PAGE4Q-Notes ■ February 1990
AIDS Response Encouraging for Gays
It's My Opiiiioii
By Richard Epsoh-Nelms
Special to Q-Notes ,.
The beginning of this new year has brought
recognition that the gay and lesbian commu
nity has dealt with the AIDS epidemic in the
most responsible manner while other seg
ments of our society have yet to acknowl
edge the problem.
On January 10, an editorial appeared the
Charlotte Observer, saying:
Good News About AIDS
Results Show Aggressive Education
Can Reduce Spread
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC)
says the spread of AIDS has showed among
homosexual men, and the agency has low
ered its projection of AIDS cases among aU
Americans this year from 65,000 to under
57,000.
That’s encouraging. But the good news is
tempered by an increase in AIDS among
intravenous drug users, heterosexuals and
newborns — and by data showing the prog
nosis for AIDS patients without treatment as
being worse than medical experts had thought.
And some health officials say a General
Accounting Office reports shows there has
been a substantial undercounting of AIDS
cases, perhaps by as much as 33%. CDC
disputes that, saying 80% to 90% of all ADS
cases are being reported to health officials.
Either way, it is clear that the need for
AIDS awareness and research is as important
as ever. Credit for the slowing of ADS
among gay men must be given to the aggres
sive education programs about AIDs that gay
men have instituted in their communities.
ADS is still a battle that has to be fought
by the entire community. And the new CDC
statistics suggest that the best weapion against
the disease today is aggressive education.
While this recognition was and is needed,
it is not enough. It is not enough to tell a group
that their work is “well done” when that
society refuses to acknowledge the very
existence of that group in all other respects.
Likewise, it is not enough for our commu
nity to be concerned only in our existence—
or a threat to that existence without at lea^t
equal concern for full and equal treatment in
all aspects of society. When we internalize
and act out the homophobia that is cast upon
us, we become willing participants in our
own destraction. When we let go unchal
lenged expressions of homophobia, we are in
essence giving tacit approval of those ex
pressions.
Equal rights come with a price — respon
sibility. It is up to each of us to be responsible
and part of that responsibility is to demand
recognition from each other and the larger
society.
We have done well in the area of ADS
and there is more — much more to be done.
Yet, let us not stop and rest on our laurels. Let
us stop at nothing less than full recognition as
the caring, loving people that we are. Let us
be recognized as a people who stand up —
even when that standing up might cause
personal pain or difficulty.
Without fulfilling that goal, there really is
a threat to our existence — OURSELVES!
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SATURDAY FEBRUARY 3 1990
ACT UP — Too Much?
Letter To
The Editor
It is regrettable that at a time when a few
in our community are struggling to gain ac
ceptance for us all that there are those whose
misguided actions might actually be harming
the cause they so zealously support.
An example is the recent disruption of a
worship service at St. Patrick's Cathedral by
the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT
UP). Time magazine reported that “Church
goers who dodged the chaos in the aisles and
made it to the altar to take communion saw
one protester take a wafer from a priest and
throw it to the ground.”
As a gay Christian I was incensed that
such disrespect would be shown. Perhaps it is
time for us in the silent gay and lesbian crowd
to counter such excesses by mass involve
ment in responsible gay and lesbian reli
gious, political and human rights organiza
tions.
Through this “constmctive activism” can't
our goals be reached while showing the same
degree of dignity and respect we are demand
ing for ourselves?
— Dan Perkins
Rock Hudson: A Review
Movie
Review
By Steve Madison
Special to Q-Notes
Rock Hudson, the man, was a synthetic
creation of a Hollywood studio intent on
presenting a glossy shell of heterosexual
American masculinity to a gullible public
too eagerly willing to swallow the fabrica
tion whole.
The same, unfortunately, could also be
said about “Rock Hudson,” the made-for-TV
movie airing recently on ABC-TV. Purport
ing to be a tell-all exposd on the “scandalous”
lifestyle that led one of the most popular
movie stars of the last quarter century to die
a miserable ADS-related death, the telefilm
was actually a flat, all-too-superficial treat
ment of a man who must have been far more
interesting than the lifeless human storied
here.
The movie got off to a terrible start in its
credits sequence as actual studio pose shots
of the red Rock Hudson were used. We
segued from those real pictures to Thomas
Ian Griffith playing Roy Fitzgerald (aka Rock
Hudson), and the illusion for the evening was
forever shattered. He neither looked nor
sounded like the real Hudson, and the movie
compounded this by continually using actual
photographs of Hudson during the entire
film. Newsreel footage of Hudson’s accept
ing Golden Globes and Modem Screen
awards heightened the problem.
The screenplay was likewise lackluster,
covering the most obvious stereotypes of the
movie star-hiding-in-the-cl6set syndrome.
And because the life was squeezed into two
hours, whole chunks of Hudson’s life went
by without any information concerning why
his movie career went stale and how a man
whose reputation was so promiscuous had a
total of three boyfriends during the course of
the film.
From a gay viewpoint, it’s quite distress
ing to observe that the portrayal of homo
sexuality on American television hasn’t
matured significantly since “That Certain
Summer” was broadcast 18 years ago. A cool
touch on the shoulder or a clapped arm around
the waist is about as daring as we’re going to
see on the national networks. One male hug
in a swimming pool here was about as erotic
as the romantic episodes in “Pee-wee’s Big
Adventure.” Suffice it to say the scenes be
tween Hudson and his wife Phyllis were
considerably more graphically sensual.
In addition to the cheesy production val
ues of the film (the premiere of “Giant”
looked like the opening of a convenience
store on a nearby comer), one other aspect of
the production was bothersome.
Much was made before the movie' s snow
ing about the heterosexuality of actors Grif
fith and William Moses, who played Hudson’s
last acknowledged lover Marc Christian, in
real life. That’s standard operational proce
dure in today’s still-sanitized movie busi
ness, but why all the fear and fuss? With the
lack of real physical contact between the two
actors here, they had nothing at all about their
reputations to worry about, at least as hetero
sexuals. Their acting abilities, particularly
Griffith’s, though, may be seriously in ques
tion after this feeble effort.
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