Quite simply, my interests have moved away from public health and towards social justice. I no longer believe at heart in promoting public health. So much of that work has been co-opted by moral behavioralists who believe the solution to HIV is to pathologize, scold, rinse and repeat. There are still those out there who believe in linking disease to inequality, poverty, homophobia, and larger, more structural and social factors. But they are the minority. They don't get funded. Yes, CDC and other organizations put up with listening to them -- and occasionally cite concepts developed by them (fundamental causes, for instance). But the DEBI machine just keeps on pushing forward, despite countless reasons to abandon that funding structure -- the least of which is that it is entirely patronizing and utterly ridiculous. Who actually follows DEBIs they way they say they do? They don't. But they report that they did to get the money. The researchers get their faulty "evidence" to back up the untenable claims of their "intervention," and the CBOs get their money. It's disgusting. There's no other word for it.
I believe public health is not the only end out there worth fighting for. We lose sight of that sometimes, I think, when we get caught up in HIV work. We don't even have to look outside of HIV to find injustice worth making a muck about. HIV-positive people are being thrown in jail left and right in this country under laws that were passed mostly in the 1980s to allegedly promote disclosure. There has been a surge of interest in repealing and/or amending these statutes to prevent their further abuse (see examples here, here, here), and this work is far more exciting and interesting to me than squabbling over whether gay men deserve to be trusted to make informed decisions about risk.
This is where my work will continue. Perhaps one day I may blog again on that issue or another, but not now. I'm in my fifth year here at Michigan, working on my dissertation on how Michigan public officials enforce the state's HIV disclosure law. I'm thrilled about where this work is taking me. I'm happy to continue answering questions by e-mail, but this blog will in the coming weeks be archived and the comments system will be dismantled (though previously posted comments will remain).
Happy trails! It's been a glorious few years here on the blog. I'll miss it. Thanks for reading. Thanks for helping me to think through so many issues I've posted about.
In honor of this final goodbye, here's a look back at some of my favorite pieces over the years. Ah, memories! So many good times. And some bad ones too!
From 2005:
Rehnquist Hospitalized, Bush to Take Over World (July 14)I am a Political Scientist. What the hell does that mean? (July 28)
My FIRST Day as a Graduate Student (August 26)
Online Racial Power Disparities (August 28)
Why I Left the NC Fellows Program (September 8)
The Surreal Life, San Fran Style (October 16)
Creating Change Conference '05 (November 14)
From 2006:
Misogyny and Gay Men (January 22)"Against Health" Conference (October 13)
Frustrated with San Francisco (October 29)
The Death of Fiscally Conservative Repubs, and the Rise of Libertarian Dems (October 30)
From 2007:
LGBTI Health Summit - Philadelphia (March 17)Beyond Identity Politics? (May 19)
Toronto = Fabulous (October 7)
Longtime Companion, Early AIDS Movies, and Mentorship (October 25)
What I'm Thankful For, 2007 (November 20)
Questions of Trans-Inclusion and Identity (December 3)
A Lovely Time in Mexico! (December 17)
From 2008:
Creating Change '08: Mourning / Celebration (February 10)Making it Work: Mobilizing Gay and Lesbian Identities in the 21st Century (February 12)
Where's the Pleasure in Gay Sex? (February 16)
On the Staph Debate and the Swiss AIDS Study (February 17)
Barebacking and XTube: A Window Into Our Sex Lives (February 22)
Gay Men's Health Leadership Academy: Day 1 / Day 2 / Day 3 (March 22-24)
Gay.com Conversations on Race: Part One / Part Two (April 1-2)
HIV Prevention Politics in Detroit (April 17)
The Gayest Podcast in Michigan - Episode 2a: Troy Wood (June 23)
Juanita More's 2008 PRIDE Party Extravaganza (June 30)
The Gayest Podcast in Michigan - Episode 2b: Troy Wood, Ctd. (July 4)
"DON'T ASK ME TO PAY FOR THEIR MEDICINE!" (July 23)
Gaycation '08 Photo Album (July 28)
Hooking Up (July 31)
Racial Diversity on Manhunt, Adam4Adam: San Francisco Edition (August 6)
Racial Diversity on Manhunt, Adam4Adam: Atlanta Edition (August 8)
Racial Diversity on Manhunt, Adam4Adam: NYC Edition (August 10)
The LAST Trannyshack EVER (August 13)
Me on "Getting it on with Bonnie" (August 21)
Dating Economics (September 13)
Three Fags in a Boat (October 12)
What is Sexual Health? (October 19)
Outrage! NC DJ Arrested for Having Unprotected Sex (October 23)
Resist "Lazy Structuralism": HIV Prevention as Case Study (October 27)
"BlacksOnBoys": The Construction of Black Masculinity (Vs. White Femininity) in Gay Porn (November 30)
Working Out, or, "What happens to twinks when they hit 25?" (December 8)
Positional Identity on Manhunt, Adam4Adam: SF Edition (December 18)
From 2009:
Positional Identity on Manhunt, Adam4Adam: NYC Edition (February 3)Me and Loretta Devine!!!! (February 10)
Eric Leven's Recent Barebacking Video: "Why are we..." (March 3)
How Do I Trust Again?: Love, Betrayal, and Moving On (March 17)
Why are Hate Crimes Worse Than Other Crimes? (April 1)
What's New in Gay Sex?: "Natural" (April 11)
Recuperating "Heteronormativity": It's Not *Just* About Heterosexuals! (April 20)
Christina Aguilera Fans Crashed My Blog (May 10)
To Everyone Who Is Demanding Lambert Come Out... (May 28)Hookups are not meaningless (And other thoughts on sex) (May 29)
From 2010:
Does Justice = Loving Yourself? Thoughts From the Forum on Black Gay Men (Feb 1)What does it mean to call something "problematic"? (Feb 2)
Can "uncertainty" help us to better explain "sexual risk"? (Feb 14)
Why do sorority girls come to gay bars? (April 9)
The anatomy of a claim: "Having older sex partners increases HIV risk for young gay men" (April 12)
Frameline 34: "We were here: Voices from the AIDS years in San Francisco" (June 22)
Queering HIV prevention: An interview with Kane Race (July 12)
Analysis of NYC's wrong-headed HIV ad, and a call for accountability (Dec 14)
And there you have it. Six years of material, all boiled down to a few dozen "greatest hits." It's been swell, y'all!
xoxoxo
Trevor
]]>Lo importante es ver que estos centros son concebidos desde la óptica que opera el Courage Latino, organizando seminarios y talleres para fomentar habilidades y herramientas en terapias de Re-orientación sexual para psiquiatras y psicólogos (quienes en estas situaciones no deberían llamarse profesionales de la salud)
Es importante voltear a lo que sucede fuera de la ciudad de México, la zona de confort de muchas personas para refugiarse en el argumento insensible de "México ya cambió". La situación es complicada a dos horas de distancia como lo está Puebla, a unos minutos en el tráfico en el Estado de México, con esto no quiero decir que no existan problemas en la ciudad de México referentes al ejercicio de derechos sexuales y reproductivos, sólo menciono que debe recalcarse que la diferencia es indescriptible.
En Puebla no existe una ley contra la discriminación, hay candados para despenalizar el aborto, hay mujeres siendo procesadas por abortar sin importar los motivos en los que sucedió, hay muchos crímenes de odio por homofobia etiquetados como crímenes pasionales, la juventud es criminalizada y las personas no heteroxuales son detenidas u hostigadas por "faltas a la moral" al demostrar sus afectos en las calles. El trabajo es mucho y es más difícil cuando las personas en el poder no trabajan para sus ciudadanos, sino para sus propios prejuicios.
]]>
Guillermo Almazán Smith said he would study the idea of creating a center like the one promoted in Guadalajara, Jalisco (another ultra-conservative location in México) by the catholic cardinal Juan Sandoval Íñiguez, impulsed also by organizations like courage latino who organizes seminars with the aim to develop skills in psychologist and other mental heatlh professionals (who shouldn't be named that way been in courses like that) in sexual re-orientation therapy.
In the other hand, the director Guillermo Almazán himself, denied being part of an ultraconservative organization named "el yunque", organization who stands against safe abortion, youth acces to contraception methods and sexual education out of any religious values. and he also said he would be able to work with all the groups and all the people including the LGBTTT organizations. Definitively we're in front of what will be a long and hard period of this new government who took posession of the power in the beggining of this year, in February.
We have a lot of work to do as organizations out of the government, we have to still fight for a law against discrimination who doesn't exist in Puebla, we're only a couple of hours of Mexico city but the reality is completely different; there's no gay marriage here, there's no anti-discrimination deppartments in the government, we still have a lot of hate crimes because of homophobia and homophobic people working for the people in high places with huge responsibilities and no care for all the people they are supposed to work for..
the link fot he note is here in spanish,
http://www.educacioncontracorriente.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=20562%3Aguillermo-almazan-smith-muestra-sus-rasgos-homofobicos-al-pretender-qrehabilitarq-homosexuales-en-puebla-como-si-fueran-enfermos&catid=16%3Anoticias
I'll keep you all guys informed, and i'm sorry about being out of here for so long.. never again!
I know that many gay men's health advocates (myself included) have had visceral, angry responses to this ad. Those responses are absolutely valid and deserved. This ad is repugnant and clearly provokes an emotional response. I'll give my own version of this at the end of this article.
But for just a second, I want to try and cool off a bit and evaluate the various arguments that have been made for and against the advertisement in terms of health behavior and the use of fear in HIV prevention. I'm not going to discuss the claims made in the ad about anal cancer and various medical outcomes -- I'm not familiar enough with those literatures to be able to comment effectively. But I do want to talk about what seems to be the crux of most conversations about this ad: Whether using fear is an effective prevention strategy.
I'll begin here with the kinds of arguments I've heard in favor of the ad, and then get to the meat of why these arguments -- well intentioned as they may be -- are not backed by sound evidence. If you're interesting in reading more about this subject, you might start with a recently published review of the scientific literature, "The Role of Fear in HIV Prevention" (PDF).
Argument 1: Young Gay Men Aren't Scared Anymore
Response: Perhaps - and We Should be Thankful It's So!: Younger gay men may well be less fearful of HIV, though the evidence to support that assertion is shaky. What we know is that most HIV-negative gay men are already scared to some degree of HIV infection -- but perhaps its not to a threshold satisfying to a different generation that lived through a time when treatment was not available, and when HIV was indeed a terminal illness. It is of course thankfully not a terminal illness for those who have access to medication anymore. As a so-called "younger" gay man myself, I want to take a moment and explain why it's not acceptable to be mad at young gay men for not being terrified of contracting HIV. The implication here is that you wish our friends were still dying so we'd be a bit more scared. I'm glad my friends are alive. I'm thankful that my HIV-positive mentors, colleagues, friends, tricks, teachers, and past lovers have access to ARV treatment that keeps them alive and healthy. And doesn't it make intuitive sense that a terminal illness would be scarier than a chronic disease? We know this from research in the risk sciences! HIV as a chronic disease is less scary than HIV as a terminal illness. Obviously. And we should be absolutely thankful that this is the case.
Argument 2: Using Fear is a Necessary Tool to Induce Behavior Change
Response: Evidence Shows Fear Doesn't Change Behavior: Underlying this argument is the notion that fear will in fact result in behavior change. But what we know is that fear campaigns are only persuasive to men who are ALREADY using condoms. Fear is not effective at encouraging men not using condoms -- presumably the population this ad is intended to impact -- to start using them. Moreover, research has shown that fear is especially ineffective at persuading young gay men, and only tends to persuade older gay men. So again we have evidence to conclude that this argument is ill-founded.
Argument 3: Fear is the Only Way to Change Behavior:
Response: Culturally Sensitive, Relatable Approaches Actually Work There are many different ways to communicate effectively about HIV risk: inducing the fear of God is not the only option. I don't have time to relay to you all of the things that work in prevention, but I do want to highlight one that is useful in rebutting arguments in favor of this ad. Research has shown that prevention works best when its approach is relevant and culturally sensitive. There are a litany of studies to back this claim up. Gay men have friends who are HIV-positive, and their bones aren't shattering before our eyes and their asses don't resemble something from the SAW franchise. The images included in this ad are just not relatable -- they're the opposite. Prevention should take the community's experiences as a starting point, rather than forcing down our throats some horrifying alternate reality that just doesn't exist in our lives.
Conclusion: We Need to be Angry and NYC DPH Must be Accountable! The ad's tactics are clearly not based on what we know about effective and useful HIV prevention. But this is just the rational, evidence-based response. Now that I've gotten that sensible approach out of the way, let me add a few more strongly colored words based on my experience and a more emotive analysis.
As a gay men's health advocate, I have to say that this ad is incredibly socially irresponsible and, as such, should be retracted immediately with apology. It is precisely this noxious brand of HIV prevention spear-headed by well-meaning but ultimately ineffective and potentially destructive public health officials who are willing to smear our names on the way to health promotion that make so many gay men like myself resent their work.
Let me be clear: Such antagonizing (which they write off as provoking "dialogue") alienates the communities you intend to work with, and it will have ill-intended, longterm consequences. Gay men have a collective memory that bears the burden of nasty campaigns like this one -- we won't forget, as much as we'd like to! Moreover, bad memories aren't the only outcome in question here: Homophobia, HIV stigma, and sexual shame are all direct outputs of stigmatizing campaigns like this one. If this ad doesn't come down with apology, I will do whatever I can to defund and shame your health department's HIV prevention efforts, and other health departments who continue to make ineffective, socially reprehensible prevention messages.
NYC's Health Department must be held accountable for this reprehensible ad. Where were the community partners in its development? Who approved the ad? How was it developed in the first place? Was there internal dissent over its release, as there has been recently in other NYC DPH efforts? These questions must be answered, and gay men everywhere have the right to ask them. This campaign may well have been made in New York, but it was disseminated internationally. We demand answers! We demand accountability!
If you're as outraged as I am about this ad, and wish yo share that outrage with the people responsible for it, you can contact:
Nichole Melendez
Administrative Assistant to Dr. Monica Sweeney, Assistant Commissioner of the Bureau of HIV/AIDS Prevention and Control at the NYC Health Department
212-788-3686
nmelend1@health.nyc.gov
Lifelube has an incredible open letter to Oprah from the inimitable David Malebranche in response to her recent show on a woman who sued her ex-husband for $12 million after she contracted HIV from him. Malebranche asks, "Have you learned nothing since the JL King disaster in 2004?" (which prompted a national panic about the "down low" and Black male sexuality generally):
The acidic taste of bile that coated the back of my throat as I heard her story was in response to the superficial and sensationalistic manner in which you handled the topic, and how it was apparent that you and your staff have learned absolutely nothing in the 6 years since you originally interviewed J.L. King on your "Down Low" episode in 2004.Yes, you can claim that for this updated version of your "Down Low" show, you actually included the fact that publically "heterosexual" White men and men of other races are equally capable of having secretive homosexual affairs as their Black counterparts. And yes, this new version of J.L. King who again opportunistically sashayed onto your stage to promote himself now uses the word "gay" to describe his sexual identity (partly as a consequence of the fame and fortune he attained from appearing on your show). However, everything else about the show remained stuck in a metaphorical time warp in which Black women are portrayed as simple victims with no personal responsibility or accountability when it comes to their sexual behavior, and Black men are projected as nothing more than predatory liars, cheaters and "mosquito-like" vectors of disease when it comes to HIV.
I felt like I was like watching a train wreck or an car accident about to happen: it was so awful that despite wanting to turn it off, I found myself transfixed and could not bring myself to pick up the remote or change the channel. From the ominous background music and blurred images on the screen when discussing Black men being intimate with one another (God forbid!), to your declaration that reading your guest's husband's sexually explicit emails and messages on gay websites "blew your mind," the way in which your show was staged did nothing to forward the conversation on the current facts or the social context that currently drives secretive same sex behavior among Black men and the current HIV racial disparity in the United States. Instead, what came across was a clear, fear-mongering and hyperbolic message: "Black women, look out for your husbands, they could be lying and cheating on you with other men and putting you at risk for HIV." It was bad enough that 6 years ago, after your original "Down Low" show, you single-handedly launched a major media and cultural hysteria where Black women across the country were now searching for signs of how they could tell if their men were "on the Down Low" through stereotypical signs and ridiculously offensive generalizations about how homosexual men think and act. Your show also helped J.L. King and other self-proclaimed "HIV experts" make a lot of money off this capitalistic, fear-based industry to promote their books, movies and narcissistic products on the so-called "Down Low." It did nothing, however, but open new wounds and put salt in the old scars caused by centuries of sexual exploitation and calculated pathologizing of Black bodies in the United States and internationally. The way you and your staff have handled this topic has done nothing but widen the already irreparable rifts between Black men and women, as well as between Black heterosexual and non-heterosexual peoples."
You just gotta read the rest. It's incredible.
]]>Hate speech, here we go again... If the USA moves fast in terms of modern technologies, I am afraid the same cannot be said about sex and social justice. Quite the contrary: a few days ago, we had to face the failure of the repeal of this ridiculous, anachronistic policy - Don't Ask, Don't Tell - and only after a massive response from the CNN story on Shirvell do we now finally have word this morning that Shirvell has *finally* been suspended (but not fired!) by his boss the Attorney General, who went on CNN to defend Shirvell's right to free speech. This guy spends hours of his spare time blogging against the MSA president, Chris Armstrong, and has recourse to the most offensive, insulting, threatening words to justify his hateful obsession, stating it is nothing but a political campaign and that his homophobia is somewhat sponsored by the freedom of speech.
Since Armstrong became the MSA president, he became an obsession of a rather peculiar kind for Andrew Shirvell, who started observing his target in the most disturbing way, including gossiping about Armstrong's friends and physically approaching his private home. It would be pathetic and maybe laughable if we were not worried about Shirvell's behavior, but at this point, his obsession cannot be taken as only political and shows evidence of stalking and harassment. Of course freedom of speech is an undisputable principle in the USA, and queers out there really know the price to pay to enjoy and maintain the freedom of speech, so the question is not to turn Shirvell into the victim of some sort of queer intifada because we expect the Attorney General to spank him, but rather to understand that the freedom of speech cannot be abused to promote a hateful rhetoric (against queers, or Jews, or Afro-Americans, or... the list is much too long), precisely because the goals of any hateful speech is to silence a targeted individual or community.
Using the freedom of speech to ultimately challenge other people's agency cannot be socially constructive. We should not address the issue of banning hate speech as a matter of censorship, but rather as a way of understanding the practice of the freedom of speech from a collective, social point of view. (I believe, like so many queers after Oscar Wilde, that only works of art should have this possibility to be disconnected from ethics and politics, precisely because the realm of aesthetics is not grounded on the quest for goodness, but the quest for beauty.) The point is not to censor but to learn how to feel and phrase one's emotions and values. That's when the concept of respect becomes crucial in terms of articulating the freedom of speech with the art of living together in the same, yet extremely diversified, nation (it's horrible I feel like I am preaching right now...).
One of my fears, in this painful story raised by Shirvell's threatening obsession with Armstrong, is the hypothesis that Shirvell could be one of us. The history of homophobia is full of examples of self hatred, closeted homosexuals who not only cannot come out but spend their energy hating shameless queers out there. Remember J. Edgar Hoover, president of the FBI during the years of McCarthyism, who made sure to include queers in the hunt witch? He put so much energy in breaking the lives of homosexual American citizens, and yet, he was over the rainbow even if he had constructed a special hell for people sharing his own sexuality. What is better for us: a straight homophobic guy or a closeted, self hating queen? This is just a horrible alternative. Let's say that we still believe in the possibility to have a society with friendly straight people and no more self hatred among queers because of homophobia. Clearly, the fight is not over.
As a University of Michigan graduate student, I feel it is important to declare my solidarity with Chris. As they have been saying on campus: Elected by us, respected by us. In solidarity with our chosen Michigan Student Assembly President Chris Armstrong.
]]>That's what I call a movie sensation: watching Cool Hand Luke, an American classic movie, starring Paul Newman in one of - if not his - best roles, left me all wet and impressed on my couch. The plot in itself is pretty simple: our hero, soon to be called "Cool hand Luke," is sentenced to two years in prison because he was caught dead drunk while cutting the heads off parking meters in his small town. He is sent in a sunny prison camp, somewhere in Georgia, surrounded by hot, topless thugs of all kinds, and working like a slave under the eyes of a sadistic captain - big brother is watching you. In this context, oscillating between gay porn ambiance and concentration camp, Luke gains respect from his mates by the aura of his personality and a series of escapes: after his third escapade, he is finally killed by cops while having a conversation with God in a desolate church.
Luke is not just a social outcast, but he incarnates, well before Edward Scissorhands, a tormented, beautiful prince fallen on earth, lost and confused among the rules and norms of his peers. The symbolic gesture of cutting the heads off parking meters shows his resistance to the logics of discipline and capitalism: but more than a rebel, Luke stands out as an existentialist subject who takes the radical freedom to question the basis of the society he lives in, starting with the faith in God, the duty of obey and fear cops, and the quest for money. Prophet without a revelation, seducer without sexual activity, he only rules with the devastating charm of his smile and the paradoxical strength of his skepticism. In his confrontation with either God ("I guess you're a hard case, too") or the captain ("I wish you'd stop being so nice with me"), just like when he plays poker with his fellows, he expresses the wit of the weak, and makes some point out of his nothingness. In this case, including his tragic end, he reminds us of another enigmatic figure of resistance, Melville's Bartleby.
Luke is a hero of a strange kind: an anti-hero. Although his masculinity is blatant and overwhelming, he does not fit the classic standards of manliness. At the beginning of his stay in the camp, his independence and irony make him engage in a fight against the leader of prisoners, Dragline. The spectator expects him to knock out Dragline out of bravery and violence, but actually Dragline beats the hell out of him: the surprise comes from the fact that Luke, in spite of his inferiority, keeps standing up over and over, receiving more blows and approaching the edge of a black out or a mortal injury. Reluctant to surrender, he impresses so much Dragline by his resistance that, finally, it is Dragline who stops beating him and gets out of the ring. Luke's masculinity is not so much about beating other people than it is about taking it in without fainting - some sort of power bottom, indeed. After this episode, Dragline loves Luke and calls him his baby until his sacrifice for him at the end of the movie.
Women do not matter for Luke, it is pretty clear in an amazing scene of the movie when prisoners leer at a woman washing her car in a very erotic way. All the prisoners enjoy this exhibitionist show and are just about to jerk off in their pants. Only Luke remains quiet and comments that she's pretending to look innocent, but that she is actually enjoying every minute of her performance. Likewise, during his second escape from the camp, Luke sends Dragline a magazine in which he appears on a page surrounded by two beautiful women. When he is caught by the cops and brought back to prison, the prisoners are all excited about asking him about these girls, but he tells me the picture was a phony, he only sent it to please them.
Eventually, only one woman matters to Luke, and it is after her death he starts running away from his prison and takes one step further in his opposition to discipline and punishment: this woman is his mother, Arletta, played by Jo Van Fleet. What we have here is maybe a failure to communicate between Luke and Big Brother, but no failure in terms of compassion and emotions: by the end of the movie, Cool hand Luke acquires a charisma that survives him and blesses the audience with a confusing sensation of grace. A masterpiece, indeed.
Here's a taste -- the famous car wash scene:
]]>Two-thirds of US gay men believe that it should be illegal for an HIV-positive man to have unprotected anal sex without disclosure, investigators report in the October edition of AIDS Care."Believing that it should be illegal was associated with HIV-negative or unknown status, less education, having a non-gay sexual orientation, living in a state that was perceived as hostile towards GLBT persons, reporting fewer UAI [unprotected anal intercourse] partners...and feeling greater responsibility", write the authors.
[snip]
The overwhelming majority (70%) of HIV-negative and untested men (69%) supported legal sanctions, but only 38% of HIV-positive men endorsed criminalisation. "These differences most likely reflect a shift in orientation toward criminal statues on HIV transmission following seroconversion", comment the investigators.
Men with the lowest educational achievements were most likely to support criminalisation (75%), and those with a degree least likely (58%).
Over three-quarters of men who did not identify as gay or bisexual supported criminalisation compared to 63% of those who had some form of gay identity.
In addition, those who were least comfortable with their sexual orientation were most likely to endorse criminalisation.
The full text of the actual study can be downloaded for free here.
]]>Via Joe.My.God.
]]>There are many amazing scenes in Nadir Moknèche's second movie, Viva Laldjérie. I guess my favorite would be the one where Goucem, a 27 year old single lady, has wild sex with a sexy jock she picked up in a nightclub in Algiers. As both of them are on fire and not interested in anything than a hookup, they go some underground place used by queers for their own pleasures. While Goucem and her partner fuck fiercely in this open space, they are being observed by Samir, a sexy guy who had been following Goucem for a while, and by Yacine, the gay son of Goucem's regular sugar daddy, Aniss. This scene offers a dizzy combination of voyeurism, cruising, and impersonal intimacy based on the confused dynamics of burning desires and clair obscure identities.
It all happens in the capital of Algeria, in 2003, when the country is trying to recover from the terror of the 1990s, but is still struggling with the corruptive authority of dictatorship and the rise of an oppressive Islamization of the nation. In such a difficult context, not much space is left for individualism and diversity, and yet Viva Laldjérie focuses on the lives of anonymous characters, three women and one gay men, who all fight with courage and dignity in order to express themselves against any norms, including when the price to pay is likely to become a social outcast or to end up assassinated. Yacine tries to be as openly gay as possible, but he is either beaten up by closeted Arabic men who become aggressive after sex or harassed by the police who do not tolerate any explicit homosexual identity.
In the end, Yacine wants to escape Algeria and go to France in order to live his sexuality without fearing for his life. Goucem is still single at 27 and she is not a virgin any longer, plus her married sugar daddy finally leaves his wife, but only to marry another of his mistresses. Goucem's situation as a straight woman with no children and no husband pushes her toward the edge, just like her neighbor Fifi who finally decided to work as a prostitute in order to maintain an agency of her own.
For a camp audience, the most beloved, dramatic character remains Goucem's mother, La Papicha, who used to work as a cabaret artist at Le Copacabana, a cabaret that had to be closed in the 1990 under the threat of religious terrorism. More fabulous than ever as 50 year old drama queen - absolutely worthy of some Almodovar divas - she refuses to beg for a French visa, teaches a little girl how to dance and bemuse men, and dreams of buying Le Copacabana in order to open it again.
Subtle, brave, oscillating between camp and pudor, Viva Laldjérie pays an emotional tribute to those who face infamy and pressure with the unexpected strength and beauty of sexual and gender mavericks. Thanks to them, and to directors such as Nadir Moknèche, there is space for hope, solidarity, and a better understanding of a nation in the making.
And good news: You can watch the entire movie via Hulu now!
]]>But of course, this alarming headline bears no relation to what the research actually found. Timothy at Box Turtle Bulletin breaks it down for us:
The conclusions from this study were that there are two distinct methods of HIV transmission in Belgium and that these two populations have little overcross. Young gay men who become infected get the virus from other local young gay men while Africans and other non-gay patients came to be infected through travel or migrated to Belgium with the virus.* * What this study did not find was that "white gay men take greater HIV risk". The study told us almost nothing whatsoever about whether "white gay men" or "gay men of color" take greater risk, because the study had few gay men of color. Belgium is not known for its racial diversity (racism in Belgium is defined in terms of Dutch v. French speaking people). Nearly all of Belgium is white, so nearly all gay Belgians who seroconvert were also white.
* Nor did it find a rampant disregard for safer sex among gay Belgians. A rough calculation suggests that only about 4% of gay Belgian men are living with HIV, a rate a third that of the US. In fact, it would appear that a small subset of young gay Belgians were behaving irresponsibly (perhaps specific social circles) and were consequently infected with a number of sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV.
* Nor does the research of transmission rates and methods in Belgium tell us much about rates and methods in the rest of Europe and especially the rest of the West. This was a local study involving one Belgian city, not "Europe and the UK" or anywhere else for that matter.
This is why it is so critical for us to keep a close eye on media reports relating to gay men's lives. The media gets it not just wrong, but maliciously erroneous. Shame on not just The Guardian for smearing the queers, but also the dozens of other publications that picked up this non-sense angle and ran with it (which includes gay media, like Pink News). Daniel Reeders has an excellent post on the local Australian debates over this noxious misinformation. It's nothing short of scientifically-veiled gay bashing.
]]>I'm still working on the translation of what happens in the word youth conference.. this is only a sample about the several aggressions against the Youth Coalition for Education and Sexual Health...
hope to translate my note soon.
by the way the note we made says:
"In church did they teach you is good to urinate in public places?
we dislike your little present"
(Someone urinated our stand)
]]>Llegué el domingo con la noticia de que la alianza internacional de juventudes, una organización católica, sesionaba en el domo de la feria a unos cuantos pasos del Polyforum en donde se realizó la conferencia mundial de juventud, y que además realizó con camisetas blancas una marcha antiaborto, (cabe recordar que en León hay mujeres encarceladas, de las cuales una de ellas, ni se ha comprobado si realmente estaba embarazada). El lunes, primer día de actividades se registraron agresiones contra jóvenes de la Coalición de Jóvenes por la Educación y la Salud Sexual (COJESS) en el momento en que trataron de entrar al Polyforum. Los y las jóvenes de la COJESS éramos fácilmente ubicados por nuestras camisetas rojas con leyendas sobre diversidad sexual, educación sexual, aborto seguro y derechos sexuales y reproductivos.
Para el martes existía un notable acoso por parte de las personas de derecha que entraban a todas las sesiones posibles sobre derechos humanos, sexuales y salud reproductiva, y que interrumpían a los y las ponentes en cada momento en el que se tocaban temas como aborto, educación sexual y derechos de las mujeres argumentando que el condón no es efectivo y que el único método que funciona es la abstinencia, que tenemos derecho a tener los hijos que queramos así sean veinte y que en nuestras casas deben hablarnos de sexualidad y jamás en las escuelas o en otros escenarios, repartieron panfletos sobre la amenaza de la equidad de géneros en la sociedad y se postraron con pancartas fuera del Polyforum que decían "Salud reproductiva o libertinaje disfrasado" (así, con faltas de ortografía) y "La ideología de género degenera a la sociedad", personas de estos grupos conservadores realizaron también acciones de sabotaje ante varias actividades de la COJESS (Coalición de Jóvenes por la Educación y la Salud Sexual), al irrumpir y descalificar el discurso científico y laico en el tema de salud sexual y reproductiva durante un taller facilitado por Jessica Reyes Sánchez de Salud Integral Para la Mujer SIPAM A.C. en colaboración con Alexis Hernández de Decidir, Coalición de Jóvenes por la Ciudadanía Sexual; al robar materiales informativos de las organizaciones MEXFAM A.C. y Equidad de Género A.C./Ddeser, así como lo muestran también las agresiones a lo compañeros Daniel Serrano y Juan Carlos Mendoza documentadas en varios periódicos, producto de la homofobia.
Muchos y muchas nos preguntamos el porqué un evento internacional de estas ambiciones y dimensiones se lleva cabo en una ciudad como León Guanajuato (donde mucha gente me trató bien, siempre y cuando no perteneciera a un grupo religioso con instrucciones específicas) Al inicio esta conferencia sería llevada a cabo en la ciudad de México, pero pareciera que el ambiente de izquierda que supone reina en la ciudad de México y la notable diferencia en cuanto a legislaciones comparada con otros estados de la república pudiera no ser conveniente para este resurgimiento de la derecha.
Al final de cuentas, las voces menos representadas fueron de las y los jóvenes, el foro de ONGs pareciera no haber sido tan exitoso y contundente por una tremenda falta de transparencia en el proceso que debiera ser un constante monitoreo a los objetivos de desarrollo del milenio entre los que se incluyen erradicar la pobreza y el hambre, combatir el VIH/Sida, el paludismo y otras enfermedades, promover la igualdad de géneros, mejorar la salud matera.etc.
En lo personal parte de mi corazón creció un poco más en León, me enfrenté a situaciones que afianzaron mi compromiso así como el de muchas y muchos compañeros de lucha y defensa de derechos de las y los jóvenes; una promesa de viajar a Aguascalientes, a Guadalajara, ir mas seguido al defe y hasta caerle a los Estados Unidos, el aprender que hacer ante provocaciones que incitan a la violencia (y que no necesariamente implican pedirle paciencia a papá Dios) Lamento la tardanza pero una experiencia así arda un poco en asimilarse.
Nol
Cher topping Xtina for two hours? Sounds like a dream!
]]>