Page 10

Healthwise

By STILL ANONYMOUS

Gay Peoples Chronicle

Celebrating a small victory-

December 1985

am a 34-year-old white male professional, typical of millions of other careeroriented professionals across the country. I am also gay.

When AIDS began to inch upon the scene a few years ago, I read with interest, and a bit of anxiety, how the disease was beginning to affect large numbers of gay men in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and New Yori. Some of my friends, mostly health care workers, decided to organize a group here to deal with the probable (but still seemingly far off) spread of the disease to Northeast Ohio.

I attended the first meetI never went back.

ing. was scared, scared

for

several reasons. First of all,

I was suddenly possessed by the fear that by merely associating with such a group I could somehow be exposed to the disease (explanations about transmission

the reaction to the disease today, especially in the straight community, I realize now that I was merely a few years ahead of everybody else.

The second reason I never went back after that initial Health Issues Taskforce meeting was my equally paralyzing fear that I would be sticking my neck out too far into gay community affairs and away from the safer gay havens of bars, parties, and volleyball.

my part, within the confines of my self-imposed fear of greater disclosure. Unlike a few years ago, my renewed association with the Taskforce has eased my irration al fears of AIDS because I know so much more about it. And I now can take Taskforce work to the post office and printer's (my business suit helps), not feeling uncomfortable but actually a little proud. I still freeze at the thought of seeing my name in print or my face on TV. I've yet to arrive there and I have no inkling of when I will ascend to that next level.

directly affected by it or not. If we don't pull together and help ourselves, the consequences are even more frightening than fear of involvement.

zone.

I know there must be others out there who find themselves in a situation similar to mine. I've taken that first step in getting 10volved and no one is trying to push me beyond my comfort More of us must join the fight against this disand its medical, sociand political effect on community. No matter what our comfort level, our contributions are equally welcome and valuable.

ease

al,

our I wasn't comfortable with the idea of carrying my gay identity out of the bar and into the post office, printer's, or media.

This past year something inside me has changed. Maybe it's been the unending assault on our lifestyle by those who find us disgust ing, or the manipulation of the AIDS situation by the media, or the fear and confusion I see in the faces and hear in the voices of my gay friends. Probably it's

more.

all hadn't really reached the public yet). Irrational? Totally. But when I look at

NGRA's Schatz

Talks on AIDS

By CHARLES CALLENDER

Benjamin Schatz, Director of the AIDS Civil Rights Project of National Gay Rights Advocates, took part in the EEO Megatrends Seminar November 14 at the Bond Court Hotel. Sponsored by

the Center for Human Rights, the Seminar centered on the rights of employees.

Homophobia Suggested

Schatz opened by criticizing the Center for Human Rights for assigning him to the session on Wrongful Discharge, explaining that most employers are legally free to fire people because they are gay. He charged the Center had cancelled a Gay Rights session because it saw the topic as politically controversial.

She

Dorothy Hendricks-Sterling, the Center's executive director, denies this. told The Chronicle that speakers on gay rights were divided between the sessions on Wrongful Discharge and Medical Problems in the Workplace to give them more exposure.

Rhonda Rivera, listed in the program as speaking on Wrongful Discharge, did not attend the Seminar. Asked by The Chronicle why she withdrew, Rivera explained that her participation had never

Still, as the year ends, I must celebrate a small, personal victory. I feel better about myself and my community than ever before. I also realize that it's okay to work behind the scenes on this issue and not on the front line, if I'm not ready. It has hit home that AIDS--and

of these things for the things and

Now I feel I'm ready to do

been confirmed with her. She suggested that the basic problem had been poor communication rather than homophobia.

Anti-Gay Strategies

Schatz denounced lobbying by right-wing groups trying to block funding for AIDS research and for the care of AIDS victims. He attributed the present concern about AIDS to fears it may spread into the general population and said the gay men it has been killing have been considered expendable.

Comparing attempts to use gay people as scapegoats for AIDS with charges during the Middle Ages that Jews were spreading the Black Plague, he pointed out that Louie who unsuccessfully Welch, for mayor of Houston on a platform calling for the quarantine of gay people, received the same percentage

ran

the popular vote Walter Mondale had in the 1984 presidential election.

Warning that some rightwing politicians are now basing their careers on spreading fear of AIDS, he pointed to Moral Majority publications showing nuclear Families wearing gas masks to protect themselves from infection. He described such blatant attempts to panic the public as cruel and fascist.

The Need for Education Schatz emphasized the need to explain to employers, as well as to the general public, that AIDS is not casu-

its implications. gay community--is the most crucial issue of our lifetime, whether we

re

ally transmitted. He pointed out that as the incidence of AIDS rises, the proportion of its victims by riskgroup remains constant.

He also stressed the need to educate the public about the kind of responses that medical researchers traditionally give. As an example he used the hypothetical question, "Can you get brain tumors from staring at the color purple?" Most medical researchers, he said, would not respond with a flat denial, but instead with a cautious statement that they have no evidence at present proving that you can.

Schatz denounced as cruel plans to use the HTLV-3 test to screen out potential employees, even though persons who test positive present no danger in the workplace. In lieu of testing, some employers are refusing to hire men who "look gay." Besides the current hysteria about children in public schools, he noted the U.S. Military's attempts to use the test to screen out gay men, and the plans of insurance companies to screen applicants by life-style..

Quarantine

The most frightening development he sees are the calls for quarantining all victims of AIDS, or those persons who test positive for HTLV-3. As an example, he cited the bill recently introduced into the Ohio state legislature by repreWith an sentative Gilmore.

Every now and then when anxiety rears its ugly head and I hear myself saying, "What are you getting yurself into?" I find two words --courage and dignity-strongly reassuring. I don't pretend to be comparing myself to the great men and women of our time, but even on my humble level in this world of Summits and Synods these words become a potent reinforcement for what I am trying so hard to do.

estimated 100,000 Ohioans likely to test positive, for exposure to the virus, Schatz asked where they could be quarantined.

Bright Spots

Schatz also pointed to some encouraging signs. Part of the media is showing resand compassion, ponsibility signalled by such events as producing "Early Frost." Some employers, such as the Bank of America, are dealing responsibly with the issue. Warning his audience, most

of them probably nongay, that discrimination against gay people potentially harms everyone Schatz predicted that if the current backlash develops into growing discrimination against those who are openly gay, gay men may begin closeting themselves more effectively by marrying women on a larger scale than they do now. This might spread AIDS into the general population. He told the conference that straight people must realize that gay men who become victims of AIDS are not anonymous characters who patronize sleazy bars, but are their sons, their brothers, and, sometimes, their husbands.

Katherine L. Armstrong, of the Bank of America in San Francisco, spoke during the afternoon Session on Medical Problems in the Workplace. She described her organization's 'strategy for dealing with employees who have AIDS.