ABSTRACT
The phrase “Men who have Sex with Men” (MSM) refers to those who engage in sexual relationships exclusively with other men (homosexuality) or who engage in sex relations with either men or women (bisexuality). It is a phrase that was coined in the early part of the 1990s when many new HIV infections were identified among those who were behaviorally homosexual in Western & Asian countries. Even though historical evidences of homosexuality existed in many of these countries homosexuality was socially and/or legally not accepted and HIV prevention programs for this population were not forthcoming. In the global program on AIDS conference in Geneva (1992–93) (World Health Organization, 1993) governments accepted the behavioral phrase “men who have sex with men” as a depoliticized euphemism. The phrase “men who have sex with men” is a collective social identity (Khan, 1999) for all men who have sex with other men irrespective of how they might identify themselves.
