`The First Thing I Did When I Came Back from the Clinic Last Week Was Change the Sheets on the Bed': Contamination,Penetration and Resistance - Male Clients in the VD Clinic

Abstract

Much of the iconography of sexual diseases has been characterized by notions of contamination, disgust, sin, pollution and uncleanness. This article draws on the results of a qualitative case study of male clients attending two genitourinary medicine (GUM or sexually transmitted infections) clinics and the health care professionals who worked there. The aim was to explore, describe and analyse the interpenetration of two discursive formations, sexualities and medicine. Focusing on interview data, the article outlines three key elements in the complex relationship between clinical medicine and the erotic - the recruitment of the individual into the active patient role; the deployment of incitements to confess and other techniques that choreograph the clinical encounter; and the importance of surveillance, power and the policing of boundaries. It is argued that the central form of resistance is the penetration of the clinic by desire itself and that much of the professional's practice is concerned with the maintenance of a cordon sanitaire against the erotic.