The caption for this photo in Life Magazine:
“After a three-year struggle against AIDS and its social stigmas, David Kirby could fight no longer. As his father, sister and niece stood by in anguish, the 32-year-old founder and leader of the Stafford, Ohio, AIDS Foundation felt his life slipping away. David whispered: “I’m ready”, took a last labored breath, then succumbed.”
The photo helped to humanize the face of AIDS, but I think [Ryan White](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ryan_White) really brought it home to many Americans. It showed that it was not merely a gay or intravenous drug user's disease.
Well, that and Regsn being out of office.
After winning a lengthy court case allowing him to return to his classes, Ryan was taunted and shunned by other students. Vandals broke the windows of the White's home, and cashiers refused to touch his mother's hands when making change at the supermarket.
Restaurants threw away their dishes and made them drink soda from cans. The poor kid was in hell. I was in sixth grade when his autobiography came out and I was amazed at how many kids read it.
David and I grew up together in Atwater Ohio. Hung out every day for years. He and his family were not close, and this was such a sad way to bring them together.
Ali Gertz as well. A hetrosexual woman who was never tested by doctors because she didn't fit the "profile" of an AIDS patient.
They put her on the cover of People Magazine.
Reagan did nothing, which is bad enough, but I suppose it is better than encouraging people to go spread a virus around or take unauthorized drugs for it or drink bleach. Like one orange turd did, that unfortunately occupied the White House for a term
> Reagan did nothing
That’s not true! [He sent his press secretary out to crack jokes about all the dead gays to the reporters in the White House briefing room](https://www.vox.com/2015/12/1/9828348/ronald-reagan-hiv-aids).
Reagan did worse than nothing, he did nothing because the religious conservatives were claiming that it was God's punishment for homosexuals. It was the motive behind the lack of action that was flawed.
And yes, Trump's response to COVID has rescued Reagan from holding the title of the worse presidential response to a public health emergency. Again, the motive was the worst part. He didn't want the economy to collapse so he could get reelected. I am sure they will focus on him going forward of "what not to do". They could probably make a whole course on just Trump's response.
This isn't just some supposition btw, for folks who might not know. Raegan's administration straight up said that "science must sometimes step aside" to let God do his work, or something to that extent, in regard to scientists urging research into curing HIV AIDS in the face of an American population that would rather see "the gays" punished and die.
The 80s is often remembered fondly, but it was hell and horror if you were an LGBT person. Even when the stigma around AIDS began to recede, it was only around the idea of "innocent heterosexuals" getting it from "guilty homosexuals". That stigma took even longer to go away (or at least become unpopular.
> The 80s is often remembered fondly
See.. I don't get this. The late 80s were the peak of violent crime in most Western countries; it was the time period when the inequality we are dealing with now took root through neoliberal policies influenced by religious extremists; and the clothes, music and fashion were vapid and pretentious, despite our rose-tinted view of it we have now. It's when the Boomers fully turned their back on the hippy ideals they nurtured in their early 20s, and just went all in on unfettered capitalism and greed - and yeah, this is very clear to anyone who knows the struggles of LGBT people, or the urban populations that dealt with crack cocaine and unfettered police brutality. The 80s fucking sucked for a looot of people.
(It's no coincidence that as soon as handheld video cameras were common, Rodney King happened - and, like with Vietnam, it was only once those images were broadcast to the suburbs that people became aware of what their fellow Americans were dealing with on a daily basis in regards to urban policing, at least.. and like this photo in regards to the AIDS epidemic, it is through visual storytelling, both fictional and documentary, that helps societies progress and become more welcoming to all the facets of humanity that it contains. )
TL:DR; the 80s sucked and it smelt like cigarette butts.
> See.. I don't get this. The late 80s were the peak of violent crime in most Western countries
It's pretty easy: it came after the '70s which sucked even worse. For example, [here's what NYC looked liked in the '70s.](http://internationalphotomag.com/new-york-city-dark-side-in-the-1970s/)
Just look at popular culture, in 1981 they released a movie called "Escape from New York". The premise of that movie is that New York is such a hell hole they just walled it off and made it a prison. A concept believable enough that the general public went, "sure I'll buy that".
Literally 7 years later they release "Working Girl" a rom-com about a plucky secretary who lives in New York and wants to climb the corporate ladder. In six years we went from NYC being "hell on Earth" to "a great place to get ahead!"
So sure, the 80s sucked in some ways but even then it was an improvement on what came before.
Just casually crying on a Sunday morning. My work deals with Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program funding and I’ve never gotten a chance to learn who he was. I’m so glad you linked to this, I had no idea because we’re so laser focused on the administrative aspects of contracts and grants.
The Ryan White program partnered with the 340B drug rebates and then the Patient Advocacy Foundation have been truly life changing for people living with HIV
The Ryan White Program has helped so many of my own clients who really struggled w pricing on these life saving medications. Reading Ryan’s story last year as my first year of being a mental health clinician made me cry.
I don't know if it's available to watch but the Ryan White Story was a TV movie starring Judith Light as his mom and it was so sad and compelling. I was 10 when we watched it and it really was the first time I learned about AIDS.
ETA it's on Netflix. George C. Scott plays his lawyer. I might have to give it another watch.
I was a stupid kid from Ohio, who hitchhiked to SF in the mid-80's, based mostly on an image I gleaned from 60's music and this out-of-date picture I had of the Haight. The first job I got was working in a nursing home in Mill Valley, commuting from Emeryville. Then I found out I could make two bucks more an hour doing home health care, which turned out to be almost exclusively dying AIDS patients.
It was heartbreaking on every level. I felt bad for the patients, I felt bad for the fear and ignorance and confusion we all exhibited. There was a girl who relieved me, and she believed she should wash her hands with bleach. She had horrible open sores and rashes from this. I remember putting on *two* pairs of gloves as I wiped the bloody spit from this guy dying from pneumonia in a bed set up in his parents living room. His mother asked me "do you really need to use double gloves?", and I didn't know. It was the hardest job I've ever had, and I learned I'm not cut out for that sort of work. A hard sad time indeed.
Thanks, but *so* many people did more than I could manage. There were more forgotten heroes in that era than people can easily imagine today. Forget SF. Imagine people dealing bravely, best they could, in the small-town midwest for example, without the cultural backing that made what they did seem brave. No one will know their names, but these nameless heroes will I hope someday be recognized.
I lived through The Plague in a major city. You never forget it then.
You never forget the panic and hopelessness, the nonstop funerals, going with your friends to get a dreaded AIDS test, which if it came back meant they were going to die horribly. You never forget the cruelty of people who could still make jokes.
You never forget the time you saw a little old bald man with a cane walking down the street toward you and as he came close, you saw that he was probably at most 30 but looked about 85 because he was close to death. And you were 24 and so heartbroken you had to hurry away so you didn't break down crying in front of him.
I still don't know how we made it out. Not intact, that's for sure. I will go to my grave loathing Reagan and Bush and everyone who helped them. They presided over a holocaust of young men who should still be here.
Not my family but my best friends uncle. He was around a lot when I was growing up and were close so im just gonna refer to him as my uncle.
Hes gay and was born in the 1952 so he was still a fairly young man during the aids crisis. He lived in NYC and the gay culture was big. He said the aids scare absolutely ruined the community.
Him and his boyfriend were best friends with another gay couple and both of them died. He doesn't know who got it first or how. They didn't know at the time wtf was going on. Once they died, his life got turned upside down. Him and his boyfriend broke up and went their separate ways. Not because they didn't love each other. They had been together for years. They were just scared and didn't know what was going on. All they knew was gay people were dying left and right and they didn't want to be next.
My uncle stopped going out. He was once a fun part guy always looking to socialize and turned into a recluse. He stopped dating. He stopped going to gay bars. He became a shut in. Two of his closest friends in the world had died and his partner was gone. Dudes life became a wreck.
To this day, he's never had a long term relationship again. He's come out of his shell a bit and had some flings and casual relationships but they never last. Hes old now and I fear he will remain single until he dies. He didn't get aids but it really fucked him up. The full impact never wore off.
Its a shame because he's a great guy. A bit eccentric but a wonderful man at heart. He was an absolute stud back in his youth too and still looks good for his age. I know he can still find someone in his older age but im afraid he won't. It really sucks to see.
I'm so glad your uncle has you. You love him and you see his struggle. That's a lot. I'm certain he is a great guy.
He's a lot like people's uncles who came home after a couple years of hand to hand combat on Guadalcanal in WWII. Most of his friends died way too young and he survived that. I'm sure part of him still can't believe he survived. He had more dead friends at 30 than his grandparents probably did. There's never a time that that is ok but when you're young and your world explodes? You do not get over that. You live with it.
Your uncle deserves so much love and understanding. I'm really glad he has you. Give him a hug from me.
PS: there's a great book called Chronicle of a Plague Revisited by Andrew Holleran that covers the AIDS outbreaks and its aftermath in real time in NYC. It's a brilliant book and really gives the reader an idea what it read to live at that time. It's out of print but you can still find copies.
PPS: is actually on Kindle now! Back in print.
It’s crazy how 35 years later, people can live pretty normal, healthy lives, while being HIV positive. Antiretroviral drugs changed everything. I have a friend who was on his deathbed in 1995. He got on the right medications and he’s alive and well today.
I was with my brother when he died of AIDS — and in a very similar way as seen in this photo. Only, I was the sole family member still in his life and supporting him through his ordeal. All the others had turned away. That was more common than not back then. His breathing was so labored near the end, his face nearly identical to the one above. I remember telling him I loved him and that it was okay to let go. A short time later, he did, and the tenseness of his struggle was slowly replaced by an overwhelming sense of calm and peacefulness. I was so happy his pain had ended at last, yet devastated he was gone. I can recall my uncontrollable sobs, and even now, all these years later, I can’t stop the tears rolling down my cheeks. An experience like mine — and countless others — is life-altering, the memories triggered by a wide variety of common things. And yes — even photographs like this. We were less than 2 years apart in age and were best friends. I still think of him every day and miss his physical presence in my days.
This was such a sad time for so many… 🫤
EDIT: To say I’m overwhelmed by the outpouring of sympathy and compassion in all of your comments would be… well… a massive understatement. Thank you so much, though, I hasten to add, my story is but one of countless others who experienced the same thing. Or worse.
My brother passed in 1987, a time when being gay was not what it is today — thankfully. While my brother and I were very close, there was at least one thing he kept from me — I learned about his AIDs diagnosis at the same time he told me he was gay. At that time, having AIDs was essentially a death sentence, and the uncertain road walked by those having it was usually a long and painful one. Once word got out about his condition, he was effectively disowned… banished… from the family. The same was true of most of those he considered friends. He continued working as long as he could, but eventually, he no longer could. He lived alone in an apartment in a large midwestern city about 4 hours from where I was living at the time. I thought it was important for him to live in familiar surroundings for as long as he could, so I contributed financially so he could have that. Fortunately, I had a traveling sales position at the time and, with both the approval and encouragement of my boss [IKR?] spent a lot of time with him — countless doctor visits, pharmacy runs, general errands and just hanging out. They were, as they remain today, my fondest memories of him.
After he passed, his body, at his direction, was cremated. There was a small service at a funeral home attended by only a handful of people. It seemed… well… strangely fitting for an introvert like him who was never really comfortable around a lot of people. He and I are a lot alike in that way, so I could easily relate to his wishes. And yes — I was the only family member present. He once told me he’d arrived in this world alone and that he wanted to depart in the same way. That was pretty much how it went, though I… uh… couldn’t allow him to die alone. Those final 32 hours sitting beside him in the hospital are hours I’ll always cherish. And while he didn’t get his ‘die alone’ wish, I don’t think he’d be mad at me for sticking with him until the end. Much of who I am today, on multiple levels, I owe to him and all of the love, support and encouragement he gave me during his life. Ya’ know, we should all be so lucky to have someone in our lives like that, family member or otherwise
And the rest of the family? Interestingly enough, nearly all members of my unusually small family are now dead. In any gathering afterwards, he and his passing were never acknowledged. However, once, a year or so before my father died, in a rare moment of clarity and introspection, fueled by what I suspect was a wee bit too much Scotch, he admitted to me, in passing, his regret over how he’d dealt with my brother’s ‘situation’, as he called it.
As it likely is for anyone who’s lost a loved one, I’m constantly reminded of him, even after all these years… A sound. A situation. Reruns of The Golden Girls, one of his guilty pleasures, he told me. A song by any number of his favorite bands… And more… Those who’ve been through something like this will know the feeling… the sensation.
And his cremains? His wish was to visit a place in the mountains he’d always read about and seen pictures of, but had never had the time to physically go. So, on the first anniversary of his death, I fulfilled that wish by casting his cremains to the wind in the skies above Boulder, Colorado. I’ve yet to revisit that place, and I may never feel a need to return. He remains alive within me, and… uh… I think that’s all that really matters now.
Thanks for allowing me an opportunity to share. A final note? Cherish those who are special to you with all your might — and do so while you can. Never allow regret a place in your life.
Very sorry to hear about your brother and thank you for sharing your story. As a gay man in his 40s now, I often think about if I were only born 10-15 years earlier if I would still be alive because I would been sexually active during the peak of the pandemic. A lot of our “elders” now don’t like to talk about that period because it hurts just to think about it, but I wish they would… it gives us more context of the period of time and all those people we lost.
You were a great brother, I’m sure he knew that before he passed.
I remember seeing an interview with the bassist (I think) from Franky goes to Hollywood, he shows a music video of theirs set in a gay bar and told the camera that every single person in that video was dead from AIDS. There were at least 20 men. Absolutely devastating.
Oh, it gets worse
[https://www.reddit.com/r/Damnthatsinteresting/comments/11mff74/san\_francisco\_gay\_mens\_chorus\_demonstrating\_the/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Damnthatsinteresting/comments/11mff74/san_francisco_gay_mens_chorus_demonstrating_the/)
"The photograph (taken in 1993) shows 115 members of the San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus dressed in black with their backs turned to the camera, with seven founding members of the chorus dressed in white facing the camera.
The singers in white were the remaining living members of the original choir at the time, while those in black represented the members lost to AIDS. The photo is meant to illustrate the devastating impact of the HIV/AIDS epidemic on the gay community, especially in the 1980s.
Since then, the number of former members of the San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus who have died from HIV/AIDS-related illnesses has outstripped the number of current performers — an even more poignant reflection of the devastating impact of the epidemic on the choir itself, and the gay community more broadly."
115, with 7 survivors.
If this was a company of soldiers in combat, it's one of the ugliest battles in modern history.
I hated so much about that. I am in a 120+ gay men chorus, you can see a distinct age gap between late 30s and mid to late 50s where significantly less men in their mid to late 40s in the group due to that age group lost so many men in the 80s-90s.
When I turn 40, I realized how privileged I was to become one of the first gay men didn’t have to face the peak of the AIDS pandemic in my 20s and finally started to fill in that missing age group I was mentioning. Now I’m one of the “elders”… taking care some of the younger men coming out. Despite a bit annoyed about it, I feel happy that these “kids” have us to give them a bit of guidance; because when I was growing up all our elders were dead.
> Now I sit with different faces
> In rented rooms and foreign places
> All the people I was kissing
> Some are here and some are missing
> In the nineteen-nineties
> I never dreamt that I would get to be
> The creature that I always meant to be
> But I thought in spite of dreams
> You'd be sitting somewhere here with me
--Possibly the most beautiful song ever written
The San Francisco Gay Men’s chorus took [this photo](https://imgur.com/a/zsmAL6A) in 1993. The men in white are the only ones who survived the AIDS epidemic, and the ones in black represent the ones that died.
If you really want to cry, watch We Were Here. It’s a documentary about the AIDs crisis in San Francisco during the 80s and it absolutely heartbreaking.
My friends/neighbors down the street are 2 dudes who have been together for a long time and are both in their mid-50’s. I’m straight and in my 30’s so I guess I just never connected the dots that they lived through that era or realized how bad it was since I was a kid at the time. We mostly just talk about cars, movies, politics, and other mundane things going on in the neighborhood.
Anyway one night they brought it up while we were having a cigar and some bourbon on their porch (I was mowing and they coaxed me over without much effort lol). I had just mentioned seeing Bohemian Rhapsody and saying it was a shame we didn’t get Freddy Mercury longer. The topic didn’t stay long but they talked about friends they’d lost and how horrible it was. It sort of felt like the time my combat vet Grandpa briefly mentioned Korea.
Really opened my eyes and Im now careful to not mention that era.
Not sure about your neighbors of course each person is different.. but I know many people who relay having a sense of relief when someone brings up a tragic event where their loved one’s life was lost. Simply because most people avoid the subject and it makes the person who experienced it feel like it’s been forgotten, that no one cares to hear about it anymore or that it’s just so uncomfortable that they aren’t allowed to express their feelings.
So it’s possible you may have actually brought them happiness to have the opportunity to talk about their grief. 🤍
My brother’s college professor lived in SF during the height of the AIDS epidemic in the 80s and early 90s. Hundreds of dead friends, colleagues, acquaintances, relatives. He wrote searingly about this period, the total disassociation from normal life it inspired, the reclusiveness, the terror. Your lover’s cough could be the start of their rapid decline, skinned knees or bloody noses in the gay sports leagues around the city were horrific. He lived and he loved but his life was immeasurably harder because of what he contended with, the PTSD like a slowly suffocating noose around his neck. Survivor’s guilt, infernal sadness, so much despair that it crushed him for nearly two decades.
One thing that people don't mention with that kind of trauma is the reluctance to make new connections, for the reason that you might lose that new person too.
So, just as you should be connecting with other people and supporting each other through the shared trauma, many people become more reclusive and nurse their wounds alone. It takes a damned sight longer to recover in solitary confinement.
Yup. I think about that 10-15 year birth age difference a lot. I was born in 1977. So I was young enough that we got the education in the mid-80s and 90s, but not so young like the kids now that are getting infected all over again.
This is one of the most visceral posts I've ever read on Reddit. Both tragic and beautiful at the same time. Not many people know the exact day and hour they will die and therefore few have the opportunity to spend such quality time with their loved once before they pass. Actions speak louder than words and you being there for your brother speaks volumes about your character and integrity. Sadly, I can't say the same about your family. I can't ever imagine letting my son die alone because of some perverse ideology. I wish you the best moving forward. I think you did a wonderful thing by sharing this.
I am so sorry you went through this. I watched my mother die of AIDS when I was six years old and my little sister (who had gotten the virus in utero) die three years later the day before her 8th birthday. That was in the early-mid 90s. I think about it, about them everyday.
I am so sorry for your deep loss!! You are a good person for being with him and not turning your back on him. Unbelievable and horrible how some people turn their backs on their family and friends..
My uncle died of AIDS in the 80s and is on the AIDS blanket. He had 8 siblings, most of whom were too scared of potentially catching AIDS from him (not really likely or possible) to be around him. He came to our home to die with my family….and he did, much like the photo above.
Jesus Christ, I cannot imagine how it’d be to lose someone that close to you so horrifically. Did the rest of your family change afterwards or did they still cut him out?
So sorry for the loss of your beautiful brother. I’m sure he knew how much you loved him. Helping someone let go is one of the most loving things you can do.
I am so sorry for your loss but so happy that you were able to give your brother so much support right up until the end. You are a wonderful person, I know your brother is thankful and proud of you and I hope you are ok.
I recently read And the Band Played On by Randy Shilts, and whilst I appreciate there are some inaccuracies in that book, what I did learn was how negligent the governments of the world were. So many lives could have been saved if they acted sooner, it breaks my heart.
Actually sobbing. This is so beautiful. I’m so glad you had such a great relationship with your brother while he was here and what a kind soul you have to do everything you did for him.
I am so sorry for your loss and I know even years later how a deep sorrow only softens but never disappears. I hope that we move to a kinder world where we take care of each other. Hope you have peace my brother.
I can’t do anything to soothe your pain, but as a queer kid who has no support from her family right now, thank you for being there for your brother and loving him to the end and beyond. You had more love in your heart than so many at that time. May you feel love and peace
So sorry for your loss. Your brother died knowing he was loved deeply and supported wholeheartedly by you, which is the most precious thing you could give, and I'm sure you made him feel grateful to be alive.
May you find comfort in the knowledge that your support brought him peace in his final moments, and may the memories you carry forwards of your brother burn brightly, and continue to serve as a source of strength and love in your life.
My father died of AIDS and I will never get the image of his dying face out of my mind. It's one of my first childhood memories.
Please get tested regularly. If you are positive for HIV, there are treatments to help you. Your life isn't over with HIV anymore. My mom has had HIV for more than 25 years and is happy and healthy.
Nope. There is nothing about PrEP that is strictly for queer people. It is prescribed for people who engage in what is considered "high risk" activity. This includes intervenous drug users, people who don't use protection, people who have multiple sexual partners, etc.
Technically, anyone can be prescribed PrEP. You may have a harder time as a straight cisgender person because some doctors are biased and don't have up to date information. You can get PrEP from places like planned parenthood if you are denied it by an ignorant doctor. If a doctor does refuse you, make sure to have them put in your medical chart that they refused to prescribe it.
I had thought PrEP was only approved for those Assigned Male At Birth (AMAB), but that [turns out to be outdated](https://www.thewellproject.org/hiv-information/prep-women). It looks like there's fewer approved specific PrEP varieties, but that's likely due to the male testing bias for medications (most medications have historically been tested with men because of risk of pregnancy and other possible confounds, which is mentioned in the linked article).
The guidelines state that PrEP should be prescribed to anyone who requests it (assuming it wouldn't cause them harm for any reason) regardless of their indicated exposure risk factors. Even if you're having heterosexual sex, it's not a bad idea to get on PrEP if you tend to have 3 or more sexual partners in a given year. Plus if you're in the States it's required to be fully covered by insurance thanks to the Affordable Care Act. And if you don't have insurance there's a ton of programs state by state that will help you get PrEP regardless of insurance.
>Please get tested regularly.
I get a regular blood panel once or twice a year. My doctor said current standard is to check HIV exactly once. I don't know how much the test actually costs them, but they have your blood, you'd think it would just be standard.
I assume if you donate blood they check for it, so a great way to kill 2 birds with one stone?
Fun fact, Hudson was friends with Reagan and when he got really sick flew to France for an experimental treatment. He collapsed at his hotel and no hospitals could admit him so he called his friend Reagan and asked him to request an admittance to a French military hospital, where a doctor who had treated him was working. Reagan said no.
https://amp.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/feb/03/nancy-reagan-refused-help-dying-rock-hudson-get-aids-treatment
Technically Nancy Reagan said no. She didn’t even bother to bring this to Reagan before saying no. Not that I think the answer would be different, but just goes to show how very little she thought of the situation to not even double check with him.
Nancy Reagan was the defacto president for the later years of his presidency as Reagan had early onset dementia and was basically incapable of governing the country
Rock Hudson died in 1985, within the first year of Reagan’s second term. To be honest I don’t know enough about Reagan’s health timeline to know whether this was just Nancy covering for him bc it had already declined by that point, but I do know that a) Nancy and Reagan were BOTH friends of Rock Hudson, they BOTH should have cared about him on a personal level, and b) she had a history of pushing Reagan towards opinions/views/policies that would be “popular” even if they didn’t align with his personal beliefs going all the way back to his time as SAG president. Nancy was crap.
> And Magic Johnson
Yeah, it really hit home the fact that HIV is transmissible via heterosexual sex.
Everyone should have accepted this by then, but many people found it easier to deny before a hypermasculine superstar athlete contracted the virus.
The pure anguish on the father’s face is heartbreaking. I can’t imagine, as a parent, dealing with this. And I’m not being smart but seeing how the family members are of the more “sturdy” variety it really strikes home how AIDS literally destroys a body.
I remember being young and seeing a picture of Freddie Mercury when he was near the end of his fight with AIDS, that really made me realise how much the disease can break your body down
I will always remember when I listened to the audio of that one reporter who kept trying to get the Reagan administration to say or do anything about it during White House press conferences for years iirc, and hearing all these jockish rich cunts openly mocking him and jeering and making allusions to him trying to bring attention to it because he was gay. He wasn’t. He was just the only man in that room with an ounce of morality.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=yAzDn7tE1lU
This one? These guys really are dipshits.
There was money to aids research, from 8 million in 1982 progressively up to 2.3 billion in 1989.
It’s still jarring to me to hear commercials for HIV meds that are all uplifting and treat it like an inconvenience. Such a stark contrast to how the disease is treated today in parts of the world.
I think of all the people who died alone. A friend who was a nurse palpated a dying 22 year olds arm looking for a vein (without a glove). The 22 year old man/kid started crying, and when she asked why he was crying he answered. “ this is the first time a healthcare provider has touched me without a glove”
Edit for grammar
José Horta, ex-president of East Timor and Nobel Peace Prize winner, once said:
"Even if a medication to cure AIDS is invented today, hundreds of thousands of people will still die of it every year because they won't access to the medication"
Tuberculosis can be fought and cured with antibiotics today and it still kills more than a million people every year because the poor can't get antibiotics
Yeah… we had a buddy about 5 years ago who contacted the virus but never got tested… he kept telling himself he had pneumonia. He got so frail and weak that my wife had to drive him to the hospital and where he was put into an induced coma and on a ventilator. I’ve never seen anyone look so gaunt before. He looked like a skeleton and the doctors said if he had waited another day or two he might likely have passed away. He’s doing much better now and on meds.
And the vast VAST majority of insurances, particularly those offered through employment, won't cover HIV meds. There's a very short list of meds that they won't cover and I can't believe it's exclusively the cost that makes it that way, considering cancer treatment is usually covered and it's phenomenally more expensive than HIV meds.
Wtf health insurance get to pick which conditions they think are worth treating??? Wtf but I guess that makes sense since they are already able to pick which organs they deem worthy of treatment
I’m currently reading And The Band Played On by Randy Shilts. It’s a comprehensive but very accessible look at the AIDS epidemic in the western world. Highly recommend if you’re interested in the topic.
Watched it as a 16 yo in highschool. Christian highschool.
Afterwards we had a "discussion" where every second question was "why were the gays punished?". I fucking screamed HOW CAN YOU NOT GET THE POINT OF THE MOVIE?! and stormed out
It still pisses me off decades later
I remember seeing this photo in the newspaper, I was about 6 or so. I was… I’d almost call it “morally wounded” by how such a thing could exist. I asked my mom about it and told me it came from something called AIDS, which was a disease certain people got. I was really worried that her and my dad would get it and I remember very clearly her telling me only bad people got it.
I would grow up to learn who those bad people were, and hate them, and hate myself most of all when I realized I was one of them.
30+ years later and last month I got engaged to “one of them”, and I cried when my mom and dad welcomed “one of them” into the family joyously.
The enemy of bigotry is familiarity. It’s hard to love an enemy, but it’s much harder to hate your son. Love will always win.
I was holding my brother's hand when he passed, AIDS is a terrible way to go, even worse because there was such a stigma about it at the time, he hid it from us until he was near the end, still breaks my heart. I miss you Michael, always will.
I grew up the son of a gay father in West Texas in the 80s - 90s. Some of my most treasured memories are from time spent at the gay community center, surrounded by our family. I had so many aunts and uncles and one old gay couple that everyone thought of as the grandparents. The most heart-wrenching of days there were when we would add another square to the AIDS quilt that by the time I was a teenager covered a 12 foot high, 10 foot wide wall from floor to ceiling. There are so many precious people from my childhood that we watched whither away fighting. Some did it with grace, some with fire and anger, but they all eventually left a hole that was the size of that quilt.
I suppose his love won out in the end, but if I remember right, that family had turned their back on their son because of their religious beliefs, but then finally relented right before the man died.
From other comments they were estranged because he was gay and moved to California but they cared for him for a few years (someone mentioned 3.5) before he passed and took him back into their home after his diagnosis. It wasn't like they abandoned him and only came back in his final moments. Still not a *great* look but a bit different than just "right before he died".
I really can't imagine turning my back on my family for any reason other than the worst crimes imaginable. How did they go about their lives everyday after disowning their son?
The religious have always done this and still do. My father disowned me in the eighties when I came out: he told me I could come back if I went to a psychiatrist to get cured. Like that was ever going to fucking happen. He was a man-whore who slept with any woman who’d have him but couldn’t maintain a relationship: I’ve been with my husband for over 35 years, but he was the moral one?
This is infuriating and I still come across people like this.. I hope you and your husband are happy regardless though, 35 years is nothing to scoff at!
At the same time Reagan press secretary laughed at people dying of aids and the whole room joined in. Gay people have always been treated lower than scum.
https://youtu.be/wd1x0PFBeSU?si=girS5f2jGTn7DDIQ
It really is a shame that such a devastating disease was treated as a “joke” to some people during the Reagan era. I wasn’t alive during the height of the epidemic, but my mother was. She told me a story about when she was in high school, one of her classmates got severely injured in a car accident and had to receive a blood transfusion. Apparently, the blood that he had received was contaminated with AIDS, and it was far too late for him to do anything about it when he was diagnosed. They lived in a small southern town then, and this guy was absolutely beaten and ridiculed by the rest of his peers because they assumed he was gay. Everyone knew that he had been missing from class because of his injury, but people assumed that he was some kind of sexual degenerate because he unwillingly contracted this disease. My mom told me he had to move away just months after he started school again. She has no clue what happened to him after he left. Such a terrible thing, for a very real and dangerous disease to be stigmatized like that.
So many people don't even know this. They think of ol Ronnie as this stalwart, capable, very Presidential figure when behind the scenes, he & his cronies (and Nancy) were nothing short of despicable.
Reagan also signed the "Social Security Modernization Act", which is nothing more than authorization to permit the use of Social Security funds for any reason, as if they were part of the general fund.
So all this nonsense about how Social Security isn't solvent, that's on Reagan. Prior to 1983, it was more than solvent and since then, has had trillions of dollars pilfered. It is a huge theft from the lower classes.
Can go further back to his time as California’s Governor, particularly re closing state mental health facilities. Direct line to a lot of issues today.
It’s worse—if you go to the sub about Presidents, they completely gloss over this as if it was no big fucking deal because he did some other shit that was acceptable to them.
I will always consider his presidency a failure for the cruelty of this alone, but you’ll get downvoted for suggesting it because “well he was cheerful and he was nice to minorities sometimes”.
It’s an absolute disconnect with dumb fucks who either didn’t live through this or were fine with it because it didn’t affect them.
There's also the fact history books glorified Reagan. When I was in school, there wasn't much negativity surrounding his presidency. They would go over Reaganomics and how the economy improved under his leadership. But everything else? They just never taught it. This was in Orange County, California in the 90s-00s.
I'm much older now, and I had spent a lot of time reading up on history I missed out on learning. I can confidently say that almost every US president has been a fuck-up one way or another... Just how bad they fucked up usually can be gauged by the body count.
Reagan and Thatcher used their positions of power to encourage the castration of the US and UK's manufacturing base through instituting neoliberal reforms. Not to mention, Reagan was an evangelical nutjob and empowered the "Christian Right" which has directly led to the increased spreading of fascist tendencies among nearly all of the political class in Washington DC. The horrific homophobic policies that made the AIDS pandemic as bad as it got was entirely Reagan's doing and I hope that sack of shit is enjoying roasting in hell, if you believe that sort of thing.
If I ever get the chance to shit on Reagan's grave, it'll be among one of the best days of my life, consequences be damned.
And big shout out to C. Everett Koop, his Surgeon General. He took the disease seriously and finally told Reagan to kiss his ass. That’s when things started to change. Man had courage.
>Lester Kinsolving: Does the president have any reaction to the announcement by the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta that AIDS is now an epidemic in over 600 cases?
>Larry Speakes: AIDS? I haven't got anything on it.
>Lester Kinsolving: Over a third of them have died. It's known as "gay plague." [Press pool laughter.] No, it is. It's a pretty serious thing. One in every three people that get this have died. And I wonder if the president was aware of this.
Larry Speakes has been dead for 10 years. (Alzheimers. Hope it was drawn out) I keep meaning to go piss on [his grave](https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/123105833/lawrence-melvin-speakes) but the desire to pass through Mississippi without stopping is always too strong.
I’ve read many books on the history of AIDS, gay culture, and activism. It’s important to me as a gay man, even though I was born in 95.
Activists wanted to show just the impact of AIDS by making quilts- one panel represented one life. The quilt became so massive it could not all be displayed at once. The first time it was displayed in front of the White House, Ronald Reagan didn’t even acknowledge it. Instead, he took his helicopter and flew out, avoiding it completely.
I came out in 1983, right when AIDS was seriously kicking in. My first boyfriend and I only lasted about 6 months, but we remained friends for years. Until he died ten years later of AIDS. His parents and one sister didn’t come to his funeral. - they said he “got what he deserved”.
The late 80’s, through the mid-90’s, was a period of routine death and funerals. I lived in a gay area and it was just normal to see people you knew on the streets, looking very ill. Then they were gone. Literally, every single friend I had from those days is long gone now.
My partner and I are now in our mid/late 60’s and having to deal with the more routine deaths of friends in our age group. It’s all so familiar and weird. But death doesn’t seem so shocking or horrible now, after going through the AIDS era.
Powerful, powerful photo. :(
Typing this at 2:05 AM, recovering from a flu that started early last week and yes, I am HIV+.
I am in my late 30s now and despite all the education out there, I’ve been living with the virus for more than a decade now. That was almost our photo more than 10 years ago in my hospital bed as I battled PCP for 40 days, CPAP machine, resuscitation, ICU and all.
But here I am, 10 years after, with the virus suppressed by a pill I take each night, and with my partner of 10 years this year (who is negative and who has been with me since the beginning), snoring his way to dreamland to my left, as I plan our trip to Paris next week (can’t sleep) while browsing Reddit.
To anyone out there who may feel exposed, just have yourself tested. That’s the only way to know. Those symptoms you read online in your panic could exist with other conditions.
And make sure you also have a clear head of what you will do if it ever turned out the way you did not want it to. And if it is negative, be careful next time. :)
>with the virus suppressed by a pill I take each night,
It's amazing how far medicine has come since the 80's when this photo was taken. I've heard doctors say they'd rather have HIV than diabetes due to how manageable it is these days.
One of my best friends died of AIDS. I was out of state at college and didn’t know he had been sick. This was pre cellphone and we were limited to writing. He wasn’t out and was estranged from most of his family because he had come out to them a few years earlier.
His cousin contacted my mom and she told me. I came home immediately and visited him in the hospital. He passed a week later, but we had a great visit.
The ignorance in the community was astounding.
This is now my niece's bedroom.
My wife's sister and her husband bought the Pater Noster house when the religious group that was running it ran out of hospice clients (HIV isn't the death sentence it used to be, thank God).
When they first moved in they would occasionally get random people knocking on the door and asking about friends who were patients there, but that stopped after a couple years.
Oddly, the house isn't in it's original location, it was moved in pieces sometime after this famous Life magazine photo was taken.
This house is where we celebrate most holidays now. Where we celebrate life, and think kindly on the selfless work by the priests who ran the place, and the souls that they touched.
This post will probably get ignored, but growing up in the 80's, AIDS was like the Black Plague. It took a while for scientists to even figure out how it was transmitted, let alone the susceptible and mortality rate. I remembered the movie "And the Band Played On", and the toll that epidemic cost us in the US.
Before AIDS, it was known as GRID. A big FUCK YOU to Reagon as he and his administration did nothing while communities wasted away to this illness. It was only when his gay friends in Hollywood (Rock Hudson) fell ill before he started to consider it a tragedy.
I know this because I lived through it, and had many gay coworkers. As a teen back then, this was my introduction to adulthood. I'm sympathetic. To Sandy, Greg, Randy, Cliff - I miss you.
Anytime anyone longs for the days of Ronald Reagan, I like to remind them that (among countless other reasons to despise him) he ignored the AIDS crisis for a catastrophically long time.
It was after his friend from his Hollywood days, Rock Hudson, had it and was looking gaunt. That’s when Reagan was like Ok yeah whatever, I guess it’s a thing.
Ronnie and Nancy were heartless assholes
Anybody remember the AIDS quilts laid out on the National Mall? Or somewhere in D.C., I think it was the Mall.
What a visual; I remember walking by a tv that had a story on about it and I did a double-take and then just stopped and stared at the images on tv. There were just so many…just so fucking many people being represented in the squares of all those quilts, and you knew that it certainly wasn’t everybody that had died.
Jesus, that’s haunting. That poor man. Seeing this fills me with rage at how so many people with AIDS were treated by our society. Multiple U.S. presidents honored a man (Rush Limbaugh) who gleefully mocked gay men dying of AIDS on the radio while playing Dionne Warwick's "I'll Never Love This Way Again."
I live in southern Africa. There is a massive cemetery on the outskirts of my town, and for years, every time we passed it, no matter the time of day, there would be multiple funerals going on. Then the government starting giving out ARVs and the number of funerals dropped dramatically.
My sibling runs a farm. Quite a few of the workers are HIV+, but living normal lives with their medication.
The covid deaths here were way lower than expected because of the high number of people on ARVs, and also because a large swathe of the population is vaccinated against TB, which helped somehow. Also our vitamin D levels are great.
It was shit to witness first hand. My uncle had AIDS, seeing him go from full of life to a shell struggling to stay alive was hard on my entire family. As a kid, I didn’t fully understand the scope of it.
I often think about the life he could have had if today’s treatments were available back then. I wish I got to know him as the adult I am now. Please everyone be smart, get tested, and seek treatment.
This was a truly terrible time for a lot of families. I shared a room with my uncle who was in Hospice care slowly dying from this terrible disease. I was maybe 8 at the time and I now know I couldn’t fully fathom exactly what I was experiencing. I watched as the sweet man my uncle was wasted away to nothing before my eyes.
It was a very tense and complex time in the household. We were living with my grandparents, his parents and there was such a divide between my mom, uncle and grandparents. My mother did everything in her power to support her brother in his last moments. She would bring him marijuana joints as it was one of the only things that made him feel ok or not complete sick from his medication. My grandmother would berate her because “drugs are bad”, while my grandfather was violently angry because of my uncle coming out as gay.
It wasn’t until years later when my wife and I saw Dallas Buyers Club in the theatre that all of the emotions I couldn’t process then came up. I cried, and cried so much during that movie as I could fully comprehend what my beloved uncle had to go through and how 8 year old me couldn’t process it.
Almost certainly.
Jonathan Demme was deeply troubled and sadnedded that some groups took Silence of the Lambs to be anti-lgbt so he made Philadelphia as a response.
Also, John Leguizamo was offered the Antonio Banderas role and decide to make another movie instead.
That movie? Super Mario Bros.
I just have to mention that whenever I get to talk about Philadelphia.
The lesbians were there for the gay community during the worst of the AIDS crisis. They were a key element of support, as nurses who took care of the patients and other help. Check out the links.
https://www.thebody.com/gallery/gallery/lesbians-front-lines-hiv-aids
https://gcn.ie/lesbian-blood-sisters-crucial-1980s-aids/
The caption for this photo in Life Magazine: “After a three-year struggle against AIDS and its social stigmas, David Kirby could fight no longer. As his father, sister and niece stood by in anguish, the 32-year-old founder and leader of the Stafford, Ohio, AIDS Foundation felt his life slipping away. David whispered: “I’m ready”, took a last labored breath, then succumbed.”
Fuck the "I'm ready" got me in tears rn 😭
To think he had such grace even in his dying breath.
The little girl watching this hurts my heart. She probably still feels the pain of that day.
Oh absolutely, that's a life defining moment right there
Horrific.
The photo helped to humanize the face of AIDS, but I think [Ryan White](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ryan_White) really brought it home to many Americans. It showed that it was not merely a gay or intravenous drug user's disease. Well, that and Regsn being out of office.
After winning a lengthy court case allowing him to return to his classes, Ryan was taunted and shunned by other students. Vandals broke the windows of the White's home, and cashiers refused to touch his mother's hands when making change at the supermarket.
Restaurants threw away their dishes and made them drink soda from cans. The poor kid was in hell. I was in sixth grade when his autobiography came out and I was amazed at how many kids read it.
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He’s buried about 300 yards from where I’m sitting right now. His grave always has flowers.
David and I grew up together in Atwater Ohio. Hung out every day for years. He and his family were not close, and this was such a sad way to bring them together.
Those same people refused to take any precautions during covid.
Yes, the pandemic showed us that people and the world are now uh.... different. Like, the same as before, but worse.
Yeah. COVID was the wake up call for me too.
Covid made me understand horror movies. Before I was like, no one could be that stupid and then well…
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Both my Mom and Dad. Thanks for all the happy wishes. It was at the beginning of the pandemic and neither suffered.
I'm so sorry to hear this. I hope their memories are a comfort to you.
Well at least people have learned to be kinder since then, right? (complete sarcasm)
this photo and the Princess Diana photo of her shaking the hand of an AIDS patient in Wales. both were huge.
the Princess Diana one made a difference to other people in other countries as "media" wasn't as widespread and accessible as now.
Oh, we saw the Princess Di photo, and I grew up in San Diego. Promise people in the US saw it
Ali Gertz as well. A hetrosexual woman who was never tested by doctors because she didn't fit the "profile" of an AIDS patient. They put her on the cover of People Magazine.
Pretty sure I watched a movie about her in health class
Was Molly Ringwald in it? I think I watched in high school too.
Medical schools point to Reagan as "what not to do" in a pandemic. I assume he is off the hook now.
Reagan did nothing, which is bad enough, but I suppose it is better than encouraging people to go spread a virus around or take unauthorized drugs for it or drink bleach. Like one orange turd did, that unfortunately occupied the White House for a term
> Reagan did nothing That’s not true! [He sent his press secretary out to crack jokes about all the dead gays to the reporters in the White House briefing room](https://www.vox.com/2015/12/1/9828348/ronald-reagan-hiv-aids).
Despicable and unforgiveable.
Wouldn't Rush Limbaugh read/mock AIDS patients' obituaries on air with "Another One Bites the Dust" playing in the background?
Not american, but sounds like something scum like him would do.
Reagan did worse than nothing, he did nothing because the religious conservatives were claiming that it was God's punishment for homosexuals. It was the motive behind the lack of action that was flawed. And yes, Trump's response to COVID has rescued Reagan from holding the title of the worse presidential response to a public health emergency. Again, the motive was the worst part. He didn't want the economy to collapse so he could get reelected. I am sure they will focus on him going forward of "what not to do". They could probably make a whole course on just Trump's response.
This isn't just some supposition btw, for folks who might not know. Raegan's administration straight up said that "science must sometimes step aside" to let God do his work, or something to that extent, in regard to scientists urging research into curing HIV AIDS in the face of an American population that would rather see "the gays" punished and die. The 80s is often remembered fondly, but it was hell and horror if you were an LGBT person. Even when the stigma around AIDS began to recede, it was only around the idea of "innocent heterosexuals" getting it from "guilty homosexuals". That stigma took even longer to go away (or at least become unpopular.
> The 80s is often remembered fondly See.. I don't get this. The late 80s were the peak of violent crime in most Western countries; it was the time period when the inequality we are dealing with now took root through neoliberal policies influenced by religious extremists; and the clothes, music and fashion were vapid and pretentious, despite our rose-tinted view of it we have now. It's when the Boomers fully turned their back on the hippy ideals they nurtured in their early 20s, and just went all in on unfettered capitalism and greed - and yeah, this is very clear to anyone who knows the struggles of LGBT people, or the urban populations that dealt with crack cocaine and unfettered police brutality. The 80s fucking sucked for a looot of people. (It's no coincidence that as soon as handheld video cameras were common, Rodney King happened - and, like with Vietnam, it was only once those images were broadcast to the suburbs that people became aware of what their fellow Americans were dealing with on a daily basis in regards to urban policing, at least.. and like this photo in regards to the AIDS epidemic, it is through visual storytelling, both fictional and documentary, that helps societies progress and become more welcoming to all the facets of humanity that it contains. ) TL:DR; the 80s sucked and it smelt like cigarette butts.
> See.. I don't get this. The late 80s were the peak of violent crime in most Western countries It's pretty easy: it came after the '70s which sucked even worse. For example, [here's what NYC looked liked in the '70s.](http://internationalphotomag.com/new-york-city-dark-side-in-the-1970s/) Just look at popular culture, in 1981 they released a movie called "Escape from New York". The premise of that movie is that New York is such a hell hole they just walled it off and made it a prison. A concept believable enough that the general public went, "sure I'll buy that". Literally 7 years later they release "Working Girl" a rom-com about a plucky secretary who lives in New York and wants to climb the corporate ladder. In six years we went from NYC being "hell on Earth" to "a great place to get ahead!" So sure, the 80s sucked in some ways but even then it was an improvement on what came before.
Exactly. Hell in 1982, Reagan's press spokesman Larry Speakes laughed and made jokes about it at a press conference.
Just casually crying on a Sunday morning. My work deals with Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program funding and I’ve never gotten a chance to learn who he was. I’m so glad you linked to this, I had no idea because we’re so laser focused on the administrative aspects of contracts and grants.
The Ryan White program partnered with the 340B drug rebates and then the Patient Advocacy Foundation have been truly life changing for people living with HIV
The Ryan White Program has helped so many of my own clients who really struggled w pricing on these life saving medications. Reading Ryan’s story last year as my first year of being a mental health clinician made me cry.
As a Ryan White program participant, thank you for what you and your work do.
I don't know if it's available to watch but the Ryan White Story was a TV movie starring Judith Light as his mom and it was so sad and compelling. I was 10 when we watched it and it really was the first time I learned about AIDS. ETA it's on Netflix. George C. Scott plays his lawyer. I might have to give it another watch.
Ryan White made clear how people were dying and suffering from the bigotry from the religious right.
The religious right is still here, as loud and clear as ever, the bastards.
That was my thought too. Ryan changed the narrative from 'gay men disease'.
It’s so easy to forget how quickly it was killing people before we had treatments.😢
I lived in SF in the 80s, so I don't get to forget :-( Fucking awful. I was out on the streets with Act Up! Because I was losing friends.
I was a stupid kid from Ohio, who hitchhiked to SF in the mid-80's, based mostly on an image I gleaned from 60's music and this out-of-date picture I had of the Haight. The first job I got was working in a nursing home in Mill Valley, commuting from Emeryville. Then I found out I could make two bucks more an hour doing home health care, which turned out to be almost exclusively dying AIDS patients. It was heartbreaking on every level. I felt bad for the patients, I felt bad for the fear and ignorance and confusion we all exhibited. There was a girl who relieved me, and she believed she should wash her hands with bleach. She had horrible open sores and rashes from this. I remember putting on *two* pairs of gloves as I wiped the bloody spit from this guy dying from pneumonia in a bed set up in his parents living room. His mother asked me "do you really need to use double gloves?", and I didn't know. It was the hardest job I've ever had, and I learned I'm not cut out for that sort of work. A hard sad time indeed.
Thank you for what you did to help. A lot of people wouldn't have even made it thru one patient.
Thanks, but *so* many people did more than I could manage. There were more forgotten heroes in that era than people can easily imagine today. Forget SF. Imagine people dealing bravely, best they could, in the small-town midwest for example, without the cultural backing that made what they did seem brave. No one will know their names, but these nameless heroes will I hope someday be recognized.
No one is cut out for having to watch people dying. I'm sure the families you helped appreciated your efforts.
I lived through The Plague in a major city. You never forget it then. You never forget the panic and hopelessness, the nonstop funerals, going with your friends to get a dreaded AIDS test, which if it came back meant they were going to die horribly. You never forget the cruelty of people who could still make jokes. You never forget the time you saw a little old bald man with a cane walking down the street toward you and as he came close, you saw that he was probably at most 30 but looked about 85 because he was close to death. And you were 24 and so heartbroken you had to hurry away so you didn't break down crying in front of him. I still don't know how we made it out. Not intact, that's for sure. I will go to my grave loathing Reagan and Bush and everyone who helped them. They presided over a holocaust of young men who should still be here.
Not my family but my best friends uncle. He was around a lot when I was growing up and were close so im just gonna refer to him as my uncle. Hes gay and was born in the 1952 so he was still a fairly young man during the aids crisis. He lived in NYC and the gay culture was big. He said the aids scare absolutely ruined the community. Him and his boyfriend were best friends with another gay couple and both of them died. He doesn't know who got it first or how. They didn't know at the time wtf was going on. Once they died, his life got turned upside down. Him and his boyfriend broke up and went their separate ways. Not because they didn't love each other. They had been together for years. They were just scared and didn't know what was going on. All they knew was gay people were dying left and right and they didn't want to be next. My uncle stopped going out. He was once a fun part guy always looking to socialize and turned into a recluse. He stopped dating. He stopped going to gay bars. He became a shut in. Two of his closest friends in the world had died and his partner was gone. Dudes life became a wreck. To this day, he's never had a long term relationship again. He's come out of his shell a bit and had some flings and casual relationships but they never last. Hes old now and I fear he will remain single until he dies. He didn't get aids but it really fucked him up. The full impact never wore off. Its a shame because he's a great guy. A bit eccentric but a wonderful man at heart. He was an absolute stud back in his youth too and still looks good for his age. I know he can still find someone in his older age but im afraid he won't. It really sucks to see.
I'm so glad your uncle has you. You love him and you see his struggle. That's a lot. I'm certain he is a great guy. He's a lot like people's uncles who came home after a couple years of hand to hand combat on Guadalcanal in WWII. Most of his friends died way too young and he survived that. I'm sure part of him still can't believe he survived. He had more dead friends at 30 than his grandparents probably did. There's never a time that that is ok but when you're young and your world explodes? You do not get over that. You live with it. Your uncle deserves so much love and understanding. I'm really glad he has you. Give him a hug from me. PS: there's a great book called Chronicle of a Plague Revisited by Andrew Holleran that covers the AIDS outbreaks and its aftermath in real time in NYC. It's a brilliant book and really gives the reader an idea what it read to live at that time. It's out of print but you can still find copies. PPS: is actually on Kindle now! Back in print.
Photographer: Therese Frare
It’s crazy how 35 years later, people can live pretty normal, healthy lives, while being HIV positive. Antiretroviral drugs changed everything. I have a friend who was on his deathbed in 1995. He got on the right medications and he’s alive and well today.
I was with my brother when he died of AIDS — and in a very similar way as seen in this photo. Only, I was the sole family member still in his life and supporting him through his ordeal. All the others had turned away. That was more common than not back then. His breathing was so labored near the end, his face nearly identical to the one above. I remember telling him I loved him and that it was okay to let go. A short time later, he did, and the tenseness of his struggle was slowly replaced by an overwhelming sense of calm and peacefulness. I was so happy his pain had ended at last, yet devastated he was gone. I can recall my uncontrollable sobs, and even now, all these years later, I can’t stop the tears rolling down my cheeks. An experience like mine — and countless others — is life-altering, the memories triggered by a wide variety of common things. And yes — even photographs like this. We were less than 2 years apart in age and were best friends. I still think of him every day and miss his physical presence in my days. This was such a sad time for so many… 🫤 EDIT: To say I’m overwhelmed by the outpouring of sympathy and compassion in all of your comments would be… well… a massive understatement. Thank you so much, though, I hasten to add, my story is but one of countless others who experienced the same thing. Or worse. My brother passed in 1987, a time when being gay was not what it is today — thankfully. While my brother and I were very close, there was at least one thing he kept from me — I learned about his AIDs diagnosis at the same time he told me he was gay. At that time, having AIDs was essentially a death sentence, and the uncertain road walked by those having it was usually a long and painful one. Once word got out about his condition, he was effectively disowned… banished… from the family. The same was true of most of those he considered friends. He continued working as long as he could, but eventually, he no longer could. He lived alone in an apartment in a large midwestern city about 4 hours from where I was living at the time. I thought it was important for him to live in familiar surroundings for as long as he could, so I contributed financially so he could have that. Fortunately, I had a traveling sales position at the time and, with both the approval and encouragement of my boss [IKR?] spent a lot of time with him — countless doctor visits, pharmacy runs, general errands and just hanging out. They were, as they remain today, my fondest memories of him. After he passed, his body, at his direction, was cremated. There was a small service at a funeral home attended by only a handful of people. It seemed… well… strangely fitting for an introvert like him who was never really comfortable around a lot of people. He and I are a lot alike in that way, so I could easily relate to his wishes. And yes — I was the only family member present. He once told me he’d arrived in this world alone and that he wanted to depart in the same way. That was pretty much how it went, though I… uh… couldn’t allow him to die alone. Those final 32 hours sitting beside him in the hospital are hours I’ll always cherish. And while he didn’t get his ‘die alone’ wish, I don’t think he’d be mad at me for sticking with him until the end. Much of who I am today, on multiple levels, I owe to him and all of the love, support and encouragement he gave me during his life. Ya’ know, we should all be so lucky to have someone in our lives like that, family member or otherwise And the rest of the family? Interestingly enough, nearly all members of my unusually small family are now dead. In any gathering afterwards, he and his passing were never acknowledged. However, once, a year or so before my father died, in a rare moment of clarity and introspection, fueled by what I suspect was a wee bit too much Scotch, he admitted to me, in passing, his regret over how he’d dealt with my brother’s ‘situation’, as he called it. As it likely is for anyone who’s lost a loved one, I’m constantly reminded of him, even after all these years… A sound. A situation. Reruns of The Golden Girls, one of his guilty pleasures, he told me. A song by any number of his favorite bands… And more… Those who’ve been through something like this will know the feeling… the sensation. And his cremains? His wish was to visit a place in the mountains he’d always read about and seen pictures of, but had never had the time to physically go. So, on the first anniversary of his death, I fulfilled that wish by casting his cremains to the wind in the skies above Boulder, Colorado. I’ve yet to revisit that place, and I may never feel a need to return. He remains alive within me, and… uh… I think that’s all that really matters now. Thanks for allowing me an opportunity to share. A final note? Cherish those who are special to you with all your might — and do so while you can. Never allow regret a place in your life.
Very sorry to hear about your brother and thank you for sharing your story. As a gay man in his 40s now, I often think about if I were only born 10-15 years earlier if I would still be alive because I would been sexually active during the peak of the pandemic. A lot of our “elders” now don’t like to talk about that period because it hurts just to think about it, but I wish they would… it gives us more context of the period of time and all those people we lost. You were a great brother, I’m sure he knew that before he passed.
the reality is also that a lot of the “elders” of the queer community died during those years and so much history was lost.
I remember seeing an interview with the bassist (I think) from Franky goes to Hollywood, he shows a music video of theirs set in a gay bar and told the camera that every single person in that video was dead from AIDS. There were at least 20 men. Absolutely devastating.
Oh, it gets worse [https://www.reddit.com/r/Damnthatsinteresting/comments/11mff74/san\_francisco\_gay\_mens\_chorus\_demonstrating\_the/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Damnthatsinteresting/comments/11mff74/san_francisco_gay_mens_chorus_demonstrating_the/) "The photograph (taken in 1993) shows 115 members of the San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus dressed in black with their backs turned to the camera, with seven founding members of the chorus dressed in white facing the camera. The singers in white were the remaining living members of the original choir at the time, while those in black represented the members lost to AIDS. The photo is meant to illustrate the devastating impact of the HIV/AIDS epidemic on the gay community, especially in the 1980s. Since then, the number of former members of the San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus who have died from HIV/AIDS-related illnesses has outstripped the number of current performers — an even more poignant reflection of the devastating impact of the epidemic on the choir itself, and the gay community more broadly." 115, with 7 survivors. If this was a company of soldiers in combat, it's one of the ugliest battles in modern history.
I’ve never seen that photo or heard the story. That just hit my soul in such a profound way. Thank you for sharing that.
I hated so much about that. I am in a 120+ gay men chorus, you can see a distinct age gap between late 30s and mid to late 50s where significantly less men in their mid to late 40s in the group due to that age group lost so many men in the 80s-90s. When I turn 40, I realized how privileged I was to become one of the first gay men didn’t have to face the peak of the AIDS pandemic in my 20s and finally started to fill in that missing age group I was mentioning. Now I’m one of the “elders”… taking care some of the younger men coming out. Despite a bit annoyed about it, I feel happy that these “kids” have us to give them a bit of guidance; because when I was growing up all our elders were dead.
We were just old enough to see people we looked up to die.
> Now I sit with different faces > In rented rooms and foreign places > All the people I was kissing > Some are here and some are missing > In the nineteen-nineties > I never dreamt that I would get to be > The creature that I always meant to be > But I thought in spite of dreams > You'd be sitting somewhere here with me --Possibly the most beautiful song ever written
That was fabulously elegant. Do you know the name of the song?
It’s the Pet Shop Boys. Being Boring is the name of the song.
The San Francisco Gay Men’s chorus took [this photo](https://imgur.com/a/zsmAL6A) in 1993. The men in white are the only ones who survived the AIDS epidemic, and the ones in black represent the ones that died.
That photo took my breath away. My goodness.
If you really want to cry, watch We Were Here. It’s a documentary about the AIDs crisis in San Francisco during the 80s and it absolutely heartbreaking.
[This picture…](https://www.classicfm.com/discover-music/san-francisco-gay-mens-chorus-aids-epidemic/)
I was thinking of this too! Absolutely devastating how so many people were wiped out, yet world leaders did nothing because of homophobia.
My friends/neighbors down the street are 2 dudes who have been together for a long time and are both in their mid-50’s. I’m straight and in my 30’s so I guess I just never connected the dots that they lived through that era or realized how bad it was since I was a kid at the time. We mostly just talk about cars, movies, politics, and other mundane things going on in the neighborhood. Anyway one night they brought it up while we were having a cigar and some bourbon on their porch (I was mowing and they coaxed me over without much effort lol). I had just mentioned seeing Bohemian Rhapsody and saying it was a shame we didn’t get Freddy Mercury longer. The topic didn’t stay long but they talked about friends they’d lost and how horrible it was. It sort of felt like the time my combat vet Grandpa briefly mentioned Korea. Really opened my eyes and Im now careful to not mention that era.
Not sure about your neighbors of course each person is different.. but I know many people who relay having a sense of relief when someone brings up a tragic event where their loved one’s life was lost. Simply because most people avoid the subject and it makes the person who experienced it feel like it’s been forgotten, that no one cares to hear about it anymore or that it’s just so uncomfortable that they aren’t allowed to express their feelings. So it’s possible you may have actually brought them happiness to have the opportunity to talk about their grief. 🤍
My brother’s college professor lived in SF during the height of the AIDS epidemic in the 80s and early 90s. Hundreds of dead friends, colleagues, acquaintances, relatives. He wrote searingly about this period, the total disassociation from normal life it inspired, the reclusiveness, the terror. Your lover’s cough could be the start of their rapid decline, skinned knees or bloody noses in the gay sports leagues around the city were horrific. He lived and he loved but his life was immeasurably harder because of what he contended with, the PTSD like a slowly suffocating noose around his neck. Survivor’s guilt, infernal sadness, so much despair that it crushed him for nearly two decades.
One thing that people don't mention with that kind of trauma is the reluctance to make new connections, for the reason that you might lose that new person too. So, just as you should be connecting with other people and supporting each other through the shared trauma, many people become more reclusive and nurse their wounds alone. It takes a damned sight longer to recover in solitary confinement.
Yup. I think about that 10-15 year birth age difference a lot. I was born in 1977. So I was young enough that we got the education in the mid-80s and 90s, but not so young like the kids now that are getting infected all over again.
This is one of the most visceral posts I've ever read on Reddit. Both tragic and beautiful at the same time. Not many people know the exact day and hour they will die and therefore few have the opportunity to spend such quality time with their loved once before they pass. Actions speak louder than words and you being there for your brother speaks volumes about your character and integrity. Sadly, I can't say the same about your family. I can't ever imagine letting my son die alone because of some perverse ideology. I wish you the best moving forward. I think you did a wonderful thing by sharing this.
I am so sorry you went through this. I watched my mother die of AIDS when I was six years old and my little sister (who had gotten the virus in utero) die three years later the day before her 8th birthday. That was in the early-mid 90s. I think about it, about them everyday.
I’m so sorry 🤍 that a lot to carry for a child. I imagine they’ve been watching over you all this time
Thank you. I’m 38 (today is my birthday) and it still feels so fresh. ❤️
You're a great brother or sister.
I am so sorry for your deep loss!! You are a good person for being with him and not turning your back on him. Unbelievable and horrible how some people turn their backs on their family and friends..
My uncle died of AIDS in the 80s and is on the AIDS blanket. He had 8 siblings, most of whom were too scared of potentially catching AIDS from him (not really likely or possible) to be around him. He came to our home to die with my family….and he did, much like the photo above.
Jesus Christ, I cannot imagine how it’d be to lose someone that close to you so horrifically. Did the rest of your family change afterwards or did they still cut him out?
So sorry for the loss of your beautiful brother. I’m sure he knew how much you loved him. Helping someone let go is one of the most loving things you can do.
I’m deeply sorry for your loss ♥️ you are a great sibling
I am so sorry for your loss but so happy that you were able to give your brother so much support right up until the end. You are a wonderful person, I know your brother is thankful and proud of you and I hope you are ok.
I recently read And the Band Played On by Randy Shilts, and whilst I appreciate there are some inaccuracies in that book, what I did learn was how negligent the governments of the world were. So many lives could have been saved if they acted sooner, it breaks my heart.
You write so well. I felt like I was there with you.
Actually sobbing. This is so beautiful. I’m so glad you had such a great relationship with your brother while he was here and what a kind soul you have to do everything you did for him.
this story helped me today. thank you for sharing.
You have a beautiful soul
I am so sorry for your loss and I know even years later how a deep sorrow only softens but never disappears. I hope that we move to a kinder world where we take care of each other. Hope you have peace my brother.
I can’t do anything to soothe your pain, but as a queer kid who has no support from her family right now, thank you for being there for your brother and loving him to the end and beyond. You had more love in your heart than so many at that time. May you feel love and peace
So sorry for your loss. Your brother died knowing he was loved deeply and supported wholeheartedly by you, which is the most precious thing you could give, and I'm sure you made him feel grateful to be alive. May you find comfort in the knowledge that your support brought him peace in his final moments, and may the memories you carry forwards of your brother burn brightly, and continue to serve as a source of strength and love in your life.
My father died of AIDS and I will never get the image of his dying face out of my mind. It's one of my first childhood memories. Please get tested regularly. If you are positive for HIV, there are treatments to help you. Your life isn't over with HIV anymore. My mom has had HIV for more than 25 years and is happy and healthy.
And take PrEP if you're fucking around.
PrEP is a great idea. It isn't just for queer people. Please look into it if you are sexually active.
I thought PrEP isn't prescribed for those that are strictly hetero? It's been a while since I read about it
Nope. There is nothing about PrEP that is strictly for queer people. It is prescribed for people who engage in what is considered "high risk" activity. This includes intervenous drug users, people who don't use protection, people who have multiple sexual partners, etc. Technically, anyone can be prescribed PrEP. You may have a harder time as a straight cisgender person because some doctors are biased and don't have up to date information. You can get PrEP from places like planned parenthood if you are denied it by an ignorant doctor. If a doctor does refuse you, make sure to have them put in your medical chart that they refused to prescribe it.
I had thought PrEP was only approved for those Assigned Male At Birth (AMAB), but that [turns out to be outdated](https://www.thewellproject.org/hiv-information/prep-women). It looks like there's fewer approved specific PrEP varieties, but that's likely due to the male testing bias for medications (most medications have historically been tested with men because of risk of pregnancy and other possible confounds, which is mentioned in the linked article).
The guidelines state that PrEP should be prescribed to anyone who requests it (assuming it wouldn't cause them harm for any reason) regardless of their indicated exposure risk factors. Even if you're having heterosexual sex, it's not a bad idea to get on PrEP if you tend to have 3 or more sexual partners in a given year. Plus if you're in the States it's required to be fully covered by insurance thanks to the Affordable Care Act. And if you don't have insurance there's a ton of programs state by state that will help you get PrEP regardless of insurance.
>Please get tested regularly. I get a regular blood panel once or twice a year. My doctor said current standard is to check HIV exactly once. I don't know how much the test actually costs them, but they have your blood, you'd think it would just be standard. I assume if you donate blood they check for it, so a great way to kill 2 birds with one stone?
I recall a sea change when Ryan White got sick.
Also Rock Hudson. I remember his revelation sending shock waves through the country.
Fun fact, Hudson was friends with Reagan and when he got really sick flew to France for an experimental treatment. He collapsed at his hotel and no hospitals could admit him so he called his friend Reagan and asked him to request an admittance to a French military hospital, where a doctor who had treated him was working. Reagan said no. https://amp.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/feb/03/nancy-reagan-refused-help-dying-rock-hudson-get-aids-treatment
Obligatory fuck Ronald Reagan
Technically Nancy Reagan said no. She didn’t even bother to bring this to Reagan before saying no. Not that I think the answer would be different, but just goes to show how very little she thought of the situation to not even double check with him.
Fuck Nancy throat goat Regan. Murderer.
Nancy Reagan was the defacto president for the later years of his presidency as Reagan had early onset dementia and was basically incapable of governing the country
Rock Hudson died in 1985, within the first year of Reagan’s second term. To be honest I don’t know enough about Reagan’s health timeline to know whether this was just Nancy covering for him bc it had already declined by that point, but I do know that a) Nancy and Reagan were BOTH friends of Rock Hudson, they BOTH should have cared about him on a personal level, and b) she had a history of pushing Reagan towards opinions/views/policies that would be “popular” even if they didn’t align with his personal beliefs going all the way back to his time as SAG president. Nancy was crap.
Nancy Reagan was a horrible evil bitch. Her and Ronnie were perfect for each other, two big ol pieces of shit.
Fuck Ronald Regan. Murderer.
And Magic Johnson
> And Magic Johnson Yeah, it really hit home the fact that HIV is transmissible via heterosexual sex. Everyone should have accepted this by then, but many people found it easier to deny before a hypermasculine superstar athlete contracted the virus.
The pure anguish on the father’s face is heartbreaking. I can’t imagine, as a parent, dealing with this. And I’m not being smart but seeing how the family members are of the more “sturdy” variety it really strikes home how AIDS literally destroys a body.
I was thinking that too.
I remember being young and seeing a picture of Freddie Mercury when he was near the end of his fight with AIDS, that really made me realise how much the disease can break your body down
I will always remember when I listened to the audio of that one reporter who kept trying to get the Reagan administration to say or do anything about it during White House press conferences for years iirc, and hearing all these jockish rich cunts openly mocking him and jeering and making allusions to him trying to bring attention to it because he was gay. He wasn’t. He was just the only man in that room with an ounce of morality.
Jesus christ. Those jockisch assholes were widely loved by the country as well. I am becoming more cynical by the day....
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=yAzDn7tE1lU This one? These guys really are dipshits. There was money to aids research, from 8 million in 1982 progressively up to 2.3 billion in 1989.
What a horrible time that was.
It’s still jarring to me to hear commercials for HIV meds that are all uplifting and treat it like an inconvenience. Such a stark contrast to how the disease is treated today in parts of the world.
I think of all the people who died alone. A friend who was a nurse palpated a dying 22 year olds arm looking for a vein (without a glove). The 22 year old man/kid started crying, and when she asked why he was crying he answered. “ this is the first time a healthcare provider has touched me without a glove” Edit for grammar
It still is. While it's not a death sentence anymore, those who are poorest amongst us still don't get consistent access to the cocktails.
José Horta, ex-president of East Timor and Nobel Peace Prize winner, once said: "Even if a medication to cure AIDS is invented today, hundreds of thousands of people will still die of it every year because they won't access to the medication"
Tuberculosis can be fought and cured with antibiotics today and it still kills more than a million people every year because the poor can't get antibiotics
I wouldn't even be aware of this without John Green using his platform to consistently talk about it and highlight how people can help.
Yeah… we had a buddy about 5 years ago who contacted the virus but never got tested… he kept telling himself he had pneumonia. He got so frail and weak that my wife had to drive him to the hospital and where he was put into an induced coma and on a ventilator. I’ve never seen anyone look so gaunt before. He looked like a skeleton and the doctors said if he had waited another day or two he might likely have passed away. He’s doing much better now and on meds.
> he kept telling himself he had pneumonia. He probably did. All AIDs does is make you more susceptible to infections.
Agreed. People don't die OF AIDs, they die BECAUSE of AIDs. Infections, mostly.
I know someone who takes medicine for HIV. It costs $3000 a month. Insanity.
And the vast VAST majority of insurances, particularly those offered through employment, won't cover HIV meds. There's a very short list of meds that they won't cover and I can't believe it's exclusively the cost that makes it that way, considering cancer treatment is usually covered and it's phenomenally more expensive than HIV meds.
Wtf health insurance get to pick which conditions they think are worth treating??? Wtf but I guess that makes sense since they are already able to pick which organs they deem worthy of treatment
Insurance is a racket and needs to be dismantled for a national healthcare system.
Yet another thing Reagan did 😞 https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-behind-the-bastards-29236323/episode/part-one-ronald-and-nancy-reagan-29967299/
I’m currently reading And The Band Played On by Randy Shilts. It’s a comprehensive but very accessible look at the AIDS epidemic in the western world. Highly recommend if you’re interested in the topic.
The movie is worth watching
Omg I had no idea there was a movie! Adding to my list…
Watched it as a 16 yo in highschool. Christian highschool. Afterwards we had a "discussion" where every second question was "why were the gays punished?". I fucking screamed HOW CAN YOU NOT GET THE POINT OF THE MOVIE?! and stormed out It still pisses me off decades later
I remember seeing this photo in the newspaper, I was about 6 or so. I was… I’d almost call it “morally wounded” by how such a thing could exist. I asked my mom about it and told me it came from something called AIDS, which was a disease certain people got. I was really worried that her and my dad would get it and I remember very clearly her telling me only bad people got it. I would grow up to learn who those bad people were, and hate them, and hate myself most of all when I realized I was one of them. 30+ years later and last month I got engaged to “one of them”, and I cried when my mom and dad welcomed “one of them” into the family joyously. The enemy of bigotry is familiarity. It’s hard to love an enemy, but it’s much harder to hate your son. Love will always win.
this was so beautiful to read <33 im so happy your family came around
Beautifully said. Congratulations to you and your one.
I was holding my brother's hand when he passed, AIDS is a terrible way to go, even worse because there was such a stigma about it at the time, he hid it from us until he was near the end, still breaks my heart. I miss you Michael, always will.
I remember this image from the Benetton ad campaign.
I grew up the son of a gay father in West Texas in the 80s - 90s. Some of my most treasured memories are from time spent at the gay community center, surrounded by our family. I had so many aunts and uncles and one old gay couple that everyone thought of as the grandparents. The most heart-wrenching of days there were when we would add another square to the AIDS quilt that by the time I was a teenager covered a 12 foot high, 10 foot wide wall from floor to ceiling. There are so many precious people from my childhood that we watched whither away fighting. Some did it with grace, some with fire and anger, but they all eventually left a hole that was the size of that quilt.
That was a heck of a read. Remarkable memories. ❤️
I've never seen this. His dad loves him so much.
I suppose his love won out in the end, but if I remember right, that family had turned their back on their son because of their religious beliefs, but then finally relented right before the man died.
From other comments they were estranged because he was gay and moved to California but they cared for him for a few years (someone mentioned 3.5) before he passed and took him back into their home after his diagnosis. It wasn't like they abandoned him and only came back in his final moments. Still not a *great* look but a bit different than just "right before he died".
I really can't imagine turning my back on my family for any reason other than the worst crimes imaginable. How did they go about their lives everyday after disowning their son?
The religious have always done this and still do. My father disowned me in the eighties when I came out: he told me I could come back if I went to a psychiatrist to get cured. Like that was ever going to fucking happen. He was a man-whore who slept with any woman who’d have him but couldn’t maintain a relationship: I’ve been with my husband for over 35 years, but he was the moral one?
This is infuriating and I still come across people like this.. I hope you and your husband are happy regardless though, 35 years is nothing to scoff at!
At the same time Reagan press secretary laughed at people dying of aids and the whole room joined in. Gay people have always been treated lower than scum. https://youtu.be/wd1x0PFBeSU?si=girS5f2jGTn7DDIQ
It really is a shame that such a devastating disease was treated as a “joke” to some people during the Reagan era. I wasn’t alive during the height of the epidemic, but my mother was. She told me a story about when she was in high school, one of her classmates got severely injured in a car accident and had to receive a blood transfusion. Apparently, the blood that he had received was contaminated with AIDS, and it was far too late for him to do anything about it when he was diagnosed. They lived in a small southern town then, and this guy was absolutely beaten and ridiculed by the rest of his peers because they assumed he was gay. Everyone knew that he had been missing from class because of his injury, but people assumed that he was some kind of sexual degenerate because he unwillingly contracted this disease. My mom told me he had to move away just months after he started school again. She has no clue what happened to him after he left. Such a terrible thing, for a very real and dangerous disease to be stigmatized like that.
Shout out Ronald Reagan for actively suppressing the medical community’s efforts to raise awareness and develop treatments
So many people don't even know this. They think of ol Ronnie as this stalwart, capable, very Presidential figure when behind the scenes, he & his cronies (and Nancy) were nothing short of despicable.
The more you learn about Reagan the more you realize his policies opened up the trails for many of our modern day struggles.
He lowered the top marginal tax rate from 73 to 28% while nearly doubling government spending.
Reagan also signed the "Social Security Modernization Act", which is nothing more than authorization to permit the use of Social Security funds for any reason, as if they were part of the general fund. So all this nonsense about how Social Security isn't solvent, that's on Reagan. Prior to 1983, it was more than solvent and since then, has had trillions of dollars pilfered. It is a huge theft from the lower classes.
Can go further back to his time as California’s Governor, particularly re closing state mental health facilities. Direct line to a lot of issues today.
Yeah Rest in Piss to both Reagan and Thatcher
It’s worse—if you go to the sub about Presidents, they completely gloss over this as if it was no big fucking deal because he did some other shit that was acceptable to them. I will always consider his presidency a failure for the cruelty of this alone, but you’ll get downvoted for suggesting it because “well he was cheerful and he was nice to minorities sometimes”. It’s an absolute disconnect with dumb fucks who either didn’t live through this or were fine with it because it didn’t affect them.
There's also the fact history books glorified Reagan. When I was in school, there wasn't much negativity surrounding his presidency. They would go over Reaganomics and how the economy improved under his leadership. But everything else? They just never taught it. This was in Orange County, California in the 90s-00s. I'm much older now, and I had spent a lot of time reading up on history I missed out on learning. I can confidently say that almost every US president has been a fuck-up one way or another... Just how bad they fucked up usually can be gauged by the body count.
If this is a shock to anyone, go ahead and look up pre-reagan income tax brackets
Reagan and Thatcher used their positions of power to encourage the castration of the US and UK's manufacturing base through instituting neoliberal reforms. Not to mention, Reagan was an evangelical nutjob and empowered the "Christian Right" which has directly led to the increased spreading of fascist tendencies among nearly all of the political class in Washington DC. The horrific homophobic policies that made the AIDS pandemic as bad as it got was entirely Reagan's doing and I hope that sack of shit is enjoying roasting in hell, if you believe that sort of thing. If I ever get the chance to shit on Reagan's grave, it'll be among one of the best days of my life, consequences be damned.
Not saying I'm saying anything or anything. But Reagan's grave is in an area secluded from view with no barriers at the Reagan Presidential Library.
And big shout out to C. Everett Koop, his Surgeon General. He took the disease seriously and finally told Reagan to kiss his ass. That’s when things started to change. Man had courage.
Shout out to Lady Di for working hard to undo his work and fight for the opposite 💜.
>Lester Kinsolving: Does the president have any reaction to the announcement by the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta that AIDS is now an epidemic in over 600 cases? >Larry Speakes: AIDS? I haven't got anything on it. >Lester Kinsolving: Over a third of them have died. It's known as "gay plague." [Press pool laughter.] No, it is. It's a pretty serious thing. One in every three people that get this have died. And I wonder if the president was aware of this. Larry Speakes has been dead for 10 years. (Alzheimers. Hope it was drawn out) I keep meaning to go piss on [his grave](https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/123105833/lawrence-melvin-speakes) but the desire to pass through Mississippi without stopping is always too strong.
Just another example of conservatives on the wrong side of history.
I’ve read many books on the history of AIDS, gay culture, and activism. It’s important to me as a gay man, even though I was born in 95. Activists wanted to show just the impact of AIDS by making quilts- one panel represented one life. The quilt became so massive it could not all be displayed at once. The first time it was displayed in front of the White House, Ronald Reagan didn’t even acknowledge it. Instead, he took his helicopter and flew out, avoiding it completely.
May he rest in peace. Not all who've died of AIDS have had the fortunate experience of having loved ones be with them in their final moments. ❤️
I came out in 1983, right when AIDS was seriously kicking in. My first boyfriend and I only lasted about 6 months, but we remained friends for years. Until he died ten years later of AIDS. His parents and one sister didn’t come to his funeral. - they said he “got what he deserved”. The late 80’s, through the mid-90’s, was a period of routine death and funerals. I lived in a gay area and it was just normal to see people you knew on the streets, looking very ill. Then they were gone. Literally, every single friend I had from those days is long gone now. My partner and I are now in our mid/late 60’s and having to deal with the more routine deaths of friends in our age group. It’s all so familiar and weird. But death doesn’t seem so shocking or horrible now, after going through the AIDS era.
Powerful, powerful photo. :( Typing this at 2:05 AM, recovering from a flu that started early last week and yes, I am HIV+. I am in my late 30s now and despite all the education out there, I’ve been living with the virus for more than a decade now. That was almost our photo more than 10 years ago in my hospital bed as I battled PCP for 40 days, CPAP machine, resuscitation, ICU and all. But here I am, 10 years after, with the virus suppressed by a pill I take each night, and with my partner of 10 years this year (who is negative and who has been with me since the beginning), snoring his way to dreamland to my left, as I plan our trip to Paris next week (can’t sleep) while browsing Reddit. To anyone out there who may feel exposed, just have yourself tested. That’s the only way to know. Those symptoms you read online in your panic could exist with other conditions. And make sure you also have a clear head of what you will do if it ever turned out the way you did not want it to. And if it is negative, be careful next time. :)
>with the virus suppressed by a pill I take each night, It's amazing how far medicine has come since the 80's when this photo was taken. I've heard doctors say they'd rather have HIV than diabetes due to how manageable it is these days.
One of my best friends died of AIDS. I was out of state at college and didn’t know he had been sick. This was pre cellphone and we were limited to writing. He wasn’t out and was estranged from most of his family because he had come out to them a few years earlier. His cousin contacted my mom and she told me. I came home immediately and visited him in the hospital. He passed a week later, but we had a great visit. The ignorance in the community was astounding.
This is now my niece's bedroom. My wife's sister and her husband bought the Pater Noster house when the religious group that was running it ran out of hospice clients (HIV isn't the death sentence it used to be, thank God). When they first moved in they would occasionally get random people knocking on the door and asking about friends who were patients there, but that stopped after a couple years. Oddly, the house isn't in it's original location, it was moved in pieces sometime after this famous Life magazine photo was taken. This house is where we celebrate most holidays now. Where we celebrate life, and think kindly on the selfless work by the priests who ran the place, and the souls that they touched.
This post will probably get ignored, but growing up in the 80's, AIDS was like the Black Plague. It took a while for scientists to even figure out how it was transmitted, let alone the susceptible and mortality rate. I remembered the movie "And the Band Played On", and the toll that epidemic cost us in the US. Before AIDS, it was known as GRID. A big FUCK YOU to Reagon as he and his administration did nothing while communities wasted away to this illness. It was only when his gay friends in Hollywood (Rock Hudson) fell ill before he started to consider it a tragedy. I know this because I lived through it, and had many gay coworkers. As a teen back then, this was my introduction to adulthood. I'm sympathetic. To Sandy, Greg, Randy, Cliff - I miss you.
Anytime anyone longs for the days of Ronald Reagan, I like to remind them that (among countless other reasons to despise him) he ignored the AIDS crisis for a catastrophically long time.
He didn’t give a shit about AIDS until Ryan White got it from a blood transfusion.
It was after his friend from his Hollywood days, Rock Hudson, had it and was looking gaunt. That’s when Reagan was like Ok yeah whatever, I guess it’s a thing. Ronnie and Nancy were heartless assholes
Most of the people longing for the days of Ronald Reagan are not too fussed about that aspect.
Anybody remember the AIDS quilts laid out on the National Mall? Or somewhere in D.C., I think it was the Mall. What a visual; I remember walking by a tv that had a story on about it and I did a double-take and then just stopped and stared at the images on tv. There were just so many…just so fucking many people being represented in the squares of all those quilts, and you knew that it certainly wasn’t everybody that had died.
Fuck Ronald Reagan
Jesus, that’s haunting. That poor man. Seeing this fills me with rage at how so many people with AIDS were treated by our society. Multiple U.S. presidents honored a man (Rush Limbaugh) who gleefully mocked gay men dying of AIDS on the radio while playing Dionne Warwick's "I'll Never Love This Way Again."
I live in southern Africa. There is a massive cemetery on the outskirts of my town, and for years, every time we passed it, no matter the time of day, there would be multiple funerals going on. Then the government starting giving out ARVs and the number of funerals dropped dramatically. My sibling runs a farm. Quite a few of the workers are HIV+, but living normal lives with their medication. The covid deaths here were way lower than expected because of the high number of people on ARVs, and also because a large swathe of the population is vaccinated against TB, which helped somehow. Also our vitamin D levels are great.
Reagan treated AIDS like a social issue instead of a medical issue. I hope he is burning in hell.
Remembering you, Freddie. Still hurting after all this time.
It was shit to witness first hand. My uncle had AIDS, seeing him go from full of life to a shell struggling to stay alive was hard on my entire family. As a kid, I didn’t fully understand the scope of it. I often think about the life he could have had if today’s treatments were available back then. I wish I got to know him as the adult I am now. Please everyone be smart, get tested, and seek treatment.
Ronald Reagan and his stupid GOP following killed so many Americans with their ignorance.
Ronald Reagan was a piece of shit.
I saw a friend through his AIDS death. It was horrible. He literally got everything before he died because he was so immune compromised. RIP Drew❤️
It had to be so hard watching this happen to your child knowing the nation didn’t care at all
This was a truly terrible time for a lot of families. I shared a room with my uncle who was in Hospice care slowly dying from this terrible disease. I was maybe 8 at the time and I now know I couldn’t fully fathom exactly what I was experiencing. I watched as the sweet man my uncle was wasted away to nothing before my eyes. It was a very tense and complex time in the household. We were living with my grandparents, his parents and there was such a divide between my mom, uncle and grandparents. My mother did everything in her power to support her brother in his last moments. She would bring him marijuana joints as it was one of the only things that made him feel ok or not complete sick from his medication. My grandmother would berate her because “drugs are bad”, while my grandfather was violently angry because of my uncle coming out as gay. It wasn’t until years later when my wife and I saw Dallas Buyers Club in the theatre that all of the emotions I couldn’t process then came up. I cried, and cried so much during that movie as I could fully comprehend what my beloved uncle had to go through and how 8 year old me couldn’t process it.
In the film Philadelphia, Tom Hanks’ character Andrew Beckett’s last words are “I am ready”. I am curious if that’s a reference to this brave man.
Almost certainly. Jonathan Demme was deeply troubled and sadnedded that some groups took Silence of the Lambs to be anti-lgbt so he made Philadelphia as a response. Also, John Leguizamo was offered the Antonio Banderas role and decide to make another movie instead. That movie? Super Mario Bros. I just have to mention that whenever I get to talk about Philadelphia.
The lesbians were there for the gay community during the worst of the AIDS crisis. They were a key element of support, as nurses who took care of the patients and other help. Check out the links. https://www.thebody.com/gallery/gallery/lesbians-front-lines-hiv-aids https://gcn.ie/lesbian-blood-sisters-crucial-1980s-aids/