{"id":322,"date":"2000-12-01T15:20:39","date_gmt":"2000-12-01T15:20:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/2000\/12\/01\/soapbox\/"},"modified":"2024-11-28T09:48:08","modified_gmt":"2024-11-28T14:48:08","slug":"soapbox","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/2000\/12\/01\/soapbox\/","title":{"rendered":"Soapbox"},"content":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m not participating in A Day Without Weblogs<\/a>.<\/strong> This is not because I don\u2019t think AIDS awareness is important, or because I think it\u2019s a hollow gesture to remove your weblog for a day. On the contrary, I think any effort to shock people out of any complacency is vitally important. I think, though, that I would rather participate in World AIDS Day by taking a moment in this forum to make a call for continued dialogue and continued openness about the issue.<\/p>\n

People I love have been deeply affected by AIDS and HIV. It\u2019s touched my family and my friends, and it\u2019s been the cause of grief, anger, and fear. The fear is the worst part, I fear, in terms of how our society on the whole deals with the presence of AIDS in our lives. When people react, ond overreact with fear, it breeds a climate that punishes the sufferers rather than battles the disease itself. I don\u2019t want to live in a world where peope are ostracized and feared because of a health condition, especially one which is preventable and containable. I don\u2019t want to live in a world where compassion and understanding and lucidity are shoved aside by hysteria, suspicion, intolerance, and moral indignation. Screw that.<\/p>\n

I have friends with HIV, and it doesn\u2019t freak me out. I have a brother with HIV, and it doesn\u2019t freak me out. I\u2019ve even dated guys with HIV, also: sometimes I\u2019ve known about it, and sometimes I haven\u2019t at the time. Either way, I\u2019ve discovered that it doesn\u2019t freak me out as much as I once thought it would. I\u2019m grateful to know so that I have a chance to be a voice of reason rather than fear. What I\u2019ve discovered each time I\u2019ve learned about it is that it doesn\u2019t change who that person may be, or how I feel about that person. The presence of HIV in their lives and mine may sadden me or make me angry sometimes, but it\u2019s not the carrier I mind, it\u2019s the virus. And it\u2019s the way people react to it.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t fear HIV. Don\u2019t fear AIDS. Learn about them. Be smart and compassionate and careful. Prevent the spread of the virus. Don\u2019t make martyrs or victims or pariahs or villains out of the people who have it. It\u2019s not a judgement, it\u2019s a disease. People get it, and that\u2019s a tragedy, but pretending the tragedy doesn\u2019t exist in your world will never ensure that it won\u2019t.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m not participating in A Day Without Weblogs. This is not because I don\u2019t think AIDS awareness is important, or because I think it\u2019s a hollow gesture to remove your weblog for a day. On the contrary, I think any effort to shock people out of any complacency is vitally important. I think, though, that … Continue reading “Soapbox”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,5,14,15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-322","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ultragay","category-ultrapersonal","category-ultrapolitical","category-ultrapositive"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=322"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":71777,"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322\/revisions\/71777"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=322"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=322"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=322"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}