How to Survive a Plague

YES! I have! (I have friends in it, both alive and dead.)

It actually shows, in great detail, how a bunch of activists changed the way drugs are distributed in the United States, not just for people with HIV/AIDS but also for people with cancer and other diseases.

It is an extraordinary film, and I am so glad David France made it.

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I'm glad you old men documented this for those of us who were born so long after this happened!

Here's the trailer.

http://youtu.be/wwhFS1mUaVY

You can see two of my friends at the door of a bud at 1:50 and, if you don't blink, I'm the blur in the back of Cooper Union in a white shirt at 1:58.

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Haven't seen "How to Survive a Plague," although have seen some recent related docs on the AIDS crisis:

United in Anger: A History of ACT-UP
http://www.unitedinanger.com/

We Were Here
http://wewereherefilm.com/

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I was hoping this would be on IFC on demand but sadly, it's not.

I just saw the Boston premiere tonight but first I just have to say, Addison, the story you repeated about people "getting pozzed" for freebies is mostly an urban myth. There have been anecdotal stories here and there but certainly not a generation of people making conscious decisions like that. The anecdotes are mostly about people with serious mental health issues and no access to any kind of care. Having said that, young black and latino gay men are ridiculously disproportionately getting infected (and historically with the least access to health care).

Back to the docu: I was wondering what it would be like to revisit some of the harshest years of the single biggest tragedy that radically altered the entire course of my adult life. It was occasionally very difficult to watch and yet ultimately I was giddy. A strange, visceral reaction to the film. Maybe it's a PTSD reaction or maybe it was something Peter Staley said about coming home from war. Anyway, it was a weird rush...

By the by, the website for the movie has a link to how to access free tickets for young people, AIDS activists and people with AIDS, in NYC, SF, Chicago, ATL and Cambridge, MA. Go if you can.

free tickets

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Namo--people drying their Teacup Yorkies in microwaves is an urban myth. A sub-culture of healthy, young HIV+ men living in NYC with their rent paid by HASA, their health care provided by the State and money for Meth deposited monthly onto their EBT cards is no myth. I lost 3 years of my life through that looking glass and I assure you that land is real and fully populated, with new arrivals every day of the week.

A generation of gay men and their allies fought for those benefits as though their lives depended on it. Medical research changed the reality of living with HIV but the memories--and the anger--of anyone who lived through the 1980s in NYC created a political climate where questioning benefits for people living with HIV was absolutely unthinkable.

How do you think the tweakers can afford to live in Manhattan and f**k all day and all night, 7 days a week? Only some of us had professional careers to throw away.

EDIT: Yes--these are, by and large, people with "mental health issues". But I'm not sure that that changes the grim facts or the sad irony of the situation.

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Updated On: 9/29/12 at 02:09 AM

"I think you're describing a short-lived phenomenon that involved a very small but fairly visible minority within the circuit-party-culture during the late 1990s, after the protease inhibitors reduced the frequency of death."

I've been sober for just over a year. I'm talking about Now. (Didn't you notice that I'd disappeared from the boards? I'm hurt...)

As to whether my writing "demeans" reality--I cannot speak to that. It strikes me as the kind of thinking that posits that gay nuptials "demean" the institution of marriage. You may not like it, but it exists. I'm not sure how a frank acknowledgement of reality "demeans" reality, but if it does, then mea culpa.

As to "exactly" how many men I'm talking about, again--I cannot say with certainty. More than 500. Less than 5,000. I'm not sure that an accurate head-count would change my original thesis--that, in the fullness of time, even the best-intended actions can yield un-intended, negative consequences.

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Apologies for the confusion. My SN was slightly different--'Addison DeWitt', perhaps--although the avatar was the same. When I regained consciousness I could not remember my screen name or password and, as my email address had changed, I started fresh.

I will accept the observation that it is dangerous to extrapolate too broad a meaning from one's own experience and I will certainly agree that there is no sure way to separate fact from fiction in the autobiographies that are provided by folks as they pass the pipe. On the other hand, in my capacity as someone who can string (too many??) words together to form a coherent sentence, I spent a lot of hours in the HASA offices helping my "friends" deal with their housing issues, so I will continue to believe in my understanding of 'reality'.

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Back to the movie, on the documentary's Facebook page for tonight, Saturday Sept 29:

Attention, New York City! Not only do we have FREE tickets to How To Survive A Plague this weekend--we have a special guest appearance as well.

John Cameron Mitchell will be moderating the Q&A tonight after the 7:40 screening and before the 10pm show. Don't miss it! http://bit.ly/SHYzPw
link

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I hope you watch it, Jordan!

Didn't you notice that I'd disappeared from the boards?

As Dorothy said, "People come and go so quickly around here."

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I don't understand the argument above or Addison's point. Is it that some people "game" the system? If so, I think that's always the case and hardly an argument in favor of neglecting those in genuine need.

A friend of mine joined the Air Force, then got lonely guarding a missile silo in Montana. So he faked a nervous breakdown and got a medical discharge with full benefits.

Shall we disband the armed forces to prevent a recurrence?