Why not a [insert dis ease of choice] memorial? What’s special about AIDS?

Try the fact that it wiped out a fvck1ng generation, try that the ‘Queer Disease’ panic led to a rise in homophobic attacks, try that Clause 28 was brought in on the back of it.

Try remembering the history of your community. Yes we should give money to AIDs charities but we should put up a big fvck off statue in place to remind people of what happened here, what happened in america, Asia, what is still happening in Africa.

Roland, I feel for you, but once again WHERE have I told anyone to stop taking the pills? I haven’t and I wouldn’t as they remain the best preventive measure for delaying the onset of full-blown AIDS. What I AM saying is that examples like yours need to form the basis of a whole new approach to HIV prevention campaigns to make naive gay men, particularly youngsters, understand what people like you are going through even with the meds. And, as RobN points out, HIV in tandem with the meds will shave an average 21 years off the average sufferer’s lifespan according to the latest studies. These are the truths that have been lost amid a welter of HIV campaigns that have led people to believe that HIV is no more dangerous than non-lethal STDs, along with representatives of the gay men’s sexual health industry lying that the meds will keep everyone fit and healthy into old age. It is simply not true, and these deceptions are draining the NHS budget and ultimately costing lives. Just check out the latest Out magazine where THT know-it-all Lisa Power is commenting on the latest horrendous HIV rates among gay men. Despite the clamour in our community for a return to harder-hitting HIV campaigns, this foolish woman maintains the THT will not go down this route as it does not believe that “scare-mongering” works. Like all of their other ideas have worked? Get real! These PC zealots refuse to tell gay men what the horror of HIV really entails, Roland, and THAT is why gay men have become complacent and are becoming infected in record numbers. Gay men won’t start taking responsibility for their behaviour again until they are told the truth about HIV and shocked into playing safe by direct, hard-hitting campaigns that depict experiences such as your own. Agencies like the THT are the problem where HIV is concerned in this country. They sure aren’t the solution.

Some natty bit of sculpture is just going to make people look back, not forwards, and allow people to assume the problem has now been wrapped up in a nice pharmaceutical solution with a red ribbon tied on top.

People are naturally selfish, and always assume it’s “someone else’s problem” – the only way you will hit home is by frightening the bejeezus out of them. I saw it back in the 80′s when people were genuinely concerned, but the veil of complacency has since fallen over the problem and everyone thinks it’s old news.

On a personal note, I’m sure you will be around for many years to come, and I wish you a Merry Christmas for you and yours. x

Codex: The other matter you failed to mention is that HIV+ people, even under medication will lose at least 10 years off of their lives, some say double that.

Surely, without a historical focus that memorials provide through their symbolic power, we not only cut our self off from the past; but also the future as well.

I just feel the money would be far better served in a useful and practical way than some artistic gesture stuck in a square or field somewhere.

I’ve said it many times on here before, but people only see priorities when they have to. Everyone runs around like headless chickens about swine flu, and a few hundred die. Wait till HIV becomes drug resistant, or God forbid, airborne, then people will jump. AIDS was only a big thing when you saw it’s effect. Now it’s viewed as “Oh, that’s just so 80′s, daaahlink!”

I am one of a rare breed, I was amongst the scene people right in the middle of that initial infection, and amazingly walked away unscathed, but it was not difficult to notice people of my own age, or a few years above and below, were missing. There was a ‘hole’ in my demographic. That’s because they were either dead or dying. Even as an atheist, I say “By the grace of God” – It could have been me, and I never underestimate the lethality of this plague.

HIV/AIDS needs money. Lots of it. Nothing has changed and it still kills. The only difference is, the current bunch of typical, tight-fisted, “not-my-problem” faggots think it’s all over. Well, don’t hold your breath, but your day may still come when you live to regret that thought.

Codex, who are you exactly? You sound very much like a certain loony AIDS-Denialist we have had on these threads who is seeking to convince people with HIV to ditch their medications because “the medications are the killer, not the HIV!”.

Anything that keeps HIV and AIDS in people’s attention is good in my books.

Many thousands of Gay men lost their lives, with little or no medical intervention. A memorial for that horror alone is long overdue.