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Everyday moral reasoning in the governmentality of HIV risk
Author(s) -
Cristian Rangel J.,
Adam Barry D.
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
sociology of health and illness
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.146
H-Index - 97
eISSN - 1467-9566
pISSN - 0141-9889
DOI - 10.1111/1467-9566.12047
Subject(s) - morality , sociology , pleasure , governmentality , moral responsibility , narrative , everyday life , social psychology , vulnerability (computing) , homosexuality , human sexuality , psychology , environmental ethics , gender studies , epistemology , politics , law , philosophy , linguistics , computer security , neuroscience , political science , computer science
Abstract Drawing on the sociology of morality, this article analyses the social contexts, discourses and ethno‐methods of everyday life that shape real‐world decisions of gay men around HIV prevention. Through an analysis of the predominant narratives in an online public forum created for an HIV prevention campaign, this article explores the ways in which homosexually active men engage in everyday moral reasoning and challenge a neoliberal moral order of risk and responsibility. The article concludes that gay and bisexual men engage in forms of practical morality with their sexual partners and imagine larger communities of interest, love, companionship and pleasure. At the same time, they draw heavily from discourses on individual and rational responsibility, as well as narratives of romance and community, that shape forms of moral selfhood. Risk management techniques that are grounded in notions of rational choice and that are insensitive to the emotional worlds that these men inhabit create situations of risk avoidance but also inadvertently open them to new forms of vulnerability.