June 1985

Page 13

Healthwise

I don't remember much of the rest of an NBC newscast of an interview with a Kentucky AIDS family--husband, wife, and infant. It wasn't the sadness of what he showed, but the commentator's introduction which preoccupied me for most of the evening. As he panned the rural landscape he began his segment with these paraphrased words: "These people have never known the gay bars and bath houses of urban America, yet they suffer from AIDS." In less than ten seconds he was able to convey to his audience of millions that 1)AIDS is a homosexual disease, and Z)It is homosexuals' fault that it is spreading to heterosexual America. This blatant combination of lie and ignorance has frightening implications, least of which is my anger. However, in a homophobic society that supports our own internalized homophobia, it doesn't hurt to remind ourselves of what we are up against: 1) What you hear, see, and read in the general media about AIDS is not to be believed. It will clutter your brain. My favorite retort now to folks who are quick to tell me the latest bit of journalistic babble is "How many times a year has the media cured cancer?" The media is interested in producing a story, an event. Basic facts and simple truths are not deemed newsworthy except by a few responsible journalists and public programs.

BY THEODORE R. WILSON

A rationale for this type of reporting would suggest that it has been historically hard for the media to interpret complex medical data prepared by scientists. It is hard, but it can be done by those who want to. The fact is, they don't want to. They've got a hot story here and they are not going to give it up. "Bad guys cause good guys disease." The theme is ripe for a Dynasty episode next season. Think I'm kidding? Americans know and believe a good soap, and AIDS is good soap material and the press know it.

How much we can change is questionable. But we owe it to ourselves to listen carefully and not fall prey to their subtle and not so subtle homophobic message. If you come to believe that the media has our interest at heart, then I believe you are operating on a myth. 2)AIDS is a gay disease. Utter clutter. AIDS is a disease, nothing more and nothing less. We don't know the origins, the source of AIDS (or many other diseases for that matter). And what if we did? Sorry--no guarantee for a cure.

When people think or say that AIDS is a gay disease, they mean it started with us and it's our fault. When disease strikes us, we try to make sense out of it. We look for reasons and explanations. Yet many times fact gets muddled with confusion, the rational with the emotional, the logical .with the illogical. AIDS is yet another reminder of the limits of our knowledge or comprehension.

AIDS is a disease which

Lesbian? Gay? Alcoholic?

By ALEX LIBERACKI

I am writing a proposal for gay alcoholism and would greatly appreciate any information or statistics that you may have. This funding would greatly help the community.

Statistics on alcohol abuse in the gay and lesbian community range from 24%-40% with an additional 30% of gay men and lesbians being considered problem drinkers. The first extensive study on the problem is Leslie Fifeila's On My Way Nowhere Alienated, Isolated, and Drunk (Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Department of Health Services, 1975). This study has served as the starting point for most articles which discuss alcoholism in the gay/lesbian community. Besides Fifield's study, you might be interested in obtaining a copy of the following articles: "Alcoholism," (Mandate. 6.69 [1981]: 30-327);

warren Blumenfelds's "Alcoholism: A Disease We Can't Ignore," (Gay Community News 2 June 1984: 8+), and Randy Shilts' "Alcoholism: A Look in Depth at How a National Menace is Affecting the Gay Community," (Advocate 25 February 1974: 16-

19+).

The introduction to Jean Swallow's Out from Under (San Francisco: Spinster's Ink, 1984), the chapter on alcoholism in Mary O'DonDell's Lesbian Health Matters! (Santa Cruz: Santa Cruz Women's Health Center, 1979) and the chapter on lesbian alcoholics in Marian Sanmaier's The Invisible Alcoholics: Women and Alcohol Abuse in America

(New York: McGraw Hill, 1980) are also very good sources of information.

If you have any questions. or comments, write to Mr. Liberacki at P.O. Box 1431, East Lansing, MI, 488236431.

gays are experiencing because they are able to transmit this particular virus to one another through infected blood product or semen. It was not the intent or purpose of anyone engaging in these activities to produce disease. And most of us did so at a time when no one knew that this was the means of transmission. No one is to blame.

If, in fact, AIDS is spreading to the heterosexual community, the label "gay disease" has scary implicătions. To witch-hunt "contaminators" of the nation's blood supply and to pit one at-risk population against another, is an easy step for a homophobic society. We need to watch these trends carefully and to argue personally and politically against such thinking. can only do this if we ourselves understand that gays are the victims of a deadly disease, rather than its owners and producers. When people are afraid, scapegoating is a very real danger.

We

Having returned form the International Conference on AIDS in Atlanta last month, friends told me of the

reports they heard on the national news. Let me tell you some of the things the media neglected to report: 1) The national gay community on its own has raised between 4 and 5 million dollars for AIDS work. Those funds helped generate an additional $20 million from other sources.

2) The best and most helpful writing about AIDS has been prepared, financed, and distributed by the gay community. "How to" pamphlets on symptoms and how

HELP WANTED:

Looking for retired, unemployed

interested RN's, LPN's, and/or experienced home health aides who would want to provide home care for persons with AIDS either in their own home or the person's home. Also looking for individuals willing to provide housing on a temporary basis for persons with AIDS who are ambulatory and able to do

own self care. Education and training for care providers will be made available. Your interest obligates you in no way. Please contact:

Health Issues Task Force P.O. Box 14925 Public Square Station Cleveland, Ohio 44114

-or

call: T.R. Wilson,

M-F, 8:00 AM 5:30 PM, 844-3360

to conduct onesself sexually in this crisis are not usually the products of a concerned public health system but of an aware gay community.

3) The gay community has taken care of its own as well as other at-risk groups, while a frightened, timid, and discriminatory public health system has either refused or been resistant to provide posthospital care.

4) Gay men have begun to change risky sexual practices. Studies done in New York, San Francisco, and Chicago all show significant decreases in sexual activities which are high risk for the exchange of blood products. The San Francisco study revealed not only the decrease in risky sexual behavior, but two other important things: Gay men found their sexual lives just as satisfying after reducing at-risk behavior; and it was not the actual change in behavior but the fear of change itself which worried them.

It is not my intent to foster divisiveness but to plead caution. This crisis has produced new friends who have come to know and care about us in ways we have never expected. Yet the basic and essential problems of a homophobic society remain. The words "confinement, containment, refusal of care and treatment" never surfaced during the Legionnaire's Disease. It is not just the extent of AIDS which has prompted the ominous arousal of these words. It is the identity of most of its victims, too.

(T. Wilson is President of the Health Issues TaskForce)

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