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About Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013 | View Entire Issue (Oct. 1, 1987)
The straight stuff So what’s the difference between Pope John Paul II and Judge Robert Bork? The colors of their gowns. The mainstreaming o f America; the (AIDS) children are for burning; the gowns and grass skirts o f the Right wing; and more. Entertainment, briefly M _ c _ R _A__ E I A m erica's $100.000stipend. The media did not report just who Miss Rafko thought should be mandatorily tested, nor was evidence presented Suffer the little children that the judges bothered to ask her. he White House, unsurprisingly. Calls for mandatory testing by the AIDS announced it will oppose a House hill Laity have increasingly come to signify, not a designed to ban discrimnation against people seriously considered opinion on epidemiology , infected by HIV; the bill would also establish but merely a Rightist position on the political civil penalties for abridging the confidentiality scale. Like the Lqual Rights Amendment and of AIDS test results. Speaking for the adminis Contra funding before it. calls for mandatory tration. Secretary o f Health Dr. Otis Bowen testing (of Others) are becoming the litmus dismissed the need for federal leadership in test o f the Far Right, (he password into the this month. AIDS ant i -disc i minat ion. * * I f a state concl udes Sanctuary o f Conservatism. Robert Bork journeyed to the Senate for his that additional protections are or are not in the With such a rigorously pragmatic turn of confirmation hearing, and found the press in a interest o f its people under the particular condi mind. Miss Rafko might consider going into lather. Media opponents have chosen largely to tions of such state, then it should be free to act politics. She might, given her expertise and portray Bork as Adolf Hitler with chin hairs: a accordingly.” experience, consider serving on President man “ out o f the mainstream” due to his appa The White House announcement followed Reagan’s AIDS Commission. There, she rent disregard of rights for minorities and indi Senate hearings and media coverage that could join Penny Pullen, an Illinois state vidual freedoms. have increasingly focused on discrimination legislator, who. with the aid of help-r ate One person's “ minority,” however, is against children with AIDS. The Ray family Phyllis Schlafly. this summer pushed a sweep another person’s “ special interest group.” of Arcadia. Florida, had their house ra/ed and ing set o f state laws regarding AIDS through the Bork's partisans, using the old “ by his enemies their children expelled from public school. Illinois legislature. Among other things, the laws ye shall know him ” strategy, have attempted to R van White has made the cover of most na mandate (that word again) testing of applicants portray Borkophobes as “ yes boys” to special tional news magazines. The Associated Press for marriage licenses for HIV antibodies and interest groups who, by advocating more rights and National Public radio contrasted reactions allow tracing o f sex partners of sero-positive for everyone, will soon have us lock-stepping to school-age AIDS patients in different cities. individuals by the state. into Soviet domination. Suddenly children have become the token Miss Rafko would also join Cory SerVaas. To Bork’s supporters, gay rights activists are around which the social issues of AIDS are editor o f the Saturday Evening Post on the com first among equals when it comes to special being fought. However, the energies brought to mission. SerVaas, whose principal contribution interest groups. References to opposition by the this discussion derive from the malignancy of to the AIDS crisis has been the AIDS Mobile ’ ’organized gay lobby” in editorials is meant to homophobia. w hich goes from church to church testing Chris show just how more-mainstream-than-thou Bork It isn't surprising that the media focus on the tians for HIV antibodies (not mandatorily — really is. The liberals who are running the impact of AIDS on families; it is a way of taking yet). This month's P a ir deals with another com Senate hearings have never allowed Bork’s the experience of discrimination, fear, and ill pelling and central issue of AIDS; cases of (and their own?) anti-gay sentiments to become ness associated with AIDS and making it uni AIDS misdiagnosed as Alzheimer’s disease. an issue in the hearings, proving once again that versally meaningful. What is surprising, given The Commission that Reagan named in July gay bashing is still a popular sport. the fact we have now centered the discourse on to advise him on AIDS issues has had some Such fear of being in thrall to “ special in kids, is the speed w ith which a portion of the rough sledding recently. The commission last terest groups” might be justified if the Right population is still willing to consign children to month fired its own executive director. Linda itself w eren't so densely populated with them. the flames (in Florida, literally so). Likewise, Schaeffer, amid reports of complaints that she Since when aren’t Republicans a special the White House, despite testimony from pa lacked the experience to organize the panel and interest group? rents. took a stand to allow discrimination establish its goals. It might well be asked how The resemblance between the views of Bork against ill children. in order not to seem to be even a gifted bureaucrat could organize a com and Pope John Paul II is uncanny. Both op pandering to the demands of gays. If some kids mittee that includes, among other notables, the pose. within their respective spheres of influ suf fer just so gays don't benefit, then so be it. president of Amway. an anti-gay Roman ence. precisely the same things — the rights of Reagan seems to be saying Catholic Cardinal, a California sex counsellor women, and gays and lesbians; access to con who backed last year’s LaRouche AIDS-quar- traception and abortions, and so on. The Pope, antine initiative, a gay geneticist, and the Weird Mandatory testing as litmus test however, argues God's original intent. Sisters. Pullen and SerVaas. he dawning of the Age of Aquarius was The media have used religious dissenters (the Is this a commission, or a circus? Neither. nothing compared to the new age of ecclesiastic equivalent of special interest If’s Chernobyl — an administration official glamour (and social responsibility) ushered in told the New York Times “ the commission is in groups) not so much to locate the Pope out of the by our new Miss America. Not only did Kaye church’s mainstream, but to isolate the dis a state o f total meltdown." Lani Rae Rafko look divine in a grass skirt, she senters outside of orthodoxy. Gays — especially also tends to the ill. gav priests (whatever happened to lesbian Beware men wearing gowns As a nurse. Rafko told judges, she had nuns?) — became media stars as they demanded worked with AIDS patients. Furthermore, she wo men who have both used arguments of full inclusion in the church. The media effect, advocated “ mandatory” testing for antibodies "original intent” to justify the limitation however, was to discredit the opposition. By to HIV. Satisfied with her High Seriousness, the of rights of gays and lesbians — and just about playing up the gay angle, the press consigned judges awarded the Michigan 24-year-old Miss everyone else — have been on media parade the Pope's opposition to the fringe. B ff W C . T T T CALL ME TODAY! BONNIE L. JACKSON. R .N .. C D C Individual • Couples • Families Relapse Prevention, Consultation 2311 E. Burnside. Suite 101 Portland. Oregon 97214 SUSAN J< WILL 232-1233 - Just Out • 6 • October. 1987 • \ • I < ShELTER S fC U W COW» WLMTnwt Sales Associate 635 62 11 A ART/AIDS: Galleries, bookstores plan AIDS benefit benefit by Portland's visual arts com munity to provide a long-term care fund for AIDS patients, will be held Sunday. Oc tober 11. Participants will first visit galleries where works donated for sale will be on display (4-6 p.m .). Following gallery visits, a com munity gathering will be held (6-8 p.m .) at the Oregon Art Institute, where hors d ’oeuvres, music, performances, and an address by Tom Higgins will conclude the evening. All proceeds from the sale of tickets and from the sale of art works will be donated to the Oregon AIDS Task Force, which will administer the dispersal of the funds. Tickets for the event are $10 and up, and are available from private ticket sellers, and from participating bookstores and galleries. The day before, on Saturday, October 10, Portland-area bookstores will contribute ten percent o f that day’s sales to ART/AIDS (it’s not too early to buy those Christmas gifts). On the same day, starting at 11:00 and following throughout the day on the hour, local writers and artists will read from their own works and other selected passages. • A Selling your house yourself? Frustrated with “ lookers” who can't buy? Shocked at advertising costs? Let me show you; • how my aggressive marketing w ill work for you! • how I can “ get the word out" at no cost to you! • why 95^r o f a ll hom es are sold by real estate agents! • how working w ith Shelter will pax o ff fo r you! Recovery Therapist s part of Seattle's Perfohna ’87 New Works Festival. New City Theatre and Theatre X (of Milwaukie) premiered A History o f Sexuality, a play based on the works of gay French social historian Michel Foucault. In each o f three acts, the play examines changing concepts of what constitutes sexuality, from de Sade. to Freud, to a 20th century advertising firm. Set in Toronto, /' ve heard the Mermaids Singing is filmmaker Patricia Rozema’s first feature-length motion picture. Mermaids deals with an urban “ bachelorette” whose job as a gallery assistant to a lesbian curator pro vides more than an education in art. Portland had a hilarious weekend with comic Tom Ammiano last month. Producer Howie Bierbaum said Ammiano’s show Wrists, which chronicled the com ic’s upbringing, played to full houses. Bierbaum was also pleased with the turnout of women for a gay male stand-up comic. “ Gay show business would be nothing without lesbians.” Bierbaum is looking for financial backers to help bring more gay entertainment to Portland. After leaving Portland, Ammiano opened in a new comedy revue Can't Keep a Straight Face in San Francisco’s Theatre Rhino. According to a poll in Soap Opera Digest, eighty-seven percent of soap viewers want to see AIDS addressed on daytime TV. Accord ingly, All My Children’s Mark reveals he has shared needles with a friend, now dead of AIDS. Tune in tomorrow. • the Rf \LT( >R uni (ell unir friends jhout Professional Insurance for Portland since 1937 / COMMERCIAL PERSONAL LIFE & HEALTH Downey Insurance Agency 610 SW Broadway Portland. Oregon 97205 (503) 228-8327