There have been a number of news stories over the past couple days which shed light on what's going on.

First of all, we have the actors -- those who are out there spreading HIV:

Australian charged with spreading HIV

PlanetOut Network

published Friday, June 2, 2006

A Melbourne grandfather of five was accused in court Thursday of luring gay men on the Internet to infect them with HIV.

Michael Neal, 48, of Melbourne is charged with 25 counts, including rape and attempting to infect people with HIV. The charges stem from five accusers, one of whom has tested positive for HIV, the Australian newspaper reported.

The HIV-positive man who claims he was infected by Neal claims the defendant drugged and raped him as well.

Neal met men on the Internet from 2000 to 2005 and persuaded them to have unprotected sex, insisting that he did not have the virus, prosecutors claim. He allegedly tested positive for HIV in 2000. Health officials in Victoria received complaints about Neal starting in 2001 but were not required to forward them to police and, in fact, did not do so, the Australian Broadcasting Corp. reported May 23. Eventually, police launched an undercover investigation into Neal, and he was arrested in mid-May, the network reported.

Neal was denied bail Thursday by Magistrate Lisa Hannan, who decided he could endanger public safety if he was freed before his next court appearance in September.

Why would a man act in such a depraved fashion?

In large part because he has cultural supports for his behavior.

For example, according to this story from the AP, "AIDS educators" are fighting attempts by the NYC Health Dept to make it easier to test for HIV:

Debate emerges over HIV testing rules

By KAREN MATTHEWS, Associated Press Writer

6/2/06

NEW YORK - More than 100,000 New York City residents have HIV, and 20 percent don't know it. Many sicken and die without learning their status.

New York City health officials want to reverse the trend by making it easier for doctors to administer HIV tests and to monitor the care of people who have the virus. But the issue has drawn outrage from AIDS service providers.

The dispute coincides with the 25th anniversary of the AIDS epidemic. On June 5, 1981, federal health authorities found that five gay men in California had contracted a rare kind of pneumonia, the first recognized cases of what later became known as AIDS.

At issue in 2006 in New York is whether it is time to start treating AIDS more like other communicable diseases or whether AIDS still carries so much stigma that issues of privacy and confidentiality must remain paramount.

The changes would abolish a requirement in New York for separate written consent for an HIV test and permit public health authorities to share information about matters such as viral load and drug resistance with an HIV patient's doctor -- information which can help doctors treat their patients effectively.

New York City Health Commissioner Dr. Thomas Frieden made his case for the changes at a series of public meetings this spring.

"As long as HIV testing is different from all other testing in the medical care system it's not going to be part of routine medical care," he said at a Harlem Hospital forum.

His audience largely disagreed; it included representatives of civil liberties groups and organizations that serve people with AIDS.

What are those advocates from "organizations that serve people with AIDS" -- commonly known as AIDS Service Organizations or ASOs -- claiming?

"To imagine that it's just like every other disease -- like cancer or diabetes -- is false," said Tracy Welsh, executive director of the HIV Law Project. "Getting a positive test result is something that turns somebody's life upside down."

I have news for Ms. Welsh.

Learning that you have cancer or diabetes turns your life upside down too.

Then, if you're rational, you learn what you need to do to fight the disease -- and you go on living.

And if you have HIV -- there are lots of resources at your disposal to do just that.

Fact is, people with HIV are, in many places in this country, including NYC, PAMPERED in that regard.

To repeat, they have a lot of resources available to them.

"How will we ensure that those individuals who test positive will not be criminalized in an effort to contain the epidemic?" asked Ofelia Barrios, a staff member with the Harlem Directors Group, a consortium of AIDS services organizations.

I have news for Ms. Barrios.

No one's talking about criminalizing people who are poz.

Hasn't been discussed in over twenty years.

But there should be criminal penalties for people who recklessly spread HIV.

Just as there criminal penalties for people who drive recklessly.

Not complicated.

You see, when these "AIDS advocates" -- who are really ANAL advocates -- demand special treatment for those infected, it encourages and empowers men like Michael Neal to go out and infect as many guys as they want.

He's charged with TWENTY-FIVE counts, including rape and attempting to infect.

A few brave souls actually complained about him to the health department starting in 2001.

But, amazingly, the health department didn't forward the complaints to the police.

I wonder why.

Could it be because Mr Neal had HIV and so was considered a special case?

Doesn't matter -- the band plays on:

There is still no cure for AIDS, but antiretroviral medications can make it a manageable condition for many patients -- if they learn their HIV status and take the drugs.

State Sen. Tom Duane, the New York State Legislature's only openly HIV-positive member, said Frieden underestimates the persistence of AIDS stigma.

"People do not lose their jobs if their employer finds out that they have high cholesterol," he said. "Dr. Frieden may live in a world where the stigma's less. ... He needs to come visit a trailer park with me, where people with HIV are living, to find out what their lives are like."

I know Tom Duane -- he's a nice fella.

But I have news for him too.

People do lose their jobs over health issues other than HIV.

Happens all the time.

Shouldn't, but it does.

Again, in my experience, people with HIV have far more protection than the average disabled worker.

Tom speaks of a trailer park.

I've lived in mobile homes.

So what?

This is not proof of discrimination.

Again, what we've done is made the HIV+ a privileged class.

That's a HUGE MISTAKE.

HIV should be treated like any other disease.

And people who have HIV should be expected to behave responsibly -- 100%.

Next up -- this is from New South Wales:

The Sydney Morning Herald

More men have HIV - but it's not panic stations yet

Tim Dick

June 3, 2006

DESPITE thousands of deaths and countless safer-sex campaigns, the number of men diagnosed with HIV has again risen in NSW, 25 years after the first cases were reported in Los Angeles.

"countless safer-sex campaigns"

Maybe those "safer-sex" campaigns aren't working.

Figures released by NSW Health yesterday showed a 4.1 per cent rise in the number of men diagnosed with HIV last year. It rose from 343 to 357.

..

The director of communicable diseases, Dr Jeremy McAnulty ... said it was "frustrating that the numbers aren't coming down because it remains a deadly disease", even though antiretroviral drugs let people live much longer. "Eventually, it does reduce your life span."

No kidding.

Enter another problem:

Her name is Stevie Clayton, and she's the chief executive of the AIDS Council of NSW -- that's the New South Wales AIDS Service Organization:

Despite surveys that show more gay men in Sydney are having risky sex than they were a decade ago, she said there was little "simple complacency" about HIV among them.

But sometimes things go wrong. "It remains the case, 25 years on, the only sure way to protect yourself from HIV is to use condoms and lube," she said.

Ms. Clayton claims, despite the fact that MORE MEN ARE HAVING RISKY SEX THAN A DECADE AGO -- that they're not complacent.

Why?

Why isn't she castigating those men?

Perhaps because she's a feminist supporter of anal penetration.

And then she adds: "It remains the case, 25 years on, the only sure way to protect yourself from HIV is to use condoms and lube"

WHAT AN UTTER AND COMPLETE LIE.

Condoms and lube are NOT sure.

As she very well knows.

Buchbinder et al which I've cited since it was published:

Not just condomless anal, but anal WITH a condom is THE major risk factor for HIV infection.

Anal WITH a condom.

The only sure way to protect yourself from HIV, if you're a guy who has sex with guys, is to NOT DO ANAL AND ORAL.

FROT AND JO ARE SAFE.

And Ms. Clayton knows it.

Yet she gives forth with such a disgusting and indeed depraved lie.

"Sometimes things go wrong," says the article.

Right -- the condom breaks or the guys don't use a condom.

Why?

Because sex is about intimacy.

And sensitivity.

The condom destroys both.

Yet if you're not doing anal -- you don't need a condom.

Robert asked:

Are we so miserable that we sign our own death warrants? Is our self hatred so intense that we secretly welcome death in any form as "relief"?

Some people are doing a lot more to create those death warrants than others.

WE HAVE FOUGHT FOR SIX YEARS TO SHOW GUYS A FAR SAFER, MORE PLEASURABLE, AND TRULY MASCULINE WAY TO HAVE SEX.

What has Stevie Clayton been doing?

Or Ofelia Barrios?

Or Tracy Welsh?

They've been working to support and prop up anal and promiscuity.

They've been whores for the dominant culture of anal penetration.

That's the truth.

That's what's going on.

IT'S TIME TO FIGHT BACK.

TIME TO FIGHT BACK!

© All material Copyright 2006 by Bill Weintraub. All rights reserved.