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She may look clean, but…pick-ups, 'good time' girls, prostitutes spread syphilis and gonorrhea. U.S. Public Health Service, United States, 1940s. An appealing, seemingly innocent, young woman smiles. Three men, a sailor, a civilian and a soldier, look toward her.

She may look clean, but…pick-ups, “good time” girls, prostitutes spread syphilis and gonorrhea.
U.S. Public Health Service, United States, 1940s.
Photomechanical print: color; 37 x 51 cm.

An appealing, seemingly innocent, young woman smiles. Three men, a sailor, a civilian and a soldier, look toward her.

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Discover safer sex. Terrence Higgins Trust, London, mid-1980s. This poster, from the Love sexy, Love safe campaign, shows an intimate scene of a couple in bed. A tattooed man places his head between the legs of a sexually indeterminate partner. The precise nature of the activity is playfully obscured.

Discover safer sex.
Terrence Higgins Trust, London, mid-1980s.
Photomechanical print: color; 42 x 60 cm.

This poster, from the Love sexy, Love safe campaign, shows an intimate scene of a couple in bed. A tattooed man places his head between the legs of a sexually indeterminate partner. The precise nature of the activity is playfully obscured. Against the stigmatization of gay sex and AIDS sufferers as a source of contagion — and a larger atmosphere of panic — the poster presents sexual activity in a positive light and urges the use of reasonable measures to make sex safe.

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