THE STIGMA RETURNS TO AMERICA
Why didnt this occur to me right off the top, when I read it?
Famed fashion photographer and occasional music video director Herb Ritts -- the man who tried, and nearly succeeded in making Michael Jackson "sexy" in his video for "In the Closet" -- passed away two weeks ago, and the mainstream media described the cause of death as "complications from pneumonia".
Incredible. It's 2003, and we're still using stigma-tinged euphamisms for AIDS!
In Botswana, as well as the province of Kwa Zulu Natal in South Africa, places where AIDS infection rates are as high as the 30's and 40's (with nearly full infection in some townships), AIDS is not often listed as an official cause of death. At the insistence of those in the community, in its place are "tuberculosis" and other such diseases which may have contributed to their passing, but only because the HIV virus had completely done away with their immune system. Why such labeling? Same reason that Ritts died of "complications from pneumonia": Social stigma.
And like I've commented before, Bush ain't helping. Part of the secret of the doublethink of Republicans in power is, in a quasi-Orwelian fashion, to pretend some things don't exist, or don't matter. You know, stuff like racism, seniors' inability to get the prescription drugs they need to persist on this pleasant blue ball we call Earth, and perhaps -- good God! -- a link between guns and gun-related crime! What is this, Bizarro world?
If I drank, this would be where I'd say "I need a drink." Rather impressive of me, given that it's still ten in the morning here.
Why didnt this occur to me right off the top, when I read it?
Famed fashion photographer and occasional music video director Herb Ritts -- the man who tried, and nearly succeeded in making Michael Jackson "sexy" in his video for "In the Closet" -- passed away two weeks ago, and the mainstream media described the cause of death as "complications from pneumonia".
Incredible. It's 2003, and we're still using stigma-tinged euphamisms for AIDS!
In Botswana, as well as the province of Kwa Zulu Natal in South Africa, places where AIDS infection rates are as high as the 30's and 40's (with nearly full infection in some townships), AIDS is not often listed as an official cause of death. At the insistence of those in the community, in its place are "tuberculosis" and other such diseases which may have contributed to their passing, but only because the HIV virus had completely done away with their immune system. Why such labeling? Same reason that Ritts died of "complications from pneumonia": Social stigma.
And like I've commented before, Bush ain't helping. Part of the secret of the doublethink of Republicans in power is, in a quasi-Orwelian fashion, to pretend some things don't exist, or don't matter. You know, stuff like racism, seniors' inability to get the prescription drugs they need to persist on this pleasant blue ball we call Earth, and perhaps -- good God! -- a link between guns and gun-related crime! What is this, Bizarro world?
If I drank, this would be where I'd say "I need a drink." Rather impressive of me, given that it's still ten in the morning here.
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home