Chemsex

The Documentary Podcast

BBC

Society & Culture, Documentary, Personal Journals

4.3 • 2.6K Ratings

🗓️ 20 March 2016

⏱️ 50 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In recent years a new, extreme sub-culture of sex and drugs has become a way of life for a growing minority of gay men. The so-called chemsex scene involves an unholy trinity of drugs – Mephedrone, GHB/GBL and Crystal Meth – and together they can keep men awake for days. These relatively new drugs are taken to enhance one thing in particular - sex. Mobeen Azar travels to San Francisco - one of the first cities to see the ‘party and play’ scene emerge - and London, where chemsex is a relatively new phenomenon and speaks frankly to men involved in the lifestyle.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Thank you for downloading from the BBC.
0:04.0	The details of our complete range of podcasts and our terms of use, go to BBCworldservice.com slash podcasts. A promiscuous party lifestyle is a long-standing stereotype of the gay scene, which some men are living up to more than ever.
0:29.0	Yeah, the big weekend I probably wouldn't sleep from Friday up until sometimes Monday stayed up Sunday night and then
0:35.8	gone to work done all of work and then gone home and slept.
0:38.8	Kem sex is an emerging subculture on London's gay scene where sex and drugs have
0:45.2	seemingly become inseparable for some men. For this documentary I've got to know
0:50.4	a number of men involved in this scene and over the next hour you'll
0:54.4	hear frank conversations I've had with them about their sex lives and drug use as
0:59.0	they reveal the risks they're prepared to take in order to enhance their pleasure.
1:05.0	I've also been speaking to health professionals trying to reduce this drug use
1:10.0	and I'll find out how the connection with sex has added risks.
1:14.0	One of the common things that comes up is it started out as fun.
1:18.0	In their minds, they've been having a good time.
1:20.0	All of a sudden there will be something like an HIV diagnosis and it's like, wow, maybe I do actually have a problem here.
1:27.0	But why does some gay men feel the need to use drugs in the first place?
1:31.0	I'll be revealing the anxiety many men feel when it comes to being intimate
1:36.4	and the not so welcoming nature of some aspects of the gay scene as I try to understand
1:42.1	what draws them into the world of chem sex.
1:45.0	There we go.
1:48.0	Does that mean you just got a message?
1:50.0	Yeah, 41 messages, yeah.
1:52.0	You've got 41 messages. Yeah. There's lots of people just sending pictures.
	...

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