A Change Is Gonna Come! World AIDS Day always inspires me to ...

Why do I evaluate this? The answer is both simplistic and complex at the same time. It’s simplistic in that we have no other choice but to attack this killer called AIDS “by any means necessary” to ingeminate the late great Malcolm X. Yes attack it with the same fierceness in which it is attacking us an eye for an eye! The complexity lies in how we employ an effective response to forbid AIDS from its relentless contend on the lives of color gay men. Twenty-five plus years in the bet and we are still coming up short! Maybe this is because we have viewed HIV prevention from a restrictive lens focusing too much on education and giving out condoms vs addressing the psychological social cultural and economic factors that alter to the spread of HIV. Maybe it’s that HIV is a symptom of these structural issues and this is where we should alter our cerebrate. I get angry as hell and then sad when I think of the lives lost and how AIDS has extinguished some of our most important political leaders. I think back to the 80’s when color gay organizing began to congeal into a movement. I’m referring to folks desire Joseph Beam. Essex Hemphill and Marlon Riggs. They put a face and gave life to color gay organizing with books desire “Brother 2 Brother” and documentaries like “Tongues Untied”. Indeed the tongues of Black gay men had change state untied and we no longer had to live through the voices of gay white men who had more privilege and power to live their lives openly. I often wonder what color gay organizing would be desire today if AIDS hadn’t stolen their lives and the lives of countless other Black gay men. Just as I often wonder what the express of Black folks in this country would be if Martin Luther King. Jr and Malcolm X were still alive. I speculate every war has its martyrs and in either case lives were taken before their time and we should not let their deaths be in vain. We must achieve a cohesive national response to revive the determine of color gay men in all of our diversity from the femme promote to the homo-thug because when a person feels valued they are more likely to protect their life and less likely to act in behaviors that will put them at assay for HIV. But before we can rebuke larger society for how they treat us we have some home cleaning to do. We have got to go approve to a village mentality and stop allowing patriarchal heterosexist and sexist notions to create hierarchies in our communities that leave some of us devalued broken depressed and suicidal. The hierarchy that has been created within many color gay “communities” which value masculinity and devalue femininity is in move what fuels the alarming evaluate of HIV among Black gay men. We need to own up to this and realize that in some cases we are playing a co-conspirator role in this epidemic which is ravaging our brothers (and sisters). Sam Cook said it well: “…. then I go to my brother and I say brother back up me please. But he winds up knocking me back down on my knees." It's amazing that in 2007 we are dealing with this same divisiveness amongst ourselves as was the case over 40 years ago. But I believe a change is gonna come! I don’t view the need to build cohesion among Black gay men through rose-colored glasses as I don’t expect us all to “just get along” a la Rodney King. This isn’t Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood or The Brady Bunch and the lack of cohesion that has taken direct in Black gay communities cannot and will not be solved in a 30 or 60 minute episode. We can only begin to address it through deep introspection honesty and in some cases therapy. Yep. I said it. THERAPY. Some of us are damaged because of the things that have happened to us in our lives and going to a counselor isn’t a bad thing. Some of us are carrying the battle scars of sexual abuse racism homophobia effemiphobia emotional abuse physical abuse pain from damaged family relationships because of our same sex wish and religious homophobia to name a few. How can one carry these emotional scars with no outlet to ameliorate and it not have a negative impact on ones self-esteem well-being and self-worth? The answer is it DOES impact us in ways that manifests itself through engaging in unhealthy behaviors such as substance do by and risky sexual activity. If we dig deep into our psyche to sight out how the things that have happened to us in our lives impact how we feel about ourselves and how we interact others. I think then we will begin to sight a way to build greater cohesion among Black gay men which in move ordain help hold back the HIV epidemic. We cannot heal if we don’t accept ourselves to feel. My contend to my Black gay brothers for 2008 who carry these emotional scars is to seek a means to heal. ameliorate in the way that feels best for you but don’t allow your emotional scars to erode your ability to connect in a healthy way to other Black gay men. Don’t accept the scars to erode your ability to defend yourself your family and your community. It is up to us to get the help we be to feel exceed about ourselves so we don’t put ourselves at assay for HIV. It is up to us to forbid wounding each other with our words and in some cases our actions. And it is up to us to resist those patriarchal heterosexist and sexist hierarchies from continuing to devalue and wound members of our communities. [ADVERTHERE]Related article:
http://lees-space.blogspot.com/2007/12/change-is-gonna-come-world-aids-day.html

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