Dissertation Proposal
research on this topic for the dissertation proposal, I found out that most gay men in the plurality of Western countries are banned from donating blood for life. The screening test for donors on the website of the National Blood Service for England and North Wales, for example, asks, “Are you a man who has had oral or anal sex with another man (even if you used a condom)?” Answering yes results in an automatic no thank you (Hurley, 2009). Men who have ever had sex with men are also excluded from donating blood in most other European countries and in the United States and Canada, but several developed countries have alternatives to permanent, blanket bans—for example, Spain, Australia, and New Zealand (Hurley, 2009). Note: Nevertheless, these restrictions have now loosened due to Covid-19 and the exigence for blood donation; something that should be investigated.
Be that as it may, donating blood was an incredibly dehumanising experience for me. That is why I would like to explore the effects of the prohibition on gay men and shed some light on their lived experiences. Moreover, the fact that research on the blood donation ban in various countries is under-researched by scholars is exceptionally frustrating, but also motivating to delve into it. As Lake (2010) has discovered: a gay man who attempts to donate blood and is rejected because he is gay would most certainly feel as though his dignity had been harmed.
