#aids crisis | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

gentlemanbutch · 7 months

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the way that no one wears a mask at my local LGBTQ clinic, and in fact comments on my mask like it's just this hilarious little idiosyncrasy that I still wear one and not because I'm immunocompromised and we're in the middle of a pandemic ... as if there isn't an airborne virus that literally fucks up your immune system ... as if we didn't lose a generation of queer people to another virus that fucks up your immune system ...

#i am tired of being tired and enraged but god i am so tired and enraged #white queer able bodied people try giving a shit for five seconds challenge #disability rights #disability #disabled #disability justice #chronically ill #covid #covid 19 #covid-19 #covid conscious #covid isn't over #chronic illness #immunocompromised #hiv #aids crisis #lgbtq #lgbt #queer rights

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azuremist · 10 months

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“Unfinished Painting” — Keith Haring

This painting was left intentionally incomplete. Haring began it when he was dying due to complications from AIDS, and knew he didn’t have much time left. The piece represents the incomplete lives of him and many others, lost to AIDS during the crisis.

“AIDS Memorial Quilt” — Multiple

This quilt is over 50 tons heavy, and one of, if not the, largest pieces of community folk art. Many people who died of AIDS did not receive funerals, due to social stigma and many funeral homes refusing to handle the deceased’s remains, so this was one of the only ways their lives could be celebrated. Each panel was created in recognition of someone who died due to AIDS, typically by that person’s loved ones.

“Untitled” (Portrait of Ross in L.A.) — Felix Gonzalez-Torres

This pile of candy weighs the same amount as Gonzalez-Torres’ partner, Ross Laycock, did. Ross Laycock had died due to AIDS-related complications earlier that same year. Visitors who see this piece are encouraged to take some of the candy. As they do so, the pile of candy weighs less and less, like how AIDS had deteriorated the body of Ross Laycock.

The SF Gay Men's Chorus

This photo was taken in 1993. The men in white are the surviving original members. Every man in black is standing in for an original member who lost their lives to AIDS.

“Electric Fan (Feel it Motherfuckers); Only Unclaimed Item from the Stephen Earabino Estate, 1997” — John Boskovich

After the death of his lover, Stephen Earabino, from AIDS, Boskovich discovered that his family had completely cleared his room, including Boskovich’s own possessions, save for this fan. An entire person, existence and relationship had been erased, just like so many lives during the AIDS crisis. Boskovich encased the fan in Plexiglass, but added cutouts so that its air may be felt by the viewer, almost like an exhalation. In a sense, restoring Earabino’s breath.

“Blue” — Derek Jarman

This was Jarman’s final feature film, released four months before his death from AIDS-related complications. These complications had left him visually impaired, able to only see in shades of blue. This film consists of a single shot of a saturated blue color, as the soundtrack to the film described Jarman’s life through narration, intercut with the adventures of Blue, a humanization of the color blue. The film's final moments consist of a set of repeated names: “John. Daniel. Howard. Graham. Terry. Paul". These are the names of former lovers and friends of Jarman who had died due to AIDS.

“Untitled” (Perfect Lovers) — Felix Gonzalez-Torres

Created by the same man who created the previous untitled piece, this piece was also inspired by his lover’s deterioration and death due to AIDS. This piece consists of two perfectly alike clocks. Over the course of time, one of the clocks will fall out of sync with the other.

In a letter written to his lover about the piece, before his lover’s passing, Gonzalez-Tourres wrote, “Don't be afraid of the clocks, they are our time, the time has been so generous to us. We imprinted time with the sweet taste of victory. We conquered fate by meeting at a certain time in a certain space. We are a product of the time, therefore we give back credit were it is due: time. We are synchronized, now forever. I love you.”

Please feel free to reblog with more additions

#aids #aids pandemic #aids crisis #lgbt #lgbtqia #queer history #lgbt history #art tag #azure does a thing #(i cried while putting this post together.)#(something about art about those lost to aids makes me want to fall to my knees.)#(happy pride month)#long post #death tw

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lifewithchronicpain · 2 years

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In photographs, she looks like a scout leader about to ask if you’ve had anything to eat today. It takes a moment to see that often, just out of focus, her fingers are holding a joint and her vest is covered in risque pins, including an embroidered cannabis leaf.

Mary Jane Rathbun, jailed thrice and the reason for California’s groundbreaking action on medical cannabis, was better known as Brownie Mary, the patron saint of AIDS patients. More than twenty years after her death, it’s not hard to understand why this grandmotherly figure remains one of San Francisco’s most beloved activists.

She’s been called the Florence Nightingale of HIV/AIDS. She was famous for bringing her magic brownies to gay men and others suffering from wasting syndrome, a name for the deleterious effects on appetite caused by the stigmatized retrovirus.

Much like Nightingale’s work on hygiene and compassionate care, Brownie Mary’s legacy lives on in the recipes and procedures still used today in medicinal edible production.

Rathbun’s illicit distribution began in the early 1970s, when she was in her early 50s, while she worked at an IHOP in the Castro, 37 years before government-approved research finally proved that her hypothesis about distributing ingestible cannabis to AIDS patients was worth investigating. (Read more at link)

#aids crisis #aids/hiv #brownie mary #disability rights #activism #article

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l-ultimo-squalo · 1 year

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Vintage gay Bart shirts

#bootleg simpsons #lgbt history #gay bart #AIDS #AIDS crisis #queer history

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zegalba · 10 months

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Keith Haring's final painting titled "Unfinished Painting" (1989).

It was left intentionally to appear incomplete as Haring was dying of complications from AIDS and knew he didn't have much time left. The piece represents his and all the many incomplete lives lost to AIDS during the crisis.

#keith haring #Unfinished Painting #paintings #art #aids crisis #1989

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antinousmondragone · 5 months

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Loss and Bravery: Intimate Snapshots From the First Decade of the AIDS Crisis (ph. Sarah Krulwich, Jim Estrin, Terrence McCarthy)

1. Members of Act Up (AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power) demonstrating during rush hour in Grand Central Terminal (Jan. 23, 1991) 2. At Coming Home Hospice in San Francisco, David Brewster, an AIDS patient, being attended to by his friend Michael Bolleri (Jan. 29, 1989) 3. Andrew Weisser, a volunteer cook, serving a meal at Our House, a Los Angeles facility that helped people with AIDS (Jan. 29, 1989) 4. Margie Wilson dancing to a music video with her foster children, who have AIDS (May 5, 1988) 5. Volunteers at the Names Project in San Francisco sewing quilt panels to memorialize those who have died of AIDS (Sept. 23, 1987) 6. Robert Sanford, having relearned to play the piano without the benefit of sight, at a recital at the Lighthouse, a New York association for the blind 7. Near the Ugandan town of Masaka, a 28-year-old Ugandan woman being comforted by Maureen Nakimera, a social worker from an AIDS support organization (Aug. 23, 1990)

#world aids day #aids crisis #aids history #sarah krulwich #jim estrin #terrance mccarthy #photography #black and white photography

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brainwormcity · 2 months

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We all know there's a fat erasure problem with Good Omens art and photo edits. We've gotta stop being afraid to let them have skin folds, stretch marks and soft bellies but another thing we don't talk about is how important it is leaving them their wrinkles, their eye bags and their imperfections of age. It's part of their beauty but it also signifies something incredibly important, in my opinion.

Part of what makes Crowley and Aziraphale such unique and wonderful examples of representation, is that they're not perfect, model-like young adults. Middle aged queer characters are so important because queer elders as a whole are so rare. The world's respective governments significantly failed queer folks during the AIDS crisis in the 80s and as a result, older queer couples, especially mlm or masc presenting couples aren't particularly prevalent in media, and having that example is a strange little beacon of hope.

So please, let Crowley have his forehead wrinkles and let Aziraphale keep his eye bags. Not only are they lovely, notable parts of their appearance but they symbolize something larger than just that. Let these old, alt, soft, queer man-shaped beings be just that.

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commiepinkofag · 4 months

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Dr. Gao Yaojie: Dissident doctor who exposed China's AIDS epidemic, dies at 95

Her work uncovered how businesses selling blood led to the spread of HIV in the countryside.

She was at the forefront of AIDS activism in China and traveled across the country treating patients, often at her own expense.

A gynecologist by training, she encountered her first AIDS patient in the central province of Henan in 1996.

While she was not the first Chinese doctor to expose the AIDS epidemic, it was her efforts that made the situation known to the country and beyond.

She told the Associated Press in a previous interview that she withstood government pressure and persisted in her work because “everyone has the responsibility to help their own people. As a doctor, that’s my job. So it’s worth it.”

#gao yaojie #doctor #author #activist #aids activist #aids activism #aids #hiv #blood transfusion #aids epidemic #aids crisis #china #healthcare #health care #1996 #1990s #90s #2023

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batwynn · 3 months

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Listen. The moment you get an older than 45 queer romance going in media I’m thrilled and I just don’t gaf if it’s sad, ‘Bad Rep’, light and happy, plot B, not ‘serious enough’, ‘too serious’, Can’t Happen Because One of Them Only is in Love With the Other Inside a Mind Split Work Place, Not Safe For Work, etc. I don’t care. I want it to exist and I will thoroughly enjoy it.

I grew up hearing about all the friends my mom lost in the queer community. I grew up knowing that those people would never have a romance that aged with their bodies. That they’d never have these kinds of stories. That the people who did survive still face hatred and violence just for holding hands in public even after living through this shit for so many years. So, yeah. I want to see the older queer couples in love, ok? I don’t care if it’s not the Young People Aesthetic or ‘Good Representation’ or wtfever. I just don’t care. They deserve to age, and love, and be messy, and be real people, and have stories told about it.

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vaspider · 5 months

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Hopefully this will upload. Someone asked, "Did you think we'd ever have to be here again, explaining the basics of AIDS transmission?" & once I thought about that, I had some Feelings.

#AIDS crisis #queer history #Emotions

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zanderism · 11 months

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honoring one of my idols today since it’s pride month

thank you for going the extra mile and gambling EVERYTHING just so trans men and transmasc people like me can be safe, love loudly, and exist peacefully.

“You told me I couldn't live as a gay man, but now I am going to die as one.”

Louis “Lou” Sullivan

June 16, 1951 – March 2, 1991

#personal #gay history #gay rights #aids awareness #aids crisis #trans man #transgender #transgender male #transmasc #lgbt liberation #gay liberation #lou sullivan #shut the fuck up zander #this has half a thousand notes now.

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laurenfoxmakesthings · 11 months

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ID: A thread of tweets by PinkRangerLB, a trans lawyer, that say the following.

"We in the LGBTQ+ community must understand that our dead were real people. Vital, awake, worlds unto themselves, like us. They didn’t live and die for the sake of our learning, but they have a lot to teach.

I want to tell you about Hart Island and hope in the darkness. /1

When I say they were real people I mean I do not believe they are necessary sacrifices, or that our dead paid a cost for us. They loved, they feared, they had favorite TV shows and candy bars. They were here and it will never ever ever be okay that they’re gone. /2

They’re not symbols or metaphors. They had books to write, vacations to take, meals to cook, and the world would be better with them still in it. We aren’t enriched by death, but we can stand in their shoes and see the future. /3

Hart Island, if you don’t know, is where New York City buries bodies that aren’t claimed by a licensed funeral director. At the height of the AIDS epidemic funeral homes were urged not to embalm AIDS fatalities. /4

In New York, as elsewhere, stigma toward the queer community was at a level that even now it can be difficult to remember. Many queer people who died of AIDS had been disowned by their birth family because of their identity, their HIV status, or both. /5

To make matters worse, their partners and found families had no rights to their medical care or their bodies after they passed. The hateful families that could claim them often didn’t, and the families that loved them were powerless to see to their wishes. /6

You can read more about all this at the memorial’s website, here:

hartisland.net/aids_initiative

/7

You can feel their weight, can’t you? The absence is heavy. And it’s important we understand that weight, because it’s a flat fact that current attacks on LGBTQ+ rights, trans rights especially, will kill people. There will be more absence, and it is not okay. /8

And when we say we have hope we are not saying it’s okay that they will be gone.

None of this ignores intersectionalism, higher rates of infection in targeted communities, death rates higher still. When I say things *can* get better I am not ignoring that improvement favors /9

the privileged.

Things got better. ACT UP and other activist groups organized and gained ground through community building, mutual aid, and grassroots action. Culturally, the tide began to turn. Federal action by Reagan and then Clinton contributed very little /10

(and in fact often caused harm). Direct action by activists galvanized AIDS research and the tide turned with very little government help.

In New York City, the death rate for HIV/AIDS patients fell by 62% from 2001 to 2012. So here’s what I’m saying. We’ve been seeing /11

an escalating backlash against LGBTQ people for years now. It gets very easy for us to come to expect the worst case scenario. Trump won, states are attacking trans kids, Roe was overturned. So now we say WHEN the Supreme Court overturns gay marriage, WHEN a national /12"

abortion ban passes, WHEN trans healthcare for adults gets criminalized.

And don’t get me wrong, those are all very real threats. We have to fight like hell. I am not pretending that times aren’t dark, that people won’t die, or that it will ever be okay that our people will /13

suffer and die. But things can, and do, get better when we fight, when we look after each other. The tide will not inevitably turn, but *we* can turn it. We can say that when the wall finally fell, our hands were there, pulling it down brick by brick. /14

And those we lost, if we remember them, honor them, we are their hands too. /15"

#lgbtqia+#trans rights #transgender #activism #lgbtq #queer community #queer activism #lgbt #queer history #AIDs Crisis #you should share more of her threads on here they are often this anti-defeatist #I've been trying to use twitter less and go to tumblr more to get away from twitter's defeatism #I don't want any of you to start importing and accepting that defeatism here

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phierecycled · 3 months

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that person who got ai to ‘complete’ keith haring’s Unfinished Painting reaffirms my belief that the AIDS crisis desperately needs to be taught about in schools

#i was actually so shocked when i saw that #i hate ai #keith haring #ai #ai art #unfinished painting #queer #aids crisis #queer history

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queerism1969 · 1 year

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inhousearchive · 8 months

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AIDS awareness PSA featuring Hal Jordan, running in the back of DC Comics titles with a cover date of January 1994.

#hal jordan #green lantern #green lantern 1990 #dc #dc comics #aids crisis #aids activism #aids awareness #house-ad #house ad #90s #dcedit #comicedit #comicsedit

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hannahleah · 11 months

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Gia Carangi photographed by Robert Farber for Bloomingdales

#gia carangi #gia #photography #black and white #fashion photography #fashion editorial #fashion magazine #vintage #fashion #fashion icon #Robert Farber #aids crisis #addiction #bloomingdales

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