(ON WHAT WOULD HAVE BEEN HIS 88TH BIRTHDAY,
TRANSCRIPT OF HIS CONTRIBUTION TO THE HBO DOCUMENTARY, THE OUT LIST)
Everything changed in July 1981 with the announcement of what would be called AIDS.
I helped to start two major organisations, Gay Men Health Crisis and ACT-UP.
On the one hand, so many of our friends were dying, and on the other hand, we thought we had a small army of people who were working so very hard to save the rest of us.
It was during that time that I realised #1, I'm truly proud, I am, that I am a gay man, and #2 how truly wonderful, I think, gay people are.
I found that, with AIDS, the Times wasn't writing about us, nobody was writing about us. The mayor wasn't answering phone calls. It was awful.
People would rush up to me and say, “have you heard of anything? Is anything coming along? You know, I don't think, I won't be able to last much longer”.
And for many years, there wasn't anything and you have to say to him, somehow, “Hold on. Hold on and give each other hugs and act up made itself.
We began every meeting by announcing who had died since the last meeting.
And boy, if that wasn't enough to keep you going, I don't, I don't know what.
The first meeting had 200, the next meeting had 300.
We had a demonstration that following week on Wall Street, several thousand showed up and we were born.
They got more radical, and we decided to have a protest at Saint Patrick's.
We had all been trained in civil disobedience and it was very carefully choreographed what we were going to do.
Like all good actors, these guys and girls really got into their parts.
They faced the altar and yelled at him, “Stop murdering us.” Cardinal Connor was having a fit.
We were crucified ourselves the next day and on every major network, every major newspaper said the most awful things about ACT-UP.
How terribly we were destroying people's right to worship and people were scared.
What are we going to do? They hate us? And I said, “No they don’t. They are afraid of us. This is the best thing we have ever done.
We're no longer just limp-wristed fairies, we're guys in jeans, and Levi's and boots.
We're here, we have voices, and we're going to fight back.
It made us, that action in Saint Patrick's.
Every treatment for HIV that is out there, is out there because of us.
Not from the government, not through any politicia, not, not for money, Drug company.
We forced all of those things into being by our anger and our fear.
And that's what anger can get to you. You do not get more with honey than with vinegar.
Anger is a wonderful emotion. Very creative if you know how to do it.
I really, truly felt that, for some reason, I've been spared to tell this story.
Everybody I've known is dead. All my friends, I shouldn’t say everyone but almost, and I'm still here.
OK. Thank you, God, I don't believe in you, but thank you anyway.
This is what I'm going to do to pay back.
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