Baltimore Alternative, January 1990

DANCE INTO THE 90s pg 21 President Visits Adults And Children With AIDS Pre-Christmas Visit Marks 1st Talks With U.S. Leader by Cliff O'Neill ROCKVILLE, MD — Marking the first such visit by an American president now nearly nine years into the epidemic. President George Bush held a discussion with a group of adults infected with HIV at the National Institutes of Health here Dec. 22nd. As part of a larger visit which included a tour of a ward for children with AIDS and another meeting with a support group for families of AIDS patients, Bush, his wife and son. Health and Human Services Secretary Louis W. Sullivan and his wife met for a half hour with seven openly gay men in various stages of HIV infection. In a statement read afterwards. Bush praised the work of the federal agency, “You’re helping to improve the health of millions of Americans,” said Bush. “And even more, like those soldiers in Pana¬ ma — those heroes — you’re giving the greatest gift imaginable: the gift of life. And nowhere is this gift more evident than in your work to combat AIDS.” Although his comments were over¬ shadowed by the overthrow of Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, which hap¬ pened during the visit, and the continued Baltimorean Len Jackson met with President Bush. American occupation of Panama, Bush did devote the second half of his statement to “HIV” and “persons with AIDS.” “Only together can we all wage our war against this terrible killer,” Bush said, adding that his meetings with the groups reminded him “of the need for compas¬ sion and understanding.” see PRESIDENT VISITS page 6 The Wins — The Losses Top 5 Washington Lesbian & Gay News Items of 1989 by Cliff O' Neill WASHINGTON— Unlike the year in general news, where earth-shattering changes on the political landscape and devastating natural disasters on the physi¬ cal one made 1989 such a memorable year for all, events in gay and lesbian news throughout the year were much less con¬ spicuous. And from inside the Capital Beltway, while wins and losses on the gay and les¬ bian agenda were felt on a daily basis, none stood out as clearly as others had in years past. Unlike 1987, there was no National March on Washington on which to focus. Unlike 1988, there was no landmark piece of legislation passed to compare with the federal AIDS omnibus bill. Federal news in 1989 was marked by a series of dethronements and scandals, starting with John Tower in January, con¬ tinuing with the Democratic House leader¬ ship in the summer and culminating in the fall with investigations into five senators in regards to their dealings with a Savings and Loan operator. And in the tradition of scandal being the chief motivator of the public attention in 1989, one of our own, openly gay Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) found himself caught in the downpour of bad press that accompanied all the 1989 congressional scandals. Aside from that, it would appear from a broad overview that nothing much really happened on the federal level where AIDS and gay and lesbian issues were con¬ cerned. But appearances can be deceiving. see WINS— LOSSES page 7 The End of the Decade BOB’S STORY by Garey Lambert Most retrospectives for the decade of the 1980s talk of those great, dramatic and poignant moments; literally, earth- shaking events that made world head¬ lines: earthquakes in Mexico and San Francisco, Ronald Reagans’ scandalous Presidency, the invasions of Grenada and Panama, Mikhail Gorbachev and Eastern Europe, and the “triumph” of capitalism over communism. But, the American disgrace of the 1980s is the plague of the 1980s — the plague that was allowed to happen. It’s a story that really didn’t make it big with the national media’s retrospective fervor. S’ It doesn’t have dramatic high points that £ make for great sound bites or powerful | cut lines. It is a story of intense, writhing . agony, experienced out of sight of the media in hospital rooms and private homes. Or, in ghetto hovels, or worse. And, because it is a disease of social out¬ casts — gays, blacks, and Hispanics — and, because it is sexually transmitted. We don’t talk about such things in this pre¬ tentious, uncivilized United States of ours. We prefer to remember our success¬ es, and to gloat about our superior eco¬ nomic and political system. But, in its own way, AIDS is a story of triumph and courage. AIDS is also a peculiarly American story. For all of its horror, AIDS is a story about individual power and influence in the face of for¬ midable obstacles, and it is a story that gay people, individually and collectively, can take a great deal of pride in — though the war with AIDS is certainly not over. AIDS is a story that really begins in the sexual revolution of the 1970s with gay people’s first taste of freedom. For a group of people struggling to understand itself after decades of overwhelming con¬ demnation and repression by the larger society, developing a sense of community and learning how to interact openly with the society and even with each other was, in retrospect, a monumentally confusing and difficult task. Though, at the time it just felt joyously free and exciting. Be¬ cause our sexual orientation, our sexuali¬ ty, was the cause of our repression, after Stonewall it became the definition of our identity, and sexual expression was our Divine signs the sidewalk in front of the Senator Theatre on the night of the World Premiere of John Waters’ Hairspray. badge of freedom. In fact, we expressed our sexuality with exuberant adolescent abandon. Little did we know that, lurking in our bodily fluids was the most sinister of agents — HIV. Yet, there it was, incubat¬ ing slowly and insidiously. It waited until 1981 to show its dirty work and exert its evil power. If the seventies were our collective adolescence, then the eighties became our numbing, agonizing maturation. With AIDS, pain and death was all around us, and we had to grow up fast. The society we had tried so hard to become a part of rejected us with a new, virulent form of homophobia. Our delusions of acceptance were not only shattered, but we discov¬ ered that we’d become pariahs in a way we’d never considered before. Agents of the devil, gay people were called. AIDS was retribution from God many said. We watched in horror as American society, led by Ronald Reagan, seemed to take great delight in our stricken community and in our painful, awful demise. Perhaps even more incredible, we watched as straight society naively and stupidly assumed that it would be protccl- see BOB’S STORY page 2