All That for Nothing

In a piece for The Stranger, Nate Lippens reveals, with numerous hard-hitting, terrifying and poignant comments, how the with the demise of the AIDS awareness of the 80's, the spread of HIV is being truly allowed by older generations' reluctance to get involved, to get in the way and to get hurt.

With the pain of losing friends to the virus still clear, it's easier to step back and be silently disapproving, but this doesn't help those on the receiving end of the dangerous diseases, the unsafe practices and the 'you're positive' diagnosis. Now is the time to stand up once more and be loud, be offensive but be heard.

"Over the last half decade my exasperation with gay culture made me finally turn away. My friendships had become based more in common interests and cocksucking didn't rank high on that list. But as friends and acquaintances started testing positive again I realized that my post-gay stance was postmortem.

Maybe it was like the mob: You try to get out but they pull you back in. I realized that telling people that unsafe sex is careless and stupid isn't being moralistic; it's being realistic."

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