I'm thinking about taking part in some gay promiscuity, but I'm scared of AIDS.

Besides having the other dude use a condom, how can I avoid AIDS and other bad shit?

To be specific, you should be afraid of HIV, AIDS is only a symptom. Even if a person doesn't have AIDS itself, he or she could still carry HIV.

Basically what you should avoid is blood and semen contact. As far as i know, those are the only two ways it can spread. So, you condom and avoid kissing strangers, drugs and fighting in the parade and you should come out just ok.

I don't think condoms are reliable enough to trust when having sex with someone who is infected.

Yeah it reduces the probability of infection by a lot, but if you routinely engage in promiscuity you're much more likely to get HIV than to win the lottery.

edit - and then there are all the other sexually transmitted diseases, of course... many of which are much more contagious than AIDS.

Okay then... Maybe I'll just wait until I can find a stable gay relationship.

Or date a girl... But that doesn't sound as appealing.

@NJ5: Well yes, sex itself isn't that much of a problem, but the interaction as a whole. However, the one who's poking in, is generally in a lot more safer position than the one who's getting it in. And condoms offer about 97% protection for pregnancies, so it's basically the same for HIV (on where it protects).

If 97% is accurate, that's pretty bad... you have sex with 10 infected people (or with one infected person 10 times) and your chances of getting HIV are 1 in 4.

That 97% rate is actually the rate for perfect use for the course of a year. So if you use only condoms for birth control for a year and have sex regularly, always using a condom properly, there is a 3% chance of pregnancy. The practical rate is something more like 80% protection. Anyway, it's about pregnancy only, and in no way represents protection against HIV or other STIs.

@Burgerstein: No, it does for its part. If you can avoid blood contact, preventing the semen contact is best done with a condom.

I meant the 97% has nothing to do with HIV transmission, not that condoms don't protect against it. I added a bunch of stuff to the middle of my paragraph so I can see how it got a little confusing.

Firstly try and make sure the people you're having sex with don't have HIV, also always use condoms.

Combination of those two things makes it very unlikely that you'll get it.