June
UL2QQ4 •
Continued from Page J 3
the disease that’s frightening,
not the people who have it.”
The San Francisco Sunday
The National Gay and Les
Examiner and Chronicle
bian Task Force’s Robert Brav
reported that the PSA
was wholly unimpressed.
amounted to an apology for
“We urge our leaders to take
Reagan’s neglect of the epi
action while thev hold positions
demic while in office. Today,
of power, not after thev reach
numerous Web sites offer an
the safety of retirement and are
A ID S timeline that contains
outside the spotlight of public
the sentence, “ 1990: Ronald
scrutiny,” he said. “Some will
Reagan apologizes tor his
salute Mr. Reagan for his post-
neglect of the epidemic
presidential words on AIDS.
while he was president.”
But for all the children alienat
However, journalist
ed from their schtxils because
Andrew Miller said: “T hat’s a
they had HIV, and all the fami
lot of bullshit. Reagan said no
MATH
lies bombed out of their homes
SUIttCt * BtflTH
SllU Ct ® DIÄTH
such thing. I was editor of.
by hysterical neighbors, and all
Outweek at the time.”
the IV dmg users, black. His
I I APftRTMItO
In Fehniarv of that same
panic and Asian people with
year, Reagan visited children
AIDS, and all the gav men who
with AIDS at the University
died alone in some anonvmous
of California Medical Center
hospital room, tor all these peo
in Los Angeles. He said, “ I
ple there was no editorial.
hope my visit will bring more
There was no PSA. There was
San Francisco artist and political agitator Clinton Fein altered a photo from
attention to the need to do
no Great Communicator offer
Reagan’s funeral service to sum up how some members of the queer and A ID S
something about this horrible
ing compassion or action. There
communities feel about the Gipper’s reign
disease.”
was only presidential negligence
On his way into the hospi
and a legacy of shame.”
tal, Reagan was confronted by A C T UP’s John
our country that has claimed too many victims.
The head of the Port land-based Cascade
Fall, who screamed: “You are a murderer and a
There have been too many funerals like his.
AIDS Project also lamented Reagan’s inaction
hypocrite. If you had done something eight
There are too many patches in the quilt. We
on the epidemic.
years ago these children wouldn’t be dying.”
owe it to Ryan to make sure that the fear and
"Ronald Reagan is one of the reasons we
Reagan also published a tribute to hemo
ignorance that chased him from his home and
still have an HIV epidemic in this country in
philiac AIDS victim Ryan White in The Wash
his school will be eliminated. We owe it to
2004,” executive director Thomas Bruner told
ingtcm Post on April 11, 1990.
Ryan to open our hearts and our minds to
Just Out. “His failure of leadership on this issue
“Sadly, Ryan’s is not the only life to have
those with AIDS. We owe it to Ryan to be
while president was Kith astonishing and
been cut short by AIDS,” he wrote. “In a most
compassionate, caring and tolerant toward
unconscionable and continues to bear tragic
poignant way, he told us of a health crisis in
those with AIDS, their families and friends. It’s
consequences today." j H
F amily V alues
W- n February 1989,
^ÊÊKhf¿y..
| author Larry
A Kramer outed Presi-
cent Ronald Reagan’s
^ f r
' . Ron on C N N ’s
i t King show.
< r_
" Hie irony is Nancy’s
N '-t friends are gay and
-
<y
"u it son Ron Reagan is
s. ¡v the essence is that
H < nia Id Reagan and
R on Reagan
Nancy Reagan have sold
tlu-ir son down the river,” he said. “Ron Reagan
11 Id have been the biggest hero in the world if
he had the courage to come forth and say he
was gay, to shame and encourage his parents to
!o something about this epidemic, but because
he didn’t, more of us are dead."
Confronted on his own television show by
l uting inventor Michelangelo Signorile in
1991, Ron Reagan described himself as
“straight.” He called the accusation “insulting
to my wife of 11 years because it says she’s liv
ing a lie, and I don’t like that.”
Signorile responded that he’d heard Ron’s
wife was a lesbian.
In August 1992, Reagan daughter Patti Davis
told The Advocate that her parents think homo
sexuality is “abnormal. I certainly don’t think
they feel that whatever someone’s sexual prefer
ence is, is OK. They think that God made men
and women to make love and any variation on
that theme is in some way blasphemous.”
— R W jn
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