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Kind of interesting thread but I'm not really sure what you are getting at. Are you wanting people to reevaluate their hobby choices and get out of the lifestyle if they don't accept the risks? Are you wanting part timers to wuss out and hit the road? I think everyone HAS thought of those risks as well as countless others ie pregnancy, jealousy, affairs etc etc. Life is not without risk. The riskiest thing you ever do during a course of the day is drive to work or to the grocery store and then drive home again. So take up golf? No there are risks there too. As an emergency responder for over 20 years I have been to many golf courses for people beaned in the head by clubs and balls as well as heart attacks, strokes and people running over their buddies with the cart. If you feel it's safer to just sit on the couch there are risks there too such as deep vien thrombosis and heart disease from inactivity. My other hobbies over the years have been rockclimbing, skydiving, scuba diving, hunting, fishing etc etc. So I think my risks as a part time swinger are no greater and no less than other things I could be doing. I would even venture a guess that more people die fishing every year from falling off of boats to heart attacks than the number of hetero sexual swingers that have ever died from AIDS or hepatitis. I'm not saying that concern over STDs is not legitimate because it most certainly is but I am saying that risk is a fact of life that we cannot eliminate. We can however manage and mitigate it. The most deadly thing you can do is get into a car and go somewhere but we still drive everywhere we go. We all know the risks and we manage it. We follow the rules of the road, we wear our seat belts and we try and pay attention to our surroundings and over time if we are vigilant we reduce our chances of tragedy. Now does that mean that if we do everything right that we are always going to walk away without a scratch? No way, at any given moment so drunk can come out of nowhere and wipe us off the face of the earth. I don't see swinging as being any different than that. If we pay attention, follow the rules and use what ever safety systems that are available to us we can reduce, manage and mitigate the risks but we will never eliminate them. That is all part of informed consent.