The Disorienting Quiet of a Post-AIDS Reality
<p>This post is sexually explicit and very AIDS-y. Two states older gay men know well. Those adhering to the <a target="_blank" href="https://mikegerle.substack.com/p/the-standard-narrative">standard narrative</a> I wrote about in my last post will find this content disquieting. </p><p>So, with that warning, here goes. </p><p>*</p><p>A few months ago, on my knees, among hundreds of bodies writhing around me, a cock in my mouth exploded with a rare load in the G-dosed molly-spiked energy of a dance party dark room. I looked up and smiled with gratitude at the guy, who nodded down at me with a satisfied grin. </p><p>No thoughts of death or disease, just the pure ecstasy of pleasure. </p><p>No awkward whispers of HIV status. No recent funerals. No belongings to sift through. No forever friends with months, weeks, or days to live. No wondering who will die next. No wondering if it will be me. </p><p>Just raw pleasure thanks to drugs that now shield us from transmission–from drama. </p><p>And as I make my way back to the main party, it hits me that this is it. This is as good as the celebration of the end of the plague is going to get: a gaping void of drama. </p><p>It makes me wonder if my nightmare memories are true. </p><p>Did a male nurse sit across from me in the San Diego County Health Office in 1986 and tell me that I had less than eighteen months to live and I most likely would not see the age of 23? </p><p>That same year, did a scumbag named <a target="_blank" href="https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1986-09-17-mn-10528-story.html">Lyndon H. LaRouche get Proposition 64</a> on the California ballot that would have placed HIV+ people into concentration camps? </p><p>Did my best friend Alvin die the next year? Did I give my first eulogy at 22?</p><p>Was I getting bloodwork done every three months, for free, at the Edelman clinic in West Hollywood, where the new library is now? In 1991, did tears steam down my face when I looked at my chart and saw that my T-cells were about to fall below 200, the point at which all the opportunistic infections that pave the way to death begin? </p><p>Was I the only one there to take care of my boyfriend <a target="_blank" href="https://mikegerle.substack.com/p/world-aids-day-remembering-tony?utm_source=publication-search">Tony</a> until he died because his parents couldn’t cope with finding out their son was gay and had AIDS all at the same time? </p><p>Did I give my second eulogy at 26 on the baseball diamond of Poinsettia Park without their permission after Tony died? </p><p>Did I hook up with a guy, use a condom to fuck him, and then a few days later see him on the street in front of the parking garage where I work when he asked casually, “You’re negative, right?” </p><p>Did that happen again with another guy, in bed, right AFTER sex? </p><p>Was there a constant debate about who should disclose first? The negative guys thought it should be the positive guys. After all, they had the deadly concealed weapon. The positive guys thought it should be the negative guys. Hey, you guys have the most to lose. I was always honest, always used a condom, and thought the person who cared the most should start the boner-killing conversation. </p><p>Did I start having sex exclusively with HIV+ guys because of all that drama and the weight of possibly infecting someone else? </p><p>Yes! The drumbeat of AIDS-driven fear was ever present. </p><p>Like, when two guys with British accents took me into one of the cock sucking booths at the Zone sex club in Los Angeles. The sexual heat between the three of us was fierce, and I loved that they took turns using my ass. I’m still perplexed by the look on one of their young faces after he came. It turns out he wasn’t wearing a condom. His load was inside me. Was that an expression of guilt, fear, shame, or something else? It certainly wasn’t ecstasy. </p><p>For those of us who were positive, the drumbeat pounded like a metronome: every three months, bloodwork, results, doctor visit, repeat – bloodwork, results, doctor visit, repeat. </p><p>The guys who were HIV-negative got tested when they thought they should. Having a negative result was a reprieve, tempting these men to stretch the time to the next test when the ax might fall. </p><p>Finding ways to get off with another guy without causing more death led to lots of jerking each other off, in-person voyeurism, and dry humping. </p><p>Eros and death were constant companions. </p><p>Finally, a rich and famous straight guy named Magic Johnson was infected and was willing to talk about it. This normalized the disease enough for non-gays to start understanding. “Oh, you have what Magic has,” is what a friend of mine reported his brother saying. </p><p>Magic is how my husband, who’s almost 17 years younger than me and was born the same year AIDS was identified, learned about HIV. Hiding in his parents' room, he watched a <a target="_blank" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pM4cVKenA8">kid's show hosting Magic Johnson</a>. </p><p>Going to funerals became a regular occurrence for everyone affected by the plague, HIV+, HIV-, gay, lesbian, and straight. No one was spared the losses. </p><p>“What do you think when you’re having sex with a guy you haven’t talked about HIV with?” I asked my brutally honest HIV- best friend. </p><p>“Are you Satan?” was his honest answer. </p><p>So, what do you think about me? I thought. </p><p>In places like Los Angeles, positive guys started having their own sex parties. I visited the Downey Boys party, where I met my first “<a target="_blank" href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17166076/#:~:text=%22Bug%20chasing%22%20and%20%22gift,the%20prevalence%20of%20this%20phenomenon.">bug chaser</a>.” He was a negative guy who was so stressed about becoming HIV+ that he wanted to force his seroconversion. </p><p>Even on the <a target="_blank" href="https://www.imrl.com/">International Mister Leather</a> convention floor, arguably one of the most sex-positive spaces in the United States, bareback porn exhibitors were banned. The wails of drama surrounding that decision are legendary. </p><p>First, there was no treatment for the disease, and then AZT, Saquinavir, Viramune, Combivir, Crixivan, and others came out. Some needed to be taken every four hours, some with food, some without food. AZT made my mouth taste like metal all the time, and Crixivan made my urine thick and burn. </p><p>Finally, the “drug cocktail” came out. One pill, twice a day, that didn’t make my dick burn. </p><p>And very quietly, everyone stopped dying. </p><p>“I wonder what everyone’s going to do when we finally have a cure?” I said to my sober HIV+ friend Randy over brunch with six other gays. “Can you imagine the party we’re going to have?” </p><p>He leaned across the table and said in a whisper, “It’s already here.” </p><p>He was right, but it was still easy to get infected. </p><p>And then, <a target="_blank" href="https://www.cdc.gov/hiv/prevention/prep.html?CDC_AAref_Val=https://www.cdc.gov/hiv/basics/prep.html">PrEP</a> (pre-exposure prophylactic) came out. An HIV- guy could take one pill a day that was more effective than a condom at stopping the transmission of HIV. </p><p>Then we found out that guys with an undetectable viral load do not shed the virus. It was dubbed <a target="_blank" href="https://www.niaid.nih.gov/diseases-conditions/treatment-prevention">U=U</a> (undetectable equals untransmittable). Which was a bit irritating to me because I’d been undetectable for at least five years by the time that information was made available. </p><p>I had been less of a poria than I thought. </p><p>The final drama tsunami came from Michael Weinstein, who ran and still runs the AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF). He called PrEP a party drug. <a target="_blank" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/17/upshot/aids-group-wages-lonely-fight-against-pill-to-prevent-hiv.html">He said it was dangerous and a lot of other nonsense</a>. The man just hates sex, finds delight in curtailing it, and worries PrEP will both encourage sex and lower his client base. </p><p>Some gays had a religious-like attachment to condoms. It was a price we paid to show our love for our brothers, they explained. To them, having condomless sex was an insult to our community. It was impossible for them to grasp a new reality where pre-AIDS era gay sex could once again be enjoyed. </p><p>But the new reality played itself out with real-life data. The pages and pages of obituaries in <a target="_blank" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frontiers_(magazine)">Frontiers Magazine</a> (essentially the gay press in Los Angeles) were gone from the bi-weekly publication. And once the obituaries where gone, so were the condoms. </p><p>We let Michael Weinstein and the condom worshipers talk themselves out, and about a year later, their tsunami of drama fell to a whimper. </p><p>And then…</p><p>Silence. </p><p>Like having my windows open as my next-door neighbor's leaf blower groans away, I became so accustomed to the loud drama that when it was turned off, the silence was deafening. </p><p>Like AIDS deaths and all the drama that came with it, never happened. </p><p>To add a sexual cherry on top of this good news, we now have a drug protocol based on how gay men actually fuck, which is a lot, for preventing most of the other sexually transmitted infections PrEP doesn’t prevent. <a target="_blank" href="https://howardbrown.org/service/doxypep/">DoxyPEP</a> uses an antibiotic that’s been around for ages to minimize the transmission of common STIs. </p><p>So now, the only reason for a person to hate sex for pleasure is because a person finds pleasure in hating sex. </p><p>See the <a target="_blank" href="https://mikegerle.substack.com/p/the-standard-narrative">Standard Narrative</a>. </p><p>So now what? </p><p>First, we need to repair the damage done to our sex spaces. Let’s look at those laws still on the books requiring owners of sex establishments to go around with flashlights checking guys fucking in their venue's dark rooms, steam rooms, and rooms that aren’t allowed to lock, making sure cocks going into buttholes have condoms on them. </p><p>While we are at it, let’s make these sex spaces communal gathering spaces for gay men. Let’s follow the European model of bathhouses where a gay can get off, then talk about it over drinks and dinner in the same venue. Let’s allow them to offer spa-like services like massage. </p><p>These arcane rules in our liberal cities, such as Los Angeles, San Francisco, and New York, need to be changed. In my post, <a target="_blank" href="https://mikegerle.substack.com/p/feeling-sexy-and-socially-homeless">Feeling Sexy and Socially Homeless</a>, I argue that these spaces not only give us orgasms, but they also give us a sense of purpose and meaning, two perceptions of reality that actually lengthen our lifespans. </p><p>But we can’t do that until we believe we deserve a place to be who and what we are. </p><p>What will it take for us to believe that? </p><p>What will it take to break the silence? </p> <br/><br/>This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit <a href="https://mikegerle.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2">mikegerle.substack.com/subscribe</a>
