What if we ALL had AIDS???

Once in a while, an advertising campaign comes along that even I have to praise for its ingenuity and authenticity. I first saw the engaging campaign posters for “WE ALL HAVE AIDS” plastered on subway stations and then went to the website (http://www.weallhaveaids.com/) to read up on it. The “WE ALL HAVE AIDS” mission communicates one thing: if one of us (in the world) has AIDS, then we ALL do. I commend this message because it has done what none that came before has done; it has actively attacked the STIGMA of being HIV/AIDS- infected and put it in the first person. It shifts the mental paradigm.

Firstly, it flies in the face of conventional wisdom concerning HIV/AIDS prevention/treatment. In the recent past, other campaigns have tried to remove the stigma of HIV/AIDS by showing the “cross section” of people whom the plague has affected; actual HIV victims. While this was brave and innovative, there was still a disconnect. People were able to look into the faces of these people fighting for their lives and know that this disease was real and tangent. However, there was still an “us and them” component to it that made it easy for people that weren’t actually affected by the disease in their daily lives to separate themselves from the atrocity. It allowed the viewer to empathize with those affected, but the urgency to step up and do something -other than perhaps contribute a few dollars to an AIDS charity like AMFAR- was missing. However, giving to a cause simply as a knee-jerk reaction to people dying doesn’t change the “those poor people” mindset. It still allows you to separate YOURSELF from the problem. “She has AIDS and I’m doing something to help HER” is different from saying “I have AIDS and I’m doing something to further the search for a cure for ME”. This campaign takes the “us and them” premise and goes after the “them” component, taking it out of the equation and declaring that the sole community affected by AIDS is “US”. While only some people belong to the “them” demographic, we all belong to the “us” demographic. This shift in mindset is genius and absolutely essential if we are to mount an effective battle against the worst healthcare crisis the world has faced in recent history.

It also negates the idea that the solution is simply to throw money at the disease (which is not necessarily a bad thing. If Reagan had “thrown money” at the disease at its inception, we would probably be 10 years ahead in the search for a cure. But anyway…). There is a listing of all the charitable organizations that you can contribute time and energy to that subscribe to the message of the campaign- everyone from nelsonmandela.org to rosiesbroadwaykids.org and youthaids.org. You can find out how these organizations enact different strategies and touch different demographics in the fight against AIDS. However, the genius in this campaign lies in the T-shirts designed to extricate the stigma that is attached to each HIV/AIDS victim. They enable the wearer to make a simple statement- We ALL have AIDS if even ONE of us has AIDS. There is also another, bolder t-shirt simply proclaiming I HAVE AIDS. The shirts, available at Barney’s, Fred Segal, Theory, Scoop, Louis of Boston and Kenneth Cole New York stores, cost $35- all of which goes directly to the WE ALL HAVE AIDS foundation to further HIV/AIDS education and eradication.

Keeping the AIDS pandemic in the "mental first person" keeps the battle fresh - especially with the rash of other tragedies that perhaps have taken the spotlight off of the fight. When asked does he think that in the United States HIV/AIDS has lost its position as a much-talked-about issue in mainstream America, campaign creator/designer/activist Kenneth Cole responded “Unfortunately, it has because we as a people, I guess, respond more easily to acute disasters than to chronic ones. We deal with them comfortably, be they tsunamis, be they hurricanes or wars of questionable relevance. But we have a hard time dealing with something that isn't packaged comfortably and isn't easily fixed. Especially if we don't find ourselves to be at risk”

How absolutely, unapologetically prolific!

Open Mike- Yelling at God

For years I’ve been quietly weeping
I’ve been hoping against the obvious
Praying against the inevitable
Shaking my head at the ugliness we do, the unconscionable

I’ve been praying for my people
And crossing my fingers for things to turn out right
I’ve been quietly singing hymns and psalms and Old Negro Spirituals
And putting my heart and soul into every syllable

I’ve put on a happy face and smiled through the pain
And tried to realize that for every 3 sunny days
There has to be at least one day of rain

And I’ve done what I was supposed to do
And gave what was expected of me to give
And learned what was necessary
And listened to how a Christian is supposed to live

But through all of this giving and singing and praying and being and hoping…

I’ve tried my best to stifle this voice
That wailed at the idea of men damaging little boys
I’ve stroked it softly when it cried from its gut
When it heard about little girls in Thailand getting fucked
I’ve tried to reason with it when it couldn’t gage
How wonderfully creative people in the first world could still die of AIDS

How we could allow the savagery of clitoral circumcision
And be satisfied with international cultural tunnel-vision
How it's ok that people who sleep with their own sex have provisions
In our laws designed to keep them second-class citizens
How those poor souls were never served anything uglier and meaner
Than a ball of hell packaged with the beautiful name Katrina
How we don’t question what’s REALLY the matter
When given the choice of ‘Vote or DIE’- and we choose the latter

And so sometimes I find myself laying on my back staring at the ceiling
YELLING AT GOD!!!

Screaming like I have a right to question Him
Not in decibels full of contempt without fear of retribution
But in a blind, awkward and earnest attempt to obtain a viable resolution

Because MY God couldn’t be watching all of this go on and do NOTHING…

So my faith is being tested at a time when it could be stronger
‘Cause my patience is growing shorter and my emotions longer
And there’s only so much giving and singing and praying and being and hoping that I have left
Before I have to personally address these injustices and get something off my chest

And who knows what would happen then…

In the meantime, I’ll continue to try to lower this voice that speaks volumes of despair
And hope that sometime soon my God will take over and get us away from there…