Don't you ever get utterly enraged and annoyed when this happens :bang:? I mean,the majority of people in the world who have HIV/AIDS are straight, no? And yet I hear and see so many homophobes making HIV/AIDS jokes targeted towards gays and saying that we started it. I feel like it's about time that straight people feel equally responsible for the HIV/AIDS virus spreading because if it was just a gay virus, it would have just stayed exclusively in the community of gay men and the beard wives of closeted gay men and it wouldn't have spread any further. Do you think that a mini social campaign in this aspect is necessary? I still know a lot of people who think that gays started HIV and I feel like we need to go back in history and explain how it happened to the general public so that it will hopefully lessen discrimination in the LGBT community. What do you think? And how would you go about a campaign if you think it's necessary? Sorry if I seem angry or bitter but I just wanted a place to vent and hopefully someone understands.
The reason why HIV is associated with gay men is because in the 80s, it was actually mainly gay men that were spreading it. From what I understand because they obviously won't get pregnant from unprotected sex, and didn't know about HIV, a lot of them had unprotected sex, therefore spreading it. Straight couples didn't have as much unprotected sex, because of the pregnancy chance. Also, anal sex has a higher rate from HIV, which is also why people say gay men have it more, even though straight couples do anal too. And basically, this whole thing is basically where that dumb stereotype came from. I'm not as bothered as to who people think spread it, anyone that thinks only gay people spread can go jump off a cliff for all I care. I just want people to always teach others about safe sex and all that, escpeially considering the fact that lots of people out there don't really have good sex ed classes.
Yea. You make some great points and thanks for sharing them. Lol at the cliff part. But, in all seriousness, we have to remember and remind people that it still made it into the straight population and not just beard wives of closeted gay men. Or else it would have still been called GRID virus and not HIV/AIDS. And they can't look down upon us as being these promiscuous dirty predators because the entire population of promiscuous straight people back then outnumbered the whole gay population in itself. And it's not like gays were out to purposefully spread the HIV/AIDS. So i think the general public need to be reminded of this somehow. I know I hate to be preachy, but I think a large part of the discrimination towards us, besides religion, stems from this stereotype that we're all like the perverted pioneers of the HIV/AIDS virus.
I know it's not a 100% historically accurate documentary but in the HBO movie (based on the play) "The Normal Heart" the first fundraising and awareness efforts to research this new-at-the-time disease refer to it as "gay cancer". At the time not because it was spread by gay men (transmission was still unknown) but because it was mostly gay men who became ill. And nowadays transmission through blood transfusions is not much of an issue anymore but IV drug users sharing needles is still an issue. Unfortunately it's also just one more "fringe" group that deserve the wrath of God according to some oh-so-well-meaning religious groups.
I think most of the people here are probably too young to remember the 80's and the actual mind set and thought process of straight America. In the 80's when I was a teenager, Gay men were coming into doctors with cancerous lesions and because Regan was in office and morals being very conservative, the focus became on ONLY those gay men that had that cancer. Suddenly, right winged America was saying GRID(gay related immuno-deficiency virus)was Gods punishment for being gay. Meanwhile, the same cancers had been seen in prostitutes and IV drug users on the East Coast, and straight people in Africa, and had been seen there for many years. However, it was under played and pretty much buried due to Americas hate with homosexuals. It was not known how it was spread, people thought if you were in the same room with gay people, or had been near them that they could give it to their animals and you could get it that way. If a gay person drank from your glass, you could get it if you drank from it. So, it was not until a young person, Ryan White contacted it from a blood transfusion that people realized that not only gays could get it. However, back then, they still blamed gays for 'bringing down Gods judgement on normal people'. It was horrible, and hate was encouraged, with people suggesting that positive people should be tattooed with a positive sign and or placed on an island or concentration camp. A REAL concentration camp for gay people, all of us. Positive or negative to protect the straight religious public. Still even at this time Regan felt that it was Gods punishment so therefore NO funding was given for it for research, etc. Gays had to find research themselves, (so things such as the White Party was born). Also, this is about where the movie 'The Normal Heart' comes in. That is why people still blame Gay people for it. Sad, and ignorant, but I wish they would really teach the history of gay rights in school and focus a bit more on the HIV epidemic. I think it will open eyes. So,
It was largely because the first prominent cases where of gay men, so it quickly become associated (unfairly) with the gays due to a combination of bigotry and lack of knowledge on the disease.
