies already have stringent policies in place to protect the health of employees. Performers are required to take HIV and other STD tests before shooting a scene as part of an industry wide protocol designed to provide “a safe and healthy work environment” for “performers and adult film professionals.” Testing before shooting will not catch recent HIV infections however, since the virus can remain undetectable for up to three months after transmission.
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The group plans to pack the audience for the next meeting to discuss the proposal. So far, they say, the agency has ignored their objections.
“We are telling OSHA board that these regulations create the opposite of what they were intended to do,” Leue told Buzzfeed. “Right now, we are are a responsible industry. We employ thousands of people. It is ridiculous that we are under so much scrutiny and public attack.”