HomoQuotable - Larry Kramer

"Please know that AIDS is a worldwide plague. Please know that no country in the world, including this one, especially this one, has ever called it a plague, or dealt with it as a plague. Please know that there is no cure. Please know that after all this time the amount of money being spent to find a cure is still miniscule, still almost invisible, still impossible to locate in any national health budget, and still totally uncoordinated.

"Please know that here in America case numbers continue to rise in every category. In much of the rest of the world — Russia, India, Southeast Asia, Africa — the numbers of the infected and the dying are so grotesquely high they are rarely acknowledged. Please know that all efforts at prevention and educations continue their unending record of abject failure. Please know that there is no one in charge of this plague. This is a war for which there is no general and for which there has never been a general. How can you win a war with no one in charge?" - Larry Kramer, from a letter handed to patrons attending the revival of his landmark play, The Normal Heart.

Read Kramer's entire letter.

San Francisco: Earlier HAART Treatment Appears To Reduce New HIV Infections

According to a story posted on AIDSmap.com, San Francisco is seeing a decrease in new HIV infections because HIV+ people are going on medication sooner and therefore have a reduced period of infectiousness.

Dr Das presented more evidence from San Francisco to show a strong correlation between reductions in community viral load and the falling number of HIV diagnoses. The most recent CVL, defined as the average viral load of all HIV positive people being seen for care in the city, went down from approximately 25,000 copies/ml in 2004 to 10,000 copies/ml in 2009. Over the same time, new diagnoses of HIV decreased from 820 in 2004 to 500 in 2009. For CVL to decrease, a number of other things have to happen first, in a ‘cascade’ of events. Firstly, the frequency of testing in the at-risk population must increase; this must result in a lower proportion of undiagnosed cases; those diagnosed must be linked to care, and the majority must start treatment; and the time between diagnosis and viral suppression must reduce. Dr Das said all these indicators were strongly correlated. The average time from diagnosis to the start of treatment shrank from twelve months in 2004 to two months in 2009. The time between diagnosis and achieving an undetectable viral load went down from nearly three years in 2004 to eight months in 2009; and the percentage with an undetectable viral load within a year of diagnosis increased from 26% in 2004 to 82% in 2008.

Last April the San Francisco Department of Public Health adopted the controversial position that newly infected patients should immediately begin HAART therapy upon their diagnosis. Some AIDS activists strongly objected to that, citing the prevailing opinion that HAART treatment should be delayed as long as possible due to the long-term side effects of the medications. Many HIV specialists continue to recommend a closely-monitored delay in treatment, but the above result in San Francisco should not be discounted.

(Tipped by JMG reader Bill)

AIDS Healthcare Foundation Denounces PrEP Study: There Is No Magic Pill

The AIDS Healthcare Foundation is denouncing the study of using existing HAART medications as a daily preventive for HIV infection. From their website, No Magic Pills:

AIDS Healthcare Foundation takes the matter of HIV prevention very seriously. We are concerned about the implications of a recent study of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) using Gilead Sciences, Inc.’s drug Truvada using 2,500 gay men and showing a 44% effectiveness rate in preventing HIV transmission. AHF supports continued research on HIV prevention, but opposes quick fixes that run the risk of contributing to the spread of HIV and drug-resistant viruses. Our community must consider these issues if we are going to offer up hundreds of thousands of gay men for this totally misguided experiment.

Jeff Berry, editor of Positively Aware, responds to a full-page ad published by AHF in this week's edition of the Windy City Times.

Of course there is no magic pill. There has never been, and never will be, a one-size-fits-all method to prevent the spread of HIV. And for those populations who may be at higher risk, or who may not have the luxury of having all of the tools at their disposal (for example men or women whose partners are unwilling or unable to use a condom or other form of protection), if they could use a microbicide gel or even a pill to lessen their risk, why would we not want that?

Oral PrEP (if proven safe and effective), vaginal and rectal microbicides, condoms, risk-reduction and adherence counseling, treatment as prevention—all of these and other methods must be allowed to be fully explored and studied. We owe it to ourselves, our partners, our families, our friends, and to future generations. We cannot and must not allow politics or fear tactics to trump science—we are better than that. To do any less is a disservice to those whom we purport to serve.

VIDEO: Positively Aware writer Keith Romell explains PrEP.

AIDS Denialists: Science Under Attack

In the first half of this BBC Science Under Attack special aired Sunday night, Nobel Prize winner Sir Paul Nurse examines the mindsets of folks who deny the science behind global warming. Interesting stuff, but skip forward to 43:00 where Nurse takes on a New Yorker who blithely denies that HIV causes AIDS.

(Via -Atheist Media Blog)

Quote Of The Day - Rush Limbaugh

"These people blamed AIDS on Reagan. Sound familiar? They blamed homelessness on Reagan -- you know why they blamed AIDS on Reagan? Because he didn't care. Because he never delivered a speech about it. And because of that, AIDS was spread. They actually wanted us to believe that Reagan had the disease, was sneaking into gay people's houses at night, and impregnating them with the disease and running out. And when we left their houses he went over to Grant Park, or wherever it was, Lafayette Park and stole the pork and beans of the homeless and took them back to the White House and fixed them up and at them. That's that kind of stuff they were saying about Reagan." - Rush Limbaugh.

Larry Kramer: AIDS Is A Plague That Was And Is Allowed To Happen

As the world approaches the 30th anniversary of the first noted cases of AIDS, famed activist Larry Kramer publishes a typically blistering editorial for CNN International in which he shouts that AIDS is a plague that was allowed to happen. And still is. An excerpt:

Governments and bureaucrats and presidents and politicians and the people who run this world lie to people. They tell us HIV is under control. They tell us case numbers are decreasing. They tell us that all is being done that can be done. They tell us HIV is too complicated to eradicate. They tell us gay people and people of color have made more progress than ever before. These are all lies. [snip]

For some 30-plus years, I have been trying to tell the world where this plague came from and why, and I will continue to do so until I die, too. You see, I simply can't get the memories and the ghosts of just about every friend I had out of my life. And since there is no doubt in my mind that this plague of HIV/AIDS that took them from me was and continues to be allowed to happen, I am duty bound to tell this hideous history as best and as fully as I can. It's the least I can do. That is correct: This plague of HIV/AIDS was intentionally allowed to happen. It still is. Nothing has changed in the intentionality department. Hate has a way of hanging around forever and too often winning out in the end.

Please read Kramer's full piece, especially his "ten realities about AIDS." And read the comments, where AIDS denialists and anti-gay Christians are rushing to attack.

MoMA Gets Censored Smithsonian Exhibit

New York City's Museum of Modern Art has acquired the video created by late gay artist David Wojnarowicz, which was pulled by the Smithsonian after an outcry from the GOP and the Catholic League's Bill Donohue.

The museum acquired both the original 13-minute version of the video, titled “A Fire in My Belly,” and a separate 7-minute excerpt made by the artist; the two are now being shown in a loop as part of a display of contemporary art from the museum’s collection that will remain up until May 9. Mr. Wojnarowicz, who died of AIDS in 1992, made the video in the late 1980s in response to the AIDS crisis. It was included in a show at the National Portrait Gallery, a Smithsonian museum, examining gay themes in American portraiture but was removed after it was attacked by Bill Donohue, the president of the Catholic League, and several Republican congressmen who objected to an image in the video of ants crawling on a crucifix.

Another artist is threatening to sue the Smithsonian in a protest demand to have his own work removed.

UPDATE: The Catholic League's Bill Donohue isn't too upset with the MoMA move, but he still manages to call the museum's (straight and married) director a "queen."

Unlike the Smithsonian, which is federally funded, MoMA is largely supported by fat cats like Glenn D. Lowry, the museum's director, thus alleviating some of our objections. Lowry makes over $2 million a year and lives for free in a $6 million condo atop the museum. Unlike the rest of us, he pays no income tax on his housing. Looks like the artistic community got fleeced twice: once by embracing the "pathological nonsense" of this masterpiece, and once by the corporate welfare queen who runs—and lives in—the joint.

American Family Association: Gays Should Be Paying For 100% Of All AIDS Research

Bryan Fischer, radio host for the SPLC-certified hate group the American Family Association, says that gay people should shoulder the cost of AIDS research. Because only homosexuals get it.

We know what causes AIDS: homosexual sex and injection drug use. The Centers for Disease Control tell us that of all the males who have been diagnosed with HIV/AIDS since the epidemic started in 1977, 91% contracted it either through having sex with other males or through intravenous drug abuse.

Since we know the cause, we know the cure: stop engaging in homosexual sex and stop shooting up with drugs. Well, homosexual activist groups likewise are pushing a lifestyle that kills. If anybody should be obligated to pony up funds to mitigate a health crisis, it ought to be the organizations that are responsible for advocating the very behavior that created and perpetuates the epidemic.

Surely we will be accused of lacking compassion. But this is hardly the case. If you care about an individual, and you see that he is involved in a self-destructive pattern of behavior, the most loving thing you can to is appeal to him to start making better lifestyle choices. It is hardly compassionate to urge him to continue to engage in conduct that everybody in the world knows has a good chance of killing him in the end. That, in fact, is a form of cruelty.

Bryan Fischer's AFA radio show is heard for two hours daily on over 200 Christian radio stations in North America, with an estimated daily audience of over two million. And you can fucking bet that many, many of his listeners completely believe that only dirty queers get AIDS.

Catholic League Pressures Smithsonian Into Removing Exhibit By Gay Artist

The Catholic League, that one-guy-with-a-computer outfit headed by anti-gay nutjob Bill Donohue, has successfully pressured the Smithsonian into removing an AIDS-themed video exhibit by the late gay artist David Wojnarowicz. Because for eleven seconds, ants can be seen crawling on a crucifix. The Smithsonian acted after incoming GOP House Speaker John Boehner and incoming GOP House Majority Leader Eric Cantor echoed Donohue's complaints.

The Washington Post's art critic Blake Gopnik reports:

As part of "Hide/Seek," the gallery was showing a four-minute excerpt from a 1987 piece titled "A Fire in My Belly," made in honor of Peter Hujar, an artist-colleague and lover of Wojnarowicz who had died of AIDS complications in 1987. And for 11 seconds of that meandering, stream-of-consciousness work (the full version is 30 minutes long) a crucifix appears onscreen with ants crawling on it. It seems such an inconsequential part of the total video that neither I nor anyone I've spoken to who saw the work remembered it at all.

But that is the portion of the video that the Catholic League has decried as "designed to insult and inflict injury and assault the sensibilities of Christians," and described as "hate speech" - despite the artist's own hopes that the passage would speak to the suffering of his dead friend. The irony is that Wojnarowicz's reading of his piece puts it smack in the middle of the great tradition of using images of Christ to speak about the suffering of all mankind. There is a long, respectable history of showing hideously grisly images of Jesus - 17th-century sculptures in the National Gallery's recent show of Spanish sacred art could not have been more gory or distressing - and Wojnarowicz's video is nothing more than a relatively tepid reworking of that imagery, in modern terms.

Here's that "hate-filled" clip by David Wojnorawicz. (The music is by the brilliant Diamanda Galas.) Congratulations, Catholic League. You've spring-boarded a relatively obscure work by a gay artist into national prominence.


RELATED: Over at Art Info, Tyler Green has a lot of questions for the curators at the National Portrait Gallery regarding their capitulation to this act of religion-based censorship.

ALSO RELATED: Since we know Donohue can't resist visiting JMG whenever his name is mentioned, here Bill, this Andres Serrano is for you.UPDATE: People For the America Way respond: "There is absolutely no reason for our government to be in the business of censoring art, or cave to pressure from extreme Religious Right organizations just because it’s Christmas. That Bill Donohue and the Catholic League are fighting for censorship is unsurprising. That the GOP leadership is echoing their call is shameful. That the Smithsonian has given into their transparent political bullying is deeply disturbing."

NEW YORK CITY: Nine Arrested At Bloomberg AIDS Housing Protest

Nine people were arrested this morning outside of a breakfast meeting hosted by NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg in a protest about the exclusion of indigent AIDS patients from a state housing program that caps the rent of ill people on public assistance at 30% of their income. More photos from the protest are here. Video is here. At Bloomberg's urging, earlier this year Gov. David Paterson vetoed a bill that would have brought indigent AIDS patients into the program. Paterson said it was the hardest veto he'd ever made. NYC doesn't have the money to help poor people with AIDS feed themselves, but they do have the money to change the fucking font on every fucking street sign.

Membership

ABOVE: At the 1985 Xmas party described below: Me, Michael, and Barney. I also wrote about Barney here.

Originally posted May 2004. Reposted for World AIDS Day.

Membership

Michael didn't look good.

We were at his annual Christmas Luau party. Tons and tons of people in the house and the backyard. Standing in his kitchen, wearing a grass skirt and a ridiculous Santa hat covered in sequins, he was acting like always...all flamboyant and silly and adorable.

But he didn't look...right.

It was 1985.

My boyfriend Ken and I stayed until the end of the party to help clean up. I busied myself in the kitchen, washing glasses and cleaning ashtrays. Through the kitchen window I watched Ken and Michael in the backyard where they were stacking up the chairs and dousing the dozens of tiki torches, the trademark of Michael's party. When we were finished, Ken and I stood for a few minutes on Michael's front porch to review the party: who came, who didn't, who shouldn't have come.

Finally I yawned and stretched and nudged Ken. "C'mon babe, let's roll. Michael, lots of fun as always. Try and get some sleep, you look like you need it."

Ken shot me a scowl.

I tried to recover. "I mean, you must be exhausted from getting the party ready."

Michael laughed and lit a cigarette. "Oh, you know me. I'll bounce back. Nothing that can't be cured by cigarettes, coffee and cocaine!"

We giggled and waved and headed down the driveway. When we reached our car, I looked back at the house. Michael was struggling with the garbage cans, then broke into a hacking cough.

For the first few minutes of our ride home, Ken and I didn't say anything. Then at a traffic light, I looked over at him. "Didn't you think Michael..."

"He's FINE!" Ken cut me off.

"You didn't think he looked kinda thin? And that coughing..."

'Well, you know he smokes too much. And you'd look worn out too if YOU threw a Christmas party for 100 people.'

"Yeah, I guess."

Ken knew what I was talking about, even if we didn't actually talk about it. For two years, maybe three, we'd been following the developing story about AIDS. At first, the press was calling it 'gay cancer'. Then GRID. Gay Related Immune Disorder. Then AIDS.

We lived in Orlando. Almost all the cases were in New York or San Francisco and that made us feel safe in a strange way. Neither of us had been in either place, except as children. And we didn't have any friends from either city. Then Miami began to report cases.

Michael was from Miami.

A week after his Christmas party, on New Year's Eve out at the club, Michael uncharacteristically left early. Before midnight. He said his hip was bothering him. Our friend Jack teased him as he was leaving. "Oh, is Grandpa having some problems with his rheumatiz?"

Michael just smiled and blew us kisses from across the room and limped out.

A few weeks later Ken called me from his office. He was going to take Michael to the hospital. His hip was terribly infected, and he couldn't walk. I didn't ask him what was wrong, by now we knew. And Michael knew that we did.

Waiting for Ken to come home, I watched a TV report on AIDS. Specifically, it dealt with how funeral parlors were sometimes refusing to handle the bodies of AIDS patients. Fear of infection. Fear of loss of reputation. The narrator made a comment about the families and friends of those killed by AIDS. He called them "this new and modern group" of grievers. When Ken got home, I told him about the story with indignation.

Over the next few months, Michael was in the hospital quite a bit. Ken got into the habit of visiting him on his way home from work, something I could rarely do since I worked nights. When I did see Michael, he looked progressively worse. Skinnier, more pale, his skin patchy and scaley.

But he always had that bitchy sense of humor and that chicken cackle. I'd hear that laugh from down the hallway as I approached his room, which always seemed to be full of friends.

Florida started its state lottery that summer. On the first night of the big drawing, I tried to stay awake for the results but I fell asleep with the tickets in my hands. I was awakened by Ken sitting on the bed.

"Hey." I rolled over and looked at the clock. Three in the morning?

Ken still had his tie on. My throat clenched. I don't know why, but I pushed the lottery tickets over towards him.

"So, um...are we millionaires?"

Ken didn't answer me.

"Where have you been? At the hospital? How's Michael?"

Ken leaned over and started untying his shoes. He pulled them off and finally turned to face me. He looked so very tired. He laid down next to me and hugged me, then spoke softly into my ear.

"We've just joined that 'new and modern' group."

Once, When We Were Heroes

Bilerico contributor and AIDS activist Mark S. King remembers the worst of the plague years for World AIDS Day. Watch this, please.

BELGIUM: Archbishop Andre Leonard Hit With Pie Following AIDS Remarks

Days after comments in which he declared that AIDS was God's punishment for being gay, Belgian Archbishop Andre-Joseph Leonard was struck with a pie as he stood at the altar during a service.

Footage of the incident released Saturday showed a young man approaching Archbishop Andre Leonard on Monday and smacking him with a pie. A church official says the archbishop will not press charges against the unknown attacker. The incident came amid growing turmoil within Belgium's Roman Catholic church, which faces an investigation into hundreds of cases of sexual abuse of children by Catholic priests. Leonard himself shocked Catholics by sympathizing with priests accused of pedophilia and by saying that homosexuals deserved to get AIDS.

On Tuesday the Archbishop's spokesman resigned, saying, "Archbishop Léonard has sometimes acted like someone who’s driving against the traffic and thinks everyone else is wrong.”

PhoboQuotable - Belgium's Archbishop Andre-Joseph Leonard

“When you mistreat the environment it ends up mistreating us in turn. And when you mistreat human love, perhaps it winds up taking vengeance. All I’m saying is that sometimes there are consequences linked to our actions. this epidemic is a sort of intrinsic justice." - Belgian Archbishop Andre-Joseph Leonard, saying that AIDS is God's punishment for being gay. Leonard also said that seeking vengeance on pedophile priests was "inhumane," a remark from which he later retreated.

Arkansas Department Of Education Condemns Anti-Gay Remarks Made By School Board Member Clint McCance

The Arkansas state Department of Education has issued a statement denouncing the anti-gay remarks made by local Independence County school board member Clint McCance, who used Facebook to celebrate the suicides of LGBT teenagers and the deaths of gay people from AIDS. The DOE's statement does not appear in the above-linked Associate Press story other than their word "dismayed."

The posting said to be from Midland School Board member Clint McCance came after last week's nationwide move for people to wear purple ribbons in support of gay and lesbian youth. The posting, first reported on The Advocate's website, said that the only way McCance would wear purple is "if they all commit suicide." McCance couldn't immediately be reached for comment Wednesday but told the Arkansas Times that the issue had been "blown out of proportion" and he plans to issue a statement later in the day. The Facebook page has since been disabled but a screen-grab remains on The Advocate's website. The Human Rights Campaign has called for McCance's resignation. The state Education Department's statement Wednesday said it is "dismayed" over the posting.

A Little Rock-based television station is looking for McCance.

After receiving several emails alleging Midland school board member Clint McCance made disparaging remarks about gay students, Today's THV is investigating the allegations. McCance is accused of posting on his Facebook page that several recent suicides of gay students across the U.S. were due to those students' sin. He also allegedly made other comments bashing gays. Today's THV has not confirmed McCance actully made the posts, but B.J. Steed is in Midland, which is just outside Batesville in Independence County, trying to contact McCance as well as other school board members. Today's THV contacted Superintendent Dean Stanley's office, but he is out until Friday. Midland Principal Donna Clark would only reply "no comment" to all our questions. In response to the comments on Facebook, someone set up another Facebook page calling for McCance to be removed from the board. THV's BJ Steed will have more on this developing story on Today's THV at 5, 6 and 10 p.m.

MSNBC is reporting on the story as I type this. I'll have video ASAP.

UPDATE: Here's the statement from the Arkansas Department of Education.

The Arkansas Department of Education strongly condemns remarks or attitudes of this kind and is dismayed to see that a school board official would post something of this insensitive nature on a public forum like Facebook. Because Mr. McCance is an elected official, the department has no means of dealing with him directly. However, the department does have staff who investigate matters of bullying in schools and we will monitor and quickly respond to any bullying of students that may occur because of this, as we have with other civil rights issues in the past.

UPDATE II: The Advocate reports that McCance may keep his job.

“In Arkansas law, the only way to recall a school board member is over a felony [committed by him or her] or absentee issues,” said Julie Johnson Thompson, the director of communications for the Arkansas Department of Education in Little Rock. Thompson says McCance, as an elected official, answers to voters, not Midland school district’s superintendent. “[The Arkansas Department of Education] doesn’t have any control over his job,” Thompson pointed out.

UPDATE III: MSNBC's openly gay host Thomas Roberts covers the story.

UPDATE IV: The executive director of the Arkansas School Boards Association reacts.

Members of the Arkansas School Boards Association Board of Directors and staff were appalled to read the comments purportedly made by the Midland School Board member in which he denounces gay students. Our organization expects school board members to support the education and promote the welfare of all students in their districts. With 1,500-plus school board members in Arkansas, we are saddened that the comments made by one individual will reflect poorly on other board members who work hard on behalf of the children in their communities. ASBA has no tolerance for bullying or attacks on children, and we certainly would not tolerate such actions, either physical or verbal, by adults. When school board members take the oath of office, they swear to uphold the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of Arkansas. ASBA expects board members to adhere to state and federal laws, and bullying would certainly fall under those statutes.

Joy & Whoopi Make A Pledge

This morning Joy Behar announced on The View that she is making a $5000 donation to the NYC-based AIDS charity God's Love We Deliver "in Sharron Angle's name." Whoopi Goldberg: "You know what, I'm gonna match that, baby." Barbara Walters jumped in, "I'll match that too, but because it's a good cause, not because it's political."

Sharron Angle, helping poor people with AIDS whether she likes it or not!

ARKANSAS: School Board Member Celebrates Gay Suicides And AIDS

From Independence County, Arkansas: Midland School District board member Clint McCance took to Facebook to mock the suicides of LGBT youth and celebrate the deaths of gay people from AIDS. This is what the queer youth of Arkansas face in their schools. Repulsive. Another Facebook page calling for McCance's firing has already appeared. It looks like the Midland School District has wiped the names of its board members from its website, but Midland Superintendent Dean Stanley can be reached at dstanley@midlandschools.org. Be polite, yet forceful.

Obama Heckled By AIDS Activists

President Obama was heckled by AIDS activists during a speech in Boston on Saturday, prompting the president to fire back.

The President appeared uncharacteristically upset as, mid-sentence, a group of folks in the crowd began to loudly object to his speech as he described the work his administration had done for AIDS research. As the crowd turned their heads up to look at the hecklers, President Obama followed as well, and modified his speech for them, menacingly pointing his finger up at them as he warned that a Republican leadership would be extremely destructive to their cause. After raising his voice mid-sentence in response to them, President Obama continued: “One of the great things about being a Democrat is, we like arguing with each other. But to the folks concerned about AIDS funding, I would say ‘take a look at what the Republican leadership has to say about AIDS funding.’”

Obama was in Boston to support the reelection campaign of Gov. Deval Patrick.

Ricky Wilson

It was 25 years ago today that B-52s guitarist Ricky Wilson died of AIDS. Ricky was a Pisces and he loved computers and hot tamales.

UPDATE: JMG reader John tips us to this song Cindy Wilson wrote for her brother.

GOProud Hero Ann Coulter: Ronald Reagan Was Great Because He Hated Gays

GOProud's BFF Ann Coulter, who will headline their Homocon 2010 event here in NYC on Saturday, has published a column lionizing Ronald Reagan because of his staunch opposition to gay rights.

The social issues were the difference. Reagan agreed with Goldwater on fiscal and national defense issues, but by 1980, social issues loomed large and Reagan came down mightily on one side -- the opposite side as Goldwater, as it turned out. Unlike abortion-loving Goldwater, Reagan said, "We cannot survive as a free nation when some men decide that others are not fit to live and should be abandoned to abortion or infanticide." And unlike gay-marriage-loving Goldwater, Reagan said: "Society has always regarded marital love as a sacred expression of the bond between a man and a woman. It is the means by which families are created and society itself is extended into the future. ... We will resist the efforts of some to obtain government endorsement of homosexuality."

Again I remind you, GOProud and their ilk are no less the enemies of LGBT Americans than the Family Research Council or Focus On The Family. Perhaps more so, because by collaborating with those who wish us harm, they give those anti-gay bigots cover for their repulsive work.

(Via - Right Wing Watch)