Zachary Quinto: ‘Tremendous complacency’ has led to a rise in HIV infections

Actor Zachary Quinto has criticised the gay community for “tremendous complacency” and “laziness” towards AIDS, saying it no longer possesses the horror it once had.

The 37-year-old actor of Star Trek fame told OUT Magazine this week he was alarmed by the rising number of HIV infections in adolescents.

He said: “I think there’s a tremendous sense of complacency in the LGBT community.

“AIDS has lost the edge of horror it possessed when it swept through the world in the ’80s.

“Today’s generation sees it more as something to live with and something to be much less fearful of. And that comes with a sense of, dare I say, laziness.”

He also urged caution towards prophylactic drugs like PrEP, saying: “We need to be really vigilant and open about the fact that these drugs are not to be taken to increase our ability to have recreational sex.

“There’s an incredible underlying irresponsibility to that way of thinking…and we don’t yet know enough about this vein of medication to see where it’ll take us down the line.”

Quinto revealed in an interview in May that he has “only worked more” since he came out as gay, and said he is glad to have opened up about being gay, because he thinks it had positively affected his career.

He came out as gay in October 2011 to “an overwhelming wave of support,” in an interview with New York magazine and wrote a blog post explaining his decision.

Before making his decision to come out, Quinto had been actively working with the Trevor Project, the It Gets Better initiative, and other pro-equality charities, but he said he felt that coming out had enhanced his work with these groups.

After coming out he wrote on his blog that the suicide of gay 14-year-old Jamey Rodemeyer had spurred him to be open, and on coming out, he said: “I had been thinking about it all the time for a while, just sort of peripherally.

• Nov 29 2023

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