S/he Said
"Perhaps the most important development (in 2010) is that we're zeroing in on who is at risk for HIV in America today – and why. And we're developing successful ways to help. It's critical that we do: Of the 1.2 million Americans estimated to be living with the virus, 21% don't know their status. In addition, more than 650,000 of them are not connected to care. Why is this true? Many people living with HIV in America today face a unique set of structural and lifestyle challenges, including, but not limited to: poverty, hunger, under- or unemployment, illiteracy, racism, discrimination, immigration issues, homelessness, stigma, previous or current incarceration, sexual or domestic violence, homophobia, substance use, criminalization, addiction, and childcare and mental health issues. Much of what we have learned about fighting HIV has to be reconsidered in light of who is contracting the virus today and why."
– Regan Hofmann, in an article titled "The POZ 100," POZ Magazine's list of 100 people it feels have whose work is having great impact on HIV/AIDS in the U.S. today, http://www.poz.com, December 2010.
"Our campaign is driven from the perspective of a person living with HIV/AIDS. My life is dependent on my being optimistic. I have to believe I'm going to live. Optimism is required for people living with HIV/AIDS. Looking at HIV/AIDS through a lens of yet another unsolvable problem in black communities is not going to help. We want to stop pathologizing HIV in a black context. We want to embrace the unbelievable history and journey of black people in America and to use that to inform how we think of HIV and how we fight the disease. This campaign is a call to action and says, 'If we were greater than all those things, we can be, we will be, we have to be greater than AIDS as well.' This campaign removes HIV/AIDS from the doom and gloom and turns it into a challenge that gives us a chance to once again be victorious."
– Phill Wilson, CEO/founder, Black AIDS Institute, in an interview about the national AIDS awareness and testing campaign titled "Greater Than AIDS," http://www.poz.com, Jan/Feb 2010 Issue
"Recently I've been challenged… by people who feel I should transition. First and foremost, I am not male. I may have genderqueer tendencies, and I may enjoy playing in the middle of the two binary genders. It may make me masculine, but that is different than being male. …Sometimes I feel frustrated. This may sound like sour grapes, but sometimes it feels like butches are the forgotten remnant of the queer community. Where is the same recognition for butches who also live with non-binary genders every day? This is not about transmen getting too much. This is about transmen finally starting to get the good things they deserve, and the hope that butches one day will as well.
– Rev. Emily C. Heath, in her column titled "Claiming Butch Identity," http://www.bilerico.com, Jan. 05.
"There are so many homosexuals, both active and celibate, at all levels of clergy and Church hierarchy that the church would never be able to function if they were really to exclude all of them from ministry."
-Alberto Cutie, former Catholic priest and now Episcopal priest, in his recently-released booked titled "Dilemma: A Priest's Struggle with Faith and Love," expressing his discontent with the Catholic Church, http://www.miamiherald.com, Jan. 3.
"Savage: Scalia isn't gay?!? I always think the biggest homophobe in the room is clearly a c–ksucker! Lynch: Totally! The next religious person who tells you there's something wrong with being a homosexual, start the countdown. It's psychology 101- the people who are the loudest and hate it the most hate something in themselves."
– Dan Savage (advice columnist) and Jane Lynch (actor), in an interview, asked about the possibility of an openly gay president or Supreme Court justice, http://www.newsweek.com, Dec. 20, 2010.
