national aids strategy

No comprehensive plan guides strategic use of
AIDS-related dollars or holds government agencies
accountable for steadily improved outcomes.

thanks to lifefube for the heads up on this one! And I would just like to add that just because people are not dying the way they did 20 years ago, in no way is it acceptable that people are seroconverting at the rate they still are. especially in the gay men's community. in some circles i have heard that it is inevitable that all men will be poz by the time they are 60. I wholeheartedly say "poppycock". this is absurd. that's something the "focus on the family" camp would spout, but not my own locker room. and it's pretty obvious that just nodding to wrapping ourselves in latex isn't the most effective strategy.


Call for a National AIDS Strategy for the US
AIDS is a national crisis. The next President of the U.S. should develop a results-oriented AIDS strategy.

The wealthiest nation in the world is failing its own people in responding to the AIDS epidemic at home. Consider that in the U.S.:

Every year, 40,000 people are newly infected with HIV. The HIV infection rate has not fallen in 15 years.
Over a million people are living with HIV. In 2002, an estimated half of people living with HIV/AIDS were not in care.
African Americans represent 13% of the population but nearly half of all new HIV infections. In 2004, HIV/AIDS was the leading cause of death among black women ages 25 - 34.
The unsatisfactory outcomes from our country’s response to AIDS have serious human and economic costs. A study published in 2003 found that failure to meet the government’s then goal of reducing HIV infections by half would lead to $18 billion in excess expenses through 2010.

The U.S. must develop what it asks of other nations it supports in combating AIDS: a national strategy to achieve improved and more equitable results.

To be effective, a national AIDS strategy should…

Improve prevention and treatment outcomes through reliance on evidence-based programming
Set ambitious and credible prevention and treatment targets and require annual reporting on progress towards goals
Identify clear priorities for action across federal agencies and assign responsibilities and timelines for follow-through
Include, as a primary focus, the prevention and treatment needs of African Americans, other communities of color, gay men of all races, and other groups at elevated risk
Address social factors that increase vulnerability to infection
Promote a strengthened HIV prevention and treatment research effort
Involve many sectors in developing the national strategy: government, business, community, civil rights organizations, faith based groups, researchers, and people living with HIV/AIDS
Please sign on now so your voice can be heard. click here to sign:

hard working hero

i have become friends with richard kearns at aids-write.org since i started this blog. i have actually made a few friends that have really touched my heart and changed the direction in my way of thinking on many issues. richard is one of those. he has tagged me, and i have responded(and i'm glad i did). today, i am reminded i have never really been a foe of marijuana/cannabis, but i have never really been an advocate. i used to really love it in my teens, and then i just thought it made me stupid. since i have become a drug counselor my opinion of it has changed and i don't find it's recreational use quite as amusing as i did in the past.

but, to be honest, i had never really considered its pain and symptom relieving qualities and the importance of such until i came across richards blogs. his advocacy work and his tirelessness amaze me. i find myself tuckered out just reading his blog.

this is a reminder to me that i don't understand everything, and it might be to my benefit to keep an open mind with things that i really don't know about.

richard has begun a new blog: cannabis patient voice and i ran across this poem which he read to the la-city plum committee back in may. i find it compelling and trust it will have an effect on you as well.

chers—
here are my remarks prepared & delivered to the la-city planning & land use management committee earlier today, may 15, 2007, urging them to move forward with the medical cannabis regulation process. there must have been a couple of dozen of us there.



the city clerk’s report was unavailable at the time of the meeting, so a vote on the item was deferred until next week. i’ll be back with more to say next week too.



namasté



—lyr



my name is richard kearns. i am a 55-year-old gay man alive with AIDS in los angeles for more than 20 years. i am a medical cannabis patient & advocate. a citizen journalist & poet. i speak today in favor of regulating medical cannabis. this is my open poem calling for a city that’s a good place to die [5-15-2007].



to the self-appointed
hall monitors with
machine guns
uninformed about the law
sure about the criminals
killing us with pretense
& to all their many poisoned ears



who are you
to tell me how
to sing the blues?
i am the blues
i ring the blues out loud
for you: hear me now
these are the 1983
denver AIDS principles
in song: we are persons
with AIDS, we are, we must be
expert voices hearkened to
in all public health
policy dialogs about
our lives & deaths & our disease
the refrain is the same for
medical cannabis



here are the blues
i sing to you
our city must be
not only a good
place to live
but also also a
good place to die

this day’s challenge? to
create a greater good
with our land use wisdom



who are you
to tell me how
to sing the blues?
listen to my song
medical cannabis
saves lives
medical cannabis
can save more lives
medical cannabis
is the single most significant
in-place but unaccessed
AIDS treatment option
available today
in los angeles
for the more than
60,000 persons
livng here with
AIDS & HIV disease
& we represent
only 25 clandestined percent
of the medical cannabis community



i’m here
i’m queer
i medicate
here is my song
the time is ripe
to regulate
help us create
livable lives & deaths
who are you
to tell me how
to sing the blues?
i am the blues
song & singer
tap your foot & hum & listen
before i’m gone



namasté

and he sent me this one today: not sure if he published it yet or not, but i couldn't help but include it.... it's sooo tender.

i write on the page

i feel its emptiness

fill



& when i read i stand

not in the room but

there in ruins in

battered fields in

harvest in lost in burnt in

unfindable wreckage

home

tweekers web

i got this clip from a tweeker's website. he's called sketchy mess and it seems he just moved to palm springs from the east coast after his court appearance from a drug possession charge. his case was continued for a year with no disposition. he says he's loving warm sands 'cuz it's like disneyland for adults. it's very hot which leads to losing clothes.


notice the box being carried out in the background. for whatever it's worth, this is part of my culture. no matter how much i say "no longer".

10 years ago- for reasons unkown

i was watching logo (i'm a good fag) and there was a segment on elton john. of course, the insane meanderings and the tragedies caused by andrew cunanan were mentioned. gianni versace and elton were extremely close. it was strange suddenly to remember the disintegration of lives that occurred that summer 10 years ago. i recall it being so unsettling then. and i remember being totally creeped out by the fact that cunanan was so homogenous. i mean, so not distinct. i remember travelling somewhere, being at the airport and looking around and instantly being a little afraid because he literally could have been anywhere in that airport and no one really would have noticed. certainly not me.

then there were stories of drugs, prostitution, and pornography. now, i grant you, these are not commonplace in most gay men's lives. however, these are not strangers for many either. it is a very odd passing-of-the-torch ritual that happens from generation to generation in certain circles. but, the real question i have is the presence of meth in this story. i think at that time, really only certain cities on the west coast were seeing the ravages of meth. as a nation, the hooplah surrounding the horrors for some who use meth had not surfaced. and so when i look back on this very tragic incident, my immediate question is how much of a role did tina play? did she drive andrew to crazy town? or did she just push him over the edge? was it her finger that pulled the trigger and snuffed out the lives of miglin and versace and the others? was all this done in a psychotic state that miss thing had orchestrated?

perhaps these questions have been asked before. and if you have already heard them or read them or answered them for yourselves, i apologize for redundancy. i know that i could never really get a handle on the situation until i applied my first hand knowledge of meth to this story. and i am certainly not offering anything like an excuse, but this connection does bring a level of understanding for me to an otherwise completely baffling situation.

Andrew Phillip Cunanan (August 31, 1969 – July 23, 1997) was an American serial killer of Italian[2] and Filipino[3] descent who murdered five people, including Gianni Versace, in a cross-country journey during a three-month period in 1997, ending with Cunanan's suicide, at the age of 27. In the middle of that spree, on June 12, 1997 he became the 449th fugitive to be listed by the FBI on the FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list.

Born in the Rancho Bernardo neighborhood of San Diego, California, Cunanan graduated from The Bishop's School in the La Jolla neighborhood of San Diego, California, in 1987.




The first murder was that of his friend Jeffrey Trail, a former US Naval Officer and propane salesman on April 27, 1997, in Minneapolis, Minnesota. [3] The next victim was architect David Madson, who was found on the east shore of Rush Lake near Rush City, MN after the Minnesota Corrections Association Fishing Tournament on April 29, 1997 with gunshot wounds to the head. Police recognized a connection, as Trail's body had been found in Madson's Minneapolis loft apartment, and started an intensive nationwide manhunt.

Cunanan next drove to Chicago and killed prominent real-estate developer Lee Miglin, 72, on May 4, 1997. Five days later, the intensive manhunt for Cunanan, who escaped in Miglin's car, culminated with the fourth victim in Pennsville, New Jersey, at the Finn's Point National Cemetery, killing caretaker William Reese, 45, on May 9, 1997. Cunanan apparently killed him for his pickup truck, while leaving Miglin's car behind.

While the manhunt focused on Reese's truck, Cunanan remained in hiding in Miami Beach, Florida, for months between his fourth and fifth murders. Finally, for his fifth murder he chose fashion designer Gianni Versace, who was killed on July 15, 1997.

Eight days later, on July 23, Cunanan committed suicide in the upstairs bedroom aboard a Miami houseboat apparently to avoid capture by the police, who finally discovered Reese's stolen truck nearby and obtained tips from neighbors that someone resembling Cunanan was living in the houseboat.

The gun used by Cunanan for some of the murders was a Taurus semi-automatic pistol in .40 S&W caliber, which had been left behind in California by first victim Jeff Trail when he relocated to the Midwest.[3]




At the time of the crimes, there was much public and press speculation that Cunanan's motives were tied to a diagnosis of HIV infection; however, an autopsy found him to be HIV-negative. Cunanan was widely reported to have engaged in prostitution with older men.[4] Media speculation connected the fact that most of his victims were older gay men to Cunanan's prostitution, but after Cunanan's suicide it is impossible to identify motives with certainty.

What is known about Andrew Cunanan is brief. He spent money lavishly on himself (owing Neiman Marcus $46,000 at his death[citation needed]) and dealt drugs including cocaine and methamphetamine. He was fluent in seven languages by age 21.

Cunanan frequented the gay neighborhoods in San Diego, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. Most who knew Cunanan described him as intelligent, articulate, vain, and charming. One partner described Cunanan's sexual tastes as "extreme." The same partner attested to Cunanan's like of violent and sadomasochistic pornography.

courtesy of wikipedia

and now here are the killers and their 4th single for reasons unknown

dance hall days

i am including a shot of christian for his hairstyle only. no other inferences are intended. the hair is a beautiful example of 80's hair to me. a little highlight, a little product, and accessorized with maybe a dangle earring. (although, we didn't call it product then, we called it gel)

there is an excerpt here from life or meth which has stuck with me since the first time i read it. following that, i am attaching to one of the big dance hits from medusa's circa 1983 because i think it's completely apropos. this was definitely a cult hit because it is a very universal tale. i get goose pimples every time i hear it. and i remember how it filled the floor with boys who were shaking loose their secret sadness.


this passage defines precisely the message i hope to begin to leave as a gift for the gay men to follow me. come out- be who you are- but before you start the party and celebrate your sexuality and freedom, take the time to heal the wounds and scars you bring from all those years of deception, lies, and character assassinations. shine a light on them. don't hide them. this will hopefully help you lead a healthier and happier life.

Yyou have a lot of young gay men coming into the city; they were the nerds in high school, the wallflower, the ugly kid. They feel the city is the place to be sexy, to be a star, and they get a false burst of confidence with a drug like this."
~ John Cameron Mitchell [Director]

March 2003. John is 21, and arrives in New York anticipating that a climate of tolerance and acceptance awaits. He is typical of gay men the world over who have long flocked to the metropolitan cities to be less visible and to congregate with others like themselves. However, we arrive and establish our own gyms, clubs, shops and cafes - ghettos - and bring with us all of the emotional scarring, guilt and shame that we attached to our homosexuality in our formative years

John's first experience of New York's commercial gay scene, therefore, far from being inviting, is mostly unfriendly, indifferent and intimidating because almost everyone, it seems, is projecting their internalised homophobia and insecurities at everyone else. Gay-identified men who grow up in loving, accepting environments often find it difficult identifying and mixing with complex, baggage-heavy men, tending either to avoid socialising where gay men converge or lead fulfilled lives away from the psychological assault course posed by the scene.

In such environments, fear reveals itself in over-inflated egos and attitude; the degree to which individuals reinforce their delusions about what they think they are. Some people are so lost in their fantasy world of denial and illusion that they have difficulty discerning even the most basic truths, or to accept the glaringly obvious even when it is staring them square in the face.

"The power of both illusion and delusion should never be underestimated. The compulsion to believe in something we need and want to be true, rather than see reality for what it is, can at times be astounding."
~ Gary Younge [The Guardian]

Despite its immense ugliness to grounded, balanced people who have their egos in check, attitude is merely a person's automatic defence mechanism to the inner pain, guilt and turmoil that arises from the loss of a connection to the heart centre and separation from love.

"If one drops denial, one will see that falsehood, manipulation and distortion of truth cater prevalently to man's lowest propensities and pervade all society."
~ David R. Hawkins [The Eye of the I]

same same

from samesame.com.au

another point of view.

Crystal Myth - A Fraction Too Much Fiction
Support, By Christian Taylor, 10th July, 2007

So much gets said about gays and drugs. Like Liza Minelli and homosexual husbands, the two often go hand in hand. We’re in the grip of an ice epidemic, we’re party obsessed, we’re promiscuous barebackers – all too often these are the stories that get us column inches.

Last week two new stories emerged, both from different parts of the world, both saying two very different things. A story from the New Zealand Herald said that gay people are four times more likely to take drugs than their straight counterparts. However, a story from America’s Windy City Times said that most gay people don’t actually take drugs at all.

New Zealand’s Massey University analysed government data from 15,000 people and found that while gays drank broadly similar quantities to straights, they also were twice as likely to use pot, and were 50% more likely to smoke tobacco. Gays were also four times more likely to use speed and acid and three times as likely to take pills.

According to Frank Pega, a spokesperson for the study, we’re all basketcases, running to the bottle because of discrimination. “Other research has already established that gay, lesbian and bisexual people’s substance use is related to their exposure to personal, institutional and societal discrimination… and to social stress arising from this experience,” he said. But is this the case? How many of us actually regard ourselves as victims?

If we jump over to America, Chicago to be specific, things are sounding a little different. Susan Kingston from the King County Department of Public Health in Seattle is an expert on crystal meth, and she’s one of a few who are bringing a breath of fresh air to the gay drug use debate. Crystal meth is being talked about as being the most addictive drug out there, the most impossible to treat and the worst drug to hit gay communities worldwide. According to Kingston, much of the so called ‘ice age’ is a media driven myth. She says that newspapers rarely report on the good news, and as such gay communities suffer the same blows time after time.

“I would be so excited if I heard… a gay newspaper say most gay men don’t use drugs [and] most gay men don’t have HIV; they take care of themselves sexually; they’re not reckless; they’re not irresponsible; they go to work; they shop for groceries; [and] they value love just like anybody else,” said Kingston during a public presentation last month. She says that the hype about crystal has led to it being demonised, even within the community, which stands in the way of those who need help, actually getting it.

“Before we answer the question what are we supposed to do about this meth thing, we really have to think about who we think gay men are. If you think gay men are pools of deficits, then crystal makes complete sense. On the other hand, if you think that gay men need to keep a squeaky-clean image, then anybody who picks up a meth pipe starts to be the deviant who’s making the rest of us look bad, and we need to shove him back into his hole. That’s what’s happening.”

According to Kingston, the worst drug to hit communities worldwide – gay or straight – is actually alcohol. Paul Dillon, formerly from NDARC and now with Drug and Alcohol Research and Training Australia, agrees wholeheartedly. “Alcohol continues to be the number one problem – it has been for a long time, it always will be. But no-one wants to deal with that because it’s at the heart of our community. If that went, what would happen? It’s not so much about gay culture, but more about Australian culture – it’s very hard to beat.”

After years of working in field of drug and alcohol, Dillon says that he’s often gotten upset by people making generalisations based on people who live in the ghetto. “There are many gay couples who live in the suburbs who would never even think about going to Oxford Street, or to a Mardi Gras. We tend not to talk about them and I think that’s quite sad,” says Dillon. “We have to be careful not to reinforce stereotypes. Absolutely there are people who have drug and alcohol problems in our community. But you have to put it into a context – we live in a society and society in general has a bit of a problem, truth be known.”

Dillon says that the gay community is often the group researchers target when they want information on current trends, because we’re usually more honest and as a community, we’re often at the forefront of trends. “This is why we know a lot more about drug use within the gay community than we do about other communities. One of the greatest problems with getting any information about gay men in particular, is where do you access these people from? If you look at much of the data that’s collected around gay men and drug use, it’s not taken across the general population, often it’s done through sex on premises venues, nightclubs, special events. Are you getting a wide cross section of people there? Perhaps not.”

At the end of the day, it’s about recognising that the ‘ice epidemic’ looks less like a plague, and more like a small group who have been affected in a big way. “If you look at the research use is going down, it’s peaked here and sure it’s caused all sorts of significant problems, but is it going to turn everyone into the Incredible Hulk? No, it’s not.”