Sign up to get updates from us
In 1981, reports of a “rare cancer” affecting homosexual men surfaced, which marks the start of the AIDS crisis. For years, those living with AIDS were largely neglected by the government and medical community.
In this episode, we’re discussing how ACT UP formed in response to social neglect, government negligence, and the complacency of the medical establishment, and their decades-long work, which continues today.
Additional Resources:
Snarky Opener (0:00)
Alright, gays. Let's get our act together. The 80s may be over, but we still need to act up.
Episode Introduction (0:24)
Hello, my LGBTQuties, and welcome back to another episode of A Jaded Gay. I'm Rob Loveless and, today, I am a non-jaded gay because, after a months-long ordeal, my car is finally fixed.
I don't know if I mentioned this on the podcast, but back in October, I got in a car crash.
I was stopped in traffic in the tunnel, and a tractor-trailer hit the car behind me, who then hit me, and both cars also drove off.
So luckily, I was okay. There was no major damage to the car structure itself, but the bumper was really banged up. Couldn't really open the trunk.
And I immediately took it to the shop to get fixed, but I had to wait, like, a month after the accident for somebody to be available to actually fix it.
And then within a week of it being fixed, the emissions light came on. And so, I took it to the shop to get looked at again, and it required a new part, but the part that they needed was back-ordered.
So, this was like December-ish, when I went in initially, and the part didn't come in until, like a few weeks ago.
And of course, my inspection was up around that time too, but I couldn't actually get my car inspected because it would fail emissions.
So, I had to wait till I that part to get the emissions fixed, then to go through inspection. So finally, finally, finally, it's all fixed, and luckily, it was much cheaper than I thought it would be.
So, everything's good. Fingers crossed that I have no other issues with my car because I just, I cannot deal. I cannot deal.
ACT UP (1:36)
But anyway, from shattering bumpers to shattering stigma, today, we are going to be talking about ACT UP.
So, you know, we touched upon the AIDS crisis in May last year, when we were talking about how the COVID-19 pandemic disproportionately affected the LGBTQ+ community.
And I think in that episode, I mentioned ACT UP. And I know I mentioned the organization back in the gay icons episode about Donna Summer.
And they were the organization that Donna wrote the letter to, apologizing for the quote-unquote misunderstanding regarding her alleged homophobic remarks.
So today we're going to take a look into the history of this organization and the work they've done and are still doing today.
But first, tarot time.
Tarot (2:16)
Uh oh, today's card is The Devil, which typically is a scary-looking card in the tarot. It is part of the Major Arcana, so it indicates that it's going to have kind of a major impact on us right now.
It's number 15 in the Major Arcana. So, as you know, we add double digits together, one plus five equals six. And card number six in the Major Arcana is actually The Lovers.
So, the two cards are kind of tied together. And when we draw this card upright, like we did today, it may be indicating that we're experiencing some kind of self-sabotaging behavior.
And really, when we draw this card, it's specifically asking us to confront our inner fears about things that might be holding us back.
You know, when you look at The Devil, you see chains indicating that we're chained to something, something that's oppressing us, something that's a major obstacle that we need to overcome.
And to overcome those challenges we need to confront whatever it is face on. So maybe it is something internal, some internal behavior we're dealing with, or it could be a larger force.
And sometimes we might think that we don't have control over our own lives, over the things that are oppressing us in life, but we really need to be mindful to kind of shine a light on what we can control and find ways to break those chains that are holding us back.
A Brief History of the AIDS Epidemic (3:16)
So, with that in mind, let's turn to the topic, and specifically, let's begin with a history lesson. You know, I love it.
So, as we discussed in the Surviving Another Pandemic episode, the AIDS crisis really began in July 1981 when a newspaper published an article about a quote-unquote rare cancer affecting homosexual men.
And many criticized the government, mostly the Reagan and George H W Bush administrations, for not doing enough.
In fact, Reagan never publicly acknowledged the AIDS crisis until four years after its initial emergence.
Here's a quick excerpt from History.com:
"On September 17, 1985, President Reagan finally mentioned AIDS publicly when responding to a reporter's question. He called it a "top priority" and defended his administration's response and research funding. On October 2, Congress allocated nearly $190 million for AIDS research—$70 million more than the administration's request.
That same day, actor Rock Hudson, Reagan's close personal friend, died from AIDS, dragging the disease into the public's eye. In 1986, reports from the Institute of Medicine/National Academy of Science and Reagan’s Surgeon General, C. Everett Koop, advocated for a coordinated response to AIDS. Under pressure, Reagan appointed a commission to investigate the epidemic.
And towards the end of 1987, the country began taking steps to raise AIDS awareness by sponsoring AIDS Awareness Month, launching the “America Responds to AIDS” advertising campaign and mailing the Surgeon General’s findings to every American household. By then, about 47,000 people had been infected with HIV in the United States."
The Formation of ACT UP (4:48)
So, with that in mind, let's talk ACT UP. First off, ACT UP is an acronym which stands for AIDS Coalition To Unleash Power.
On March 10, 1987, gay activist playwright Larry Kramer called for the formation of an AIDS activist group in his speech at the Lesbian and Gay Community Center in Manhattan.
And you might recognize that name from the episode on the F word because he wrote that book called Faggots, which we referenced in it.
And ACT UP was formed in response to social neglect, government negligence, and the complacency of the medical establishment.
On March 12, 1987, so two days after Larry Kramer called for the formation of the group, approximately 300 people arrived for the establishment of ACT UP, a non-partisan group, united in anger and committed to non-violent direct action to end the AIDS crisis.
And it adopted the motto silence = death with a pink triangle.
Here's a quick excerpt from the New York City Historic Sites Project:
“'Silence = Death,' which became its motto and was used in a lot of its imagery, was adopted from the iconic poster designed in 1986 by the Silence=Death Project, which later became Gran Fury, an activist art collective formed within ACT UP in January 1988.”
And the group would meet at the Lesbian and Gay Community Center on Monday nights to plan actions and to socialize.
And the New Yorker published an article in June 2021 about how ACT UP changed America.
Here's a quote:
"More than anything, it was a safe place for people who had nowhere else to turn. They were a despised group of people, with no rights, facing a terminal disease for which there were no treatments. Abandoned by their families, government, and society."
ACT UP’s Early Demonstrations (6:20)
So, on March 24, 1987, ACT UP held its first action on Wall Street to protest the profiteering of pharmaceutical companies on AIDS drugs, especially Burroughs Wellcome, manufacturer of AZT.
Now, AZT was an anti-AIDS drug, and according to a 1987 Washington Post article, Burroughs Wellcome was charging pharmacies $8000 for a year's worth of the drug, but patients often paid as much as $12,000 each.
So, in their first protest, 250 ACT UP members demonstrated at Wall Street and Broadway near Trinity Church to demand greater access to experimental AIDS drugs and for a coordinated national policy to fight the disease.
And this location was chosen with the goal of causing a major disruption during the morning rush hour.
A flyer announcing the protest listed several immediate demands, including:
And ultimately, 17 people were arrested. And shortly after the demonstration, the FDA announced it would shorten its drug approval process by two years, a process that normally could take up to nine years—time that those then living with HIV did not have.
So, on October 11, 1987, ACT UP participated at the March for Lesbian and Gay Rights in Washington, DC, and demanded that the Reagan administration fight the spread of HIV/AIDS.
And on March 24, 1988, which was the first anniversary of their first protest, ACT UP held another demonstration on Broadway and Wall Street.
This time they had a larger group of over 1,000 people to protest pharmaceutical companies and government inaction.
There were chants like no more business as usual, and 111 people were arrested. Grand Fury photocopied thousands of dollar bills with messages on the back that they then scattered on the streets for passerbys to pick up.
And in subsequent years, there were a few other demonstrations at locations, including Governor Mario Cuomo’s State of the Union Address in Albany, the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta, and the New York Stock Exchange, among others.
Stop the Church Protest (8:21)
And one of the demonstrations I find really interesting from that time is their Stop the Church protest at St Patrick's Cathedral on December 12, 1989.
5,000 people protested the Roman Catholic Archdiocese's public stand against AIDS education and condom distribution and its opposition to a woman's right to abortion.
Originally, it started out as a silent die-in. So, during the homily, protesters laid down on the floor and staged a silent death.
However, it seemed to have little effect, and Cardinal John O'Connor continued on with mass.
As a result, Michael Petrelis, an AIDS and LGBTQ+ activist, stood on a pew and shouted, "You bigot O'Connor, you're killing us!"
According to Wikipedia, the cathedral then descended into pandemonium.
A few dozen activists interrupted mass, chanted slogans, blew whistles, quote unquote kept up a banshee screech, chained themselves to pews, threw condoms in the air, waved their fists, and lay down in the aisles to stage the die-in.
ACT UP Chapters and Groups (9:15)
And in the late 80s, ACT UP chapters were also founded in Los Angeles and Boston and New England. And I mentioned Grand Fury earlier.
According to Wikipedia, Grand Fury functioned at the anonymous art collective that produced all of the artistic media for ACT UP.
The group remained anonymous because it allowed the collective to function as a cohesive unit without any one voice being singled out.
The mission of the group was to bring an end to the AIDS crisis by making reference to the issues plaguing society at large, especially homophobia and the lack of public investment in the AIDS epidemic through bringing artworks into the public sphere in order to reach the maximum audience.
The group often faced censorship in their proceedings, including being rejected for public billboard space and being threatened with censorship in art exhibitions.
When faced with this censorship, Grand Fury often posted their work illegally on the walls of the streets. Also, in 1989 or 1990, I can't find a definitive answer, Diva-TV, an affinity group for ACT UP was formed.
It stands for Damned Interfering Video Activist Television and videotaped and documented AIDS activism.
Here's a quote:
“Although less as a "collective" after 1990, DIVA TV continued documenting (over 700 camera hours) the direct actions of ACT UP, activists, and the community responses to HIV/AIDS, producing over 160 video programs for public access television channels - as the weekly series "AIDS Community Television" from 1991 to 1996[72] and from 1994 to 96 the weekly call-in public access series "ACT UP Live"; film festival screenings; and continuing on-line documentation and streaming internet webcasts.”
Day of Desperation Protest (10:49)
Now fast forward a bit to January 23, 1991, ACT UP staged a Day of Desperation protest.
And this demonstration was in response to President George HW Bush spending a billion dollars a day on the Gulf War while claiming there was no money for much-needed increases in AIDS program.
Here's a quote from ACT UP's website:
“Activists disrupted the CBS Evening News live broadcast on the night of the 22nd shouting “Fight AIDS, not Arabs!” On the 23rd, multiple actions took place in all five boroughs, culminating in a massive action in Grand Central Station, where a banner reading “MONEY FOR AIDS NOT FOR WAR” was raised with helium balloons to the ceiling.”
ACT UP Demonstrations in the 90s and 00s (11:26)
And ACT UP held many more demonstrations in the 1990s.
Now I'm not going to go into every one, but I've included the link to their timeline in the episode description, so I definitely recommend checking it out.
But as we get into the mid to late 90s, we see a change in medical treatment for people with AIDS.
Specifically, in 1996 antiretroviral treatments came onto the market that dramatically changed the prognosis for people living with HIV, making it possible for many people to live long-term lives with the virus.
And even though treatment had improved, ACT UP, still continued to fight for LGBTQ+ rights in the late 90s.
On March 24, 1997, the 10-year anniversary of ACT UP's first demonstration, the group returned to Wall Street.
Here's an excerpt from the New York City LGBT Historic Sites Project:
“The action, called “Crash the Market,” again protested the profiteering of pharmaceutical companies, but also cutbacks in Medicaid funding. ACT UP chapters from New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Atlanta, Washington, D.C., Las Vegas, Philadelphia, and Oberlin, Ohio, brought over 500 activists, who gathered at 7:30 a.m. by the fountain in City Hall Park.
They then marched south to Wall Street, chanting “We die — they make money” and “Wall Street trades on people with AIDS!” Demands for Congressional hearings on the price of AIDS drugs were also made. Protesters rushed the doors of the Stock Exchange or sat down in the streets. During the demonstration, 73 people (mostly women) were arrested for acts of civil disobedience.”
And going into the 2000s, ACT UP continued to demonstrate for better health care for those affected by HIV and AIDS.
And there's no denying that ACT UP was crucial in pushing government agencies and drug companies to accelerate testing of medications, lower the cost of existing drugs, and bring people with HIV and AIDS into the process.
And they demonstrated the urgency of building a healthcare system designed to meet the needs of the most vulnerable. And they're still active today.
ACT UP’s Fight Today (13:15)
As noted on their website, HIV/AIDS is not history. HIV/AIDS is very much with us.
And today, they fight for:
In 2017, they celebrated their 20th anniversary.
And on Sunday, June 25, 2017, members of ACT UP marched in New York City's annual LGBT Pride March, carrying black coffins bearing the names of services that had been endangered by the Trump administration and the Republican-led Congress, including:
Episode Closing (14:12)
So, as you can see, they are still doing a lot of work for the rights of LGBTQ+ people, especially those living with HIV and AIDS.
And connecting it to the tarot, when we pull The Devil card, we see these chains that may be oppressing us.
And while it could be frustrating and feel like we have no control over our lives, this card's really shining a light for us to confront our fears and overcome those things that are holding us back, and find what we can control to break those chains.
And you know, that's not an easy thing, but especially not in the 1980s. LGBTQ+ people then had even less rights than they do now.
And on top of that, with the emergence of the AIDS pandemic, really, it felt like there was nobody fighting for them in their corner.
They were left to fight this deadly disease themselves, with little support from their family, friends, and government.
And despite it being scary, they had to fight for themselves and break those chains of oppression that society had placed upon them, to fight for their lives and for the lives of other LGBTQ+ people.
And like we talked about, their work isn't done. You know, with every new administration, there is a threat against LGBTQ+ rights.
So, we do need to continue to speak up, stand up, and act up for our rights and for the rights of other LGBTQ+ people.
It may be scary, but we have to know what we can control so we can break those chains that our oppressors hold against us.
And yes, I know this is a little bit darker of an episode, but really it is just a call to action that we can't be complicit. We need to continue to stand up for ourselves and for those in our community.
Connect with A Jaded Gay (15:27)
So, with that being said, thank you once again for listening. Please remember to rate, review, and subscribe.
If you have any feedback or questions, you can reach out to me rob@ajadedgay.com.
You can follow the podcast on Instagram, TikTok, SoundCloud, and YouTube @ajadedgaypod. You can follow me personally, Rob Loveless, on Instagram @rob_loveless.
You can also support the show for as little as $1 a month on Patreon @ajadedgay.
And remember, every day is all we have, so you got to make your own happiness.
Mmm-bye.
