Oriol R. Gutierrez Jr.

born: May 9, 1943
died: May 10, 2000

"I really believe that activism is therapeutic."
-Kiyoshi Kuromiya

Kiyoshi Kuromiya is an official honoree today for GLBT History Month 2010.

Kuromiya was born in a Japanese internment camp in rural Wyoming during World War II.

He participated with Frank Kameny, Barbara Gittings and others in the first organized LGBT civil rights demonstrations.

Diagnosed with AIDS in 1989, Kuromiya became a self-taught expert on the disease. He helped found ACT UP Philadelphia.

He was the lead plaintiff in a federal class action lawsuit on behalf of patients seeking permission to use medical marijuana.

Kuromiya died from AIDS-related complications at age 57.

Kuromiya was on the February/March 1996 cover of POZ. Click here to read his POZ story.

Click here for more about Kuromiya at the Equality Forum, which sponsors GLBT History Month.


P.S. Today is also National Coming Out Day. If you can, I strongly encourage you to come out, not only about being lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender, but also about your HIV status. It helps you and others conquer stigma and discrimination!


Oriol on:

Mercifully, I was never bullied as a child. That's not to say that I was never afraid of being bullied or that I never encountered physical and mental threats once in a while.

I worked hard at being overlooked by those who would do me harm if they knew I was gay. And for whatever the reasons, I was mostly successful at it.

I'm not proud that I could hide. Actually, I realize now that my ability to hide fueled the high level of internalized homophobia that I partially blame for my being HIV positive.

Thankfully, I have had time and space to accept and even embrace my sexual orientation. So many fellow lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender folks have not been as lucky.

Which brings me to why I'm writing about this subject. I was brought to tears this morning when I read that another gay teenager had killed himself as a result of bullying.

The old phrase "deaths come in threes" started to rattle around in my brain. Such a horrible confluence of events should make us all reflect on this subject.

Billy Lucas, a high school freshman in Indiana, hung himself dead three weeks ago. Asher Brown, an eighth-grader in Texas, shot himself dead in the head last week.

And last but not least, Seth Walsh, a 13-year-old in California, died yesterday after more than a week on life support after he hung himself.

I hope Billy, Asher and Seth rest in peace, the peace that they could not find in life.

We could think that these are isolated incidents with no connection whatsoever to each other or to us, but we would be wrong. I'm not suggesting they knew each other, but I am suggesting that their stories are just the tip of an iceberg.

The more progress LGBT people make in securing our rights, the more push back we receive from people who do not want us to succeed. It should not surprise us that as our inevitable victories happen that we suffer casualties along the way.

So I'm not surprised that gay teenagers are killing themselves, but I am sad and I am angry.

There's no doubt in my mind that severe bullying should be criminal, but that's only part of the solution. Education and outreach are critical. Groups like GLSEN (the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network) and others are working hard to make life better for all students.

We also need support to help us help ourselves. That is why we need things like National Gay Men's HIV/AIDS Awareness Day, commemorated every year on September 27.

LGBT people need help and we need it now. If anyone needs proof, all I have to say are three names: Billy, Asher and Seth.

UPDATE: Yet another gay teenager has killed himself as a result of bullying. Tyler Clementi, an 18-year-old college freshman, jumped off the George Washington Bridge last week after two classmates used a hidden camera to stream live on the Internet him having sex with a man. This incident may not fit the more traditional forms of bullying, but it deserves no less attention. Tyler, rest in peace.


Oriol on:

The New York Times published a special section titled "Op-Ed at 40" in its print edition on Sunday, September 26. The pull-out gathered excerpts from the last four decades.

From the intro:

On Sept. 21, 1970, readers who turned to the last inside page of The Times's main section found something new. The obituaries that normally appeared in that space had been moved, replaced by something called Op-Ed. The vision of John Oakes, the editorial page editor, and Harrison Salisbury, the eminent foreign correspondent, Op-Ed was meant to open the paper to outside voices. It was to be a venue for writers with no institutional affiliation with the paper, people from all walks of life whose views and perspectives would often be at odds with the opinions expressed on the editorial page across the way. (Hence, Op-Ed - Opposite Editorial.)

The presidency, New York, wars, terrorism, op-eds published online only, money, science, equality, "lit." and "and so on..." were the topic areas used by the editors to organize the content.

No doubt it was quite a task to select op-eds reflecting the vast array of topics and voices covered in 40 years. That said, I couldn't help but notice that only one op-ed covered an LGBT topic, maybe. It was in the equality section.

It was "My AIDS Death" by Robert Rafsky, first published in 1992.

Here's an excerpt:

It's always possible we'll win. The drug, or drugs, that will turn AIDS into a chronic illness like diabetes will finally be discovered ... But it's not likely, at least not in time for me. My T4 cells have started to drop again, and now I have to begin chemotherapy for Kaposi's sarcoma, an AIDS-related cancer ... I'll try to die a good death, if I can figure out what one is.

The author died in 1993.

I was moved by this op-ed and I was grateful it was included. But when I realized there was no explicitly LGBT-related op-ed included, I also felt slighted.

I am a gay man who also happens to be HIV positive. The two things are inextricably linked, but they are not the same. An HIV-related op-ed is not the same as an LGBT-related op-ed.

Had the AIDS op-ed mentioned LGBT issues, perhaps the editors could have gotten a two-for-one deal, but no dice. The AIDS op-ed did not mention anything LGBT.

The editors must have understood this distinction because in the online version of this special section, they included a video of Harvey Fierstein discussing his 2003 op-ed titled "You Better Watch Out" with a link to the op-ed itself.

Here's an excerpt:

According to legend, New York lore and two major Hollywood flicks, Macy's Santa is the real deal. And tomorrow, to the delight of millions of little children (not to mention the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court), the Santa in New York's great parade will be half of a same-sex couple. And guess who the other half will be? Me! Harvey Fierstein, nice Jewish boy from Bensonhurst, dressed in holiday finery portraying the one and only Mrs. Claus. Won't America get a kick out of that? But what if Santa really was gay?

I am glad the editors thought Fierstein's op-ed was worthy of inclusion in their online-only version. But, it still doesn't make up for the omission of a specifically LGBT-related op-ed in the print edition.

Oriol on:

October is GLBT History Month. Sponsored by the Equality Forum, this year is the fifth anniversary of GLBT History Month.

One gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender person, either living or deceased, is highlighted each day of the month.

The Equality Forum just launched a new website with all the details, so click here to visit.

This year one HIV-positive person will be honored. On October 11, the late HIV/AIDS activist Kiyoshi Kuromiya, who graced the cover of POZ in 1996, gets his due.

Also, gay Latino poet and author extraordinaire Emanuel Xavier is being honored on October 31. To read a great article in A&U about his work and his HIV/AIDS advocacy, click here.

Here is a video of this year's celebration:


Oriol on:

The National Latino AIDS Action Network (NLAAN), which advocates for Latino HIV/AIDS issues, has developed a brief survey to understand how the national HIV/AIDS strategy and health care reform may affect Latinos.

NLAAN would like to have preliminary results available to share at the 2010 United States Conference on AIDS, which starts Sunday, September 12, in Orlando.

As a result, NLAAN is asking for people to complete the survey by 5 p.m. Eastern time on Friday, September 10. You do not have to be Latino to participate, but everyone completing the survey should work with and care for Latino communities.

Go to http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/NLAANsurvey to complete the survey.


Oriol on:

"What's the Diagnosis Doc?" was the title of a breakout session I attended in San Francisco on September 2nd during the 20th anniversary convention of the National Lesbian & Gay Journalists Association (NLGJA). The session focused on LGBT health in general, but HIV/AIDS was covered in detail.

From left in the photo: Eric Verdan, MD, from the Gladstone Institute of Virology and Immunology; JoAnne Keatley, MSW, from the Center of Excellence for Transgender Health; Albert Liu, MD, MPH, from the San Francisco Department of Public Health; and NLGJA member and freelance writer Chuck Colbert, who moderated the panel.

Topics covered included the differences between pre- and post-exposure prophylaxsis (PEP vs. PrEP); the details on the vaginal microbicide news announced in Vienna at the XVIII International AIDS Conference and the possible implications for developing a comparable rectal microbicide; and the challenges of transgender health, including the disproportionate impact of HIV/AIDS on the transgender community.

As always, I greatly appreciated having HIV/AIDS included at the NLGJA convention.


Oriol on: