Being Alive, Los Angeles; May 1998
Ferd Eggan

Some of the powers that be have already accepted as fact the prospect of survival only for the fittest. The fittest will get healthier, or never get unhealthy, go to work and be off the government's hands. The homeless, the substance users, the single mothers with kids who are already viewed as "welfare queens" will not be out front in this Darwinian struggle. And of course, the overwhelming majority of AIDS cases (96% of all AIDS cases are in the Third World) will never get a chance at all.

I am worried also because here, in L.A., people with HIV/AIDS don't seem to place much value in helping each other out through support groups or even social events. Recall the famous New York Times Magazine article "When Plagues End" by that jumped up Thatcherite from England, Andrew Sullivan? He told about a circuit party where a buff muscleboy with KS was dancing-like everybody else-with his shirt off. Other partyers came up to him and told him to put his shirt back on: "he was spoiling it for the rest of us." I'm afraid that those of us who are healthy asymptomatic people with HIV will start to look down on and avoid those of us who get sick with AIDS as "failures" and "losers."

APLA reports its donor base is down and that they have to downsize. (Whatever you think of APLA I can assure you, since I sit on the committees that dole out government money, that APLA pays for most of its services through private fundraising.) Being Alive reports its volunteer base is down, as do most other AIDS organizations. And the Ryan White CARE Act and other government funding sources (which supply 100% of the funds of many AIDS organizations) are insisting on results and telling everyone that services like case management, psychosocial support-actually everything-must be tied to the delivery of medical treatment. In this atmosphere of fewer donations, fewer volunteers, and fewer government dollars, what should Being Alive do?

Being Alive is having some trouble paying for its expensive garden spot. We all love the place, but it costs a great deal. And government funds don't really pay for gardening. Being Alive has always fought the government edict that we keep data on all clients; in fact, we don't see people as "clients," but rather as brothers and sisters and lovers or comrades or fellow-sufferers or friends. Plus Being Alive is located in an area that used to be the center of the epidemic; thousands of deaths have split the center of the epidemic into the east, west and south of L.A., and into the bodies of people who are quite different from the mainly middle-class, mainly white, mainly gay men who were the base of volunteers, donors and participants in Being Alive activities. Don't get me wrong, there have always been African-Americans, Latinos, Asians, Pacific Islanders at Being Alive, but they are the ones who were able to operate in a mainly white gay milieu.

How many of us GWMs go to the Being Alive socials now? How many of us "healthy asymptomatic HIV+ GWMs" go to socials or medical updates or anything about AIDS now? The Being Alive socials have experienced some tensions over the years: first was the moralist controversy over whether socials should have beer and wine; now there is a donation requested at the door to keep out disruptive people (meaning who, the druggies or the homeless?). It may just be that the needs of people with AIDS and people with HIV who don't have a lot of support are things that Being Alive cannot supply as it is presently constituted. Being Alive is not a homeless service organization, and it is not a drug treatment center. It is, and always was, just an aggregation of motivated people with HIV and AIDS who wanted to help each other out. Much of that help took the form of sharing experience and providing information about treatments. Today, most of those who would seek information have more than enough; hence, very few people attend medical updates or read treatment newsletters. Those who need the information most are not getting it from Being Alive, although I think a lot of women get it from Women Alive.

Are you, dear reader, a PWA like me who is pinning hopes on combination therapies and trying to prepare for a longer future? Are you saddled with debts, worried about staying or getting on disability, revising your thinking about long-term relationships vs. (very) short-term sex? Are you recently-positive and surprised, ashamed and more likely to rely on friends than a bunch of strangers who might ask why you got infected "when you should have known better"? Are you feeling great, going to the gym, taking risks that might lead to greater satisfaction? Are you watching the parade go by and getting sicker but nobody is noticing you? Are you an immigrant who maybe doesn't have papers and maybe just isn't healthy enough to have to go back to working and getting paid sweatshop wages? Are you an older man who thought he would die, and now have to face loneliness and being a wallflower at the dance? Are you someone who figured he would die and therefore didn't care about safe sex, but now you think maybe you want to re-evaluate, thinking that in the long-term, we need to protect each other?

Maybe. Maybe not. But one way or another, things are hard for people with HIV and people with AIDS and for people without. And they are very hard for Being Alive. I have read Walt Senterfitt's letter to the Board of Being Alive. I think he raises the right questions, and has some viable ideas about the future. But there is no future without all of us deciding what we want. I suggest that you, reader, put down your thoughts and let's use this newsletter to define what the future will be. What should Being Alive be? Is it a service provider? Is it a membership club? Is it a support group? Support for what?

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