The direction this thread has taken in response to my provocative posting and the dramatic responses to it raise a few questions—2 of which are: Does a member of the LGBT community (or any oppressed minority for that matter) owe anything to the community at large? And, why is x-man so obsessed by this question—to the point of seeming to suggest that anyone who does not see it my way is morally wrong? I'd like to leave the first question for later, but I would like to address the second one now.
The answer to it I only fully realized not all that long ago, and it is one I have never told anyone else. I mean it, no one. So here it is.
I am almost possessed by the guilt I feel because I remained HIV negative while so many around me fell. It certainly was not because I was the posterboy for safe sex. Given my behaviour I should have become positive early on. I should have. I was lucky to an extent I did not deserve, and for which I find myself apologizing still. In the early 80's I was in graduate school; I had heard of AIDS and that the catcher was more at risk than the pitcher, but that was about all I knew. I screwed around, but as a lone wolf rather than a part of any community. My time was occupied with school; I was on a full scholarship and didn't risk fucking up. I was oblivious to what was happening in the gay community. Then I was off to Morocco and then to Asia to teach. At least in my earlier years teaching, HIV wasn't seen to be much of a problem, and it sure didn't make the news where I was. I was not sexually active in Korea, but I was in Indonesia, Malaysia, Morocco and especially Thailand. By the time I was spending a lot of time in Thailand the HIV rate had gotten alarming. Still I payed no attention.
You have to understand that before I returned to Canada in 1994 I had never touched a condom in my life. It went completely against my whole understanding of what sex was all about. At my doctor's insistence I got tested immediately upon my return. A tense week of waiting, but Negative. My unearned luck was holding. My dedication to barebacking was not based on the difference in feeling between flesh and flesh versus flesh against latex. To me the question was always that as human beings we are condemned to alienation from each other because our centres of consciousness are separate and that alienation can never be overcome—it is the price we pay for individuality. Bees, ants, and some herd animals seem to have overcome this alienation to some extent, but at a price humanity would not pay. In sex we come as close as possible to unity, but on the most fundamental level we are not successful. But we try. For me the essence of sex always centred on holding or being held, bodies pressing against each other, one person inside the other, indeed for a few moments literally glued together. For the pitcher this is a sensation; to the catcher it is a realization—the closeness, the cries from deep within you, the sweat, the surrender, the coming together (pun intended). I found transcendence in touch. For me this would be just about gone with a condom in play.
When I began working with People With Aids I finally woke up. Virtually everyone there was HIV positive. My boss and my editor knew I was negative, but otherwise I kept it secret. Occasionally I was asked, but that was officially forbidden and only happened when someone wondered if I wanted to have access to some service, such as massage, that was only open to HIV positive people. I always managed to talk around it without answering. I was, in short, ashamed of being negative. I had no right to be negative. I was surrounded by positive men and a few women positive because of HIV positive boyfriends. Antiretrovirals were on the distant horizon. For the people I was with, HIV was a death sentence, and the main issue was how long that sentence could be delayed. My job was to edit the news letter and write books to inform HIV positive people what lay in store for them—the various diseases and the sequence in which they usually came, and what could be done to stay as healthy as possible to delay them. I was mandated to write for someone with an 11th grade education, a speaker of English as a second language, and with as much humour and lightness of touch as I possibly could. This meant a lot of research on my part, a lot of learning, and the rapid realization of what those around me were going through, and how important it was to do all you could and to remain optimistic—in the face of tragedy. I met so many brave and worthy men and women, I should be amongst them, but so unfairly to them, I had been spared while they were doomed. I have no right to be here, they do.
So, you wonder why I am so obsessed? Because I lost my chance to help out much. Until 1994 I stood on the sidelines and watched. You can't imagine how ashamed that makes me feel. When I come on strong now, I am really accusing myself. I am imploring other people to avoid my fate here. I have no right to preach morality to anybody, but for me it was not so much a matter of cowardice but of ignorance. For me there was no excuse for either one.
