Hetero privilege and AIDS

[Recursion]

So I was reading this article

http://www.vox.com/2016/3/12/11210044/clinton-reagan-hiv-aids-lgbt

Which is based on a series of tweets by long-time HIV/AIDS activist Garance Franke-Ruta.

The one thing that really struck me was this point:

Bill Clinton's famous "I feel your pain" was to Bob Rafsky of ACT UP (who it turns out died less than a year later).

I was alive (albeit, in my defense, 16) at the time, and until this morning I would have sworn up and down on any object you presented me that WJC said that to a laid off steelworker, not to an HIV/AIDS activist.

The simple and self-excusing answer is that that's how the media filter works, and the more important answer is that that's how my brain worked back then and still works now and I owe it to others to fix that.

Lopez's point in the Vox piece, following Franke-Ruta, is that the Democratic establishment in the 1980s was just as detached from the LGBT community at the time as the GOP (and now that I think of it, I don't recall thinking of the GOP as specifically homophobic until 1992, when WJC started making some tiny outreaches to LGBT people).

I saw the Quilt in '93 (and even found my cousin's patch, somehow), but 17 and 16 are worlds apart, at least for me. Maybe the 17 or 18 year old me would have remembered Rafsky, but the 16 year old me didn't, and that bothers the hell out of me.

Anyways. Just a personal moment amidst the fracas of GDP.

[joshcryer]

1. Remember Ryan White? Those were such scary times (as a kid).

I was just a young teen then, those were super scary times as I recall in my memory. Simply touching other kids, while playing touch football or tag was seen was a big no no in our communities (we lived in very rural very conservative areas).

There was another post here asking about how the Clinton's handled it in Arkansas. It very likely didn't even come up there. It's almost fortunate that Bill, after gaining office, after the policy wonks sat down with him and told him it was a problem, actually did anything about it (I believe he gave HHS billions in his budget to handle it; was looking at a timeline when this came up I can find it again and link it).

This is why I think your post is on point. I think Hillary's statement was such a facepalm though because damn it her husband actually did something about it when the people before them didn't do squat for almost a decade. It's crazy. I know you don't mean to invoke that, but imagine, Bill Clinton spent billions on AIDS research, actually added HIV/AIDS to the ADA (disability) (again, saw it on that timeline I was reading), and Hillary met with and even touched, touched AIDS/HIV people! Touched!

Growing up back then, if you heard the word gay in my communities (like I said, very very conservative communities), it was like, I mean, literal leprosy. You couldn't even breath the same air as a gay person. I can only imagine what it was like for my gay brother growing up. It breaks my heart to think about it. He's actually with someone who has HIV now, they've been together for like 6 years, and I think the stigma has been greatly lifted. But back then it must've been so bad for him.

Regarding your post the other day about Hillary not being a natural politician, btw, I think was also on point. I think I rec'd that thread but I didn't respond in it. It's really unfortunate what was said and how it was handled. The Clinton's did a good job with HIV/AIDS even if they were simply going by policy recommendations. They did a good job.

[Bluenorthwest]

13. Memory is funny. Bill elected in 92, yet Diana Princess of Wales in 1989 had made headlines by

visiting a pediatric AIDS unit and holding a sick child.

7-Year-Old AIDS Patient Shares Hug With Princess
February 04, 1989

NEW YORK — The 7-year-old boy in blue pajamas was standing with his nurse in a 17th floor corridor of Harlem Hospital, and when the woman in a red wool suit with black velvet buttons on the sleeves walked by, he looked up at her shining blonde hair.
"Are you very heavy?" she asked, stopping.

Princess Diana bent down, picked up the child, who has AIDS, and hugged him. For two or three minutes, the worlds of poverty and plenty were united as the princess and the patient stood in the hallway, the little boy's head on Diana's shoulder, his arms around her neck. With a sad smile, the princess finally put him down.
---------------------------------------
"Do you think people are educated enough about this?" Diana asked the physician.

"No, not enough. But visits like yours help. Our own 'royalty,' whatever that is, being a democracy or a republic or whatever, have not done as much as you, anything so symbolic as you," the director of pediatrics replied.
http://articles.latimes.com/1989-02-04/news/mn-1517_1_aids-patient

I was in London when this happened. I will never forget the strong reactions and the instant discussions that just the day before we simply could not get started. That was Diana, not Hillary. It was 1989, years prior to Hillary being on the world stage.

[Chitown Kev]

2. Prior to the rise of the Religious Right

both political parties were pretty homophobic at the national level, aboout equally.

[joshcryer]

3. Gay marriage bans were happening until 2009.

TWO THOUSAND NINE.

(Maine's population overturned the gay marriage legalization bill.)

[jfern]

5. NC banned SSM in 2012

[joshcryer]

6. Oh wow, I completely missed / forgot that.

So 4 short years ago American people were trying to ban gay marriage. American people.

[Chitown Kev]

15. Totally missed my point

I'm going back to the days of Anita Bryant, actually....even the mere mention of Bryant's name makes me think of things that I could never type out.

[Warren DeMontague]

4. The GOP was always worse, IIRC. But up to a certain point I think Democrats varied in terms of

Bad-ness on the issue, depending on things like geography or just who you hung out with.

It is worth remembering, of course, that for all the faults of the Clinton administration which have not aged so well in the interim, the guy was a HUGE improvement on what had come before him, Tectonic really.

[joshcryer]

7. Democrats usually are.

So far, since the 90s, they've actually followed policy and ignored demagoguery. For the most part.

[Warren DeMontague]

8. ... I've said it time and again. Democratic presidents generally mildly disappoint me.

But the GOP ones always seem to invariably exceed my worst expectations by a huge margin.

Ford, maybe, was like only moderately bad.

But every Dem President I've experienced has been hugely preferable to any of the Republicans, hands down.

[Bluenorthwest]

9. 16 year old you did just fine. Few people knew of that action at the time, even among adults.

Mr Rafsky was very brave. That action made the NY Times:
http://www.nytimes.com/1992/03/28/us/1992-campaign-verbatim-heckler-stirs-clinton-anger-excerpts-exchange.html

What he and others were doing was making sure that their own deaths did not end the fight. You joined that fight very early, I explained the Quilt just this morning to a poster who suggests saying the names of the dead is vulgar.

Rafsky with Bill Clinton:

Something else to read and to watch- Bury Me Furiously:

" Let everyone here know that this is not a political funeral for Mark Fisher - who wouldn't
let us burn or bury his courage or his love for us anymore than he would let the earth
take his body until it was already in flight. He asked for this ceremony - not so we could
bury him - but so we could celebrate his undying anger.
This isn't a political funeral for Mark. It's a political funeral for the man who killed
him, and so many others, and is slowly killing me: whose name curls my tongue and curdles
my breath.
George Bush, we believe you'll be defeated tomorrow because we believe there's still
justice left in the universe, and some compassion left in the American people. But whether or
not you are - here and now - standing by Mark's body, we put this curse on you. Mark's spirit
will haunt you until the end of your days. So that, in the moment of your defeat - you'll
remember our defeats, and in the moment of your death - you'll remember our deaths. "
http://www.vidqt.com/id/K9z-AbaPIWM?lang=en

Thanks for this OP. At this moment it means a great deal.

[Recursion]

10. And thank you for that response

I need to learn a lot more about Rafsky

[Recursion]

11. Did they actually say "vulgar"?

That's kind of appalling.

[Bluenorthwest]

12. No, that's my own raising up of the rhetoric....when it was pointed out that Hillary did not name

any of her friends who died of AIDS, this was the exact comment:
"Yes, it would be great if she exploited the deceased to defend herself. I gather you weren't around during that period, but I think anyone who was connected to the gay community -- and the Clintons were (that's why the Human Rights Campaign endorsed Hillary) -- knew people who died of AIDS. Of course, she's not going to make a list of names unless it's necessary, and then she would only do so by discussing it with those people. "

Then "I don't agree that Hillary should exploit the deceased in the way you're suggesting, but perhaps you also think Bernie should put out a list of names of friends he's had who died of AIDS."

Then it was all about Bernie saying 'ghetto'.

That 'Don't Say Their Names' poster has yet to explain to me what he thought about the Names Project, ie the AIDS Quit.


I say Billy. JT. Andrew. Gene. Michael. Miguel, Cliff, another Miguel. I say Keith. Calvin. Freddie......

[Recursion]

14. Thanks for naming them

Last edited Sun Mar 13, 2016, 10:06 PM - Edit history (1)