TRAILER: Larry Kramer In Love & Anger

Kramer tells TIME: "I don’t regret anything I’ve done or said. No matter what you say, some people are going to like it and some people aren’t. So it hasn’t shut me up at all. Inside I’m just as tempestuous."  The documentary debuts on June 29th at 9PM. Set the DVR now.

ACT UP Pickets HRC's Gala In NYC

Last night ACT UP picketed outside the HRC's annual fundraising gala at Manhattan's Waldorf-Astoria, where tickets were $475. ACT UP's Facebook page explains the motivation for the protest:

HRC has created an LGBT equality index to score the Fortune 500 companies, but there's no mention of HIV and the thousands of LGBT people with HIV in the workplace. We demand that HRC include several criteria to evaluate companies on their treatment of employees living with HIV, as well as their contributions to organizations and causes relate to reducing the incidence of HIV among LGBT Americans, particularly among the young. For over 30 years, too many have been fired, harassed, outed and discriminated against at work for having HIV. Also at this gala, many of the corporations that HRC will honor actively work against the interests of middle-class and poor Americans, including people with HIV. ACT UP denounces this frequent practice of '"pinkwashing" whereby corporations with policies and practices that undermine the people's well-being are given positive publicity in exchange for maintaining LGBT-friendly (or just equal) workplaces. This is short-sighted and divisive. We demand that HRC develop other criteria that takes into account the impact of companies' policies on every American, not just LGBT Americans.

Many more photos from the protest can be seen here.

ACT UP To Protest HRC Gala In NYC

Via press release:

The AIDS Coalition To Unleash Power (ACT UP) and other HIV activist organizations will converge to protest the neglect of the AIDS crisis by mainstream LGBT organizations at the annual self-congratulatory gala held at the Waldorf Astoria in New York City by Human Rights Campaign (HRC). HRC has been absent on HIV in major ways. Even as HIV advocates go hat in hand begging for programs like PreP (Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis), HRC throws galas for thousands of dollars a plate and is nowhere to be found in New York City on critical issues such as LGBT homelessness. ACT UP New York demands that HRC immediately appoint a liaison dedicated specifically to work on HIV—not a Fellow that works temporarily. HRC should work with grassroots organizers on the ground. While the party is going on at the Waldorf, countless homeless LGBT youth are in life-threatening need on the streets of New York.

We demand that HRC work to repeal the outdated CDC policy regarding federal funding for explicit and comprehensive sex education materials. Buried in Jesse Helms’ basement since 1992, his homophobic and HIV-phobic legacy continues to impede effective HIV prevention efforts. Speaking about the ban, ACT UP member Andy Velez said: “The Human Rights Campaign’s absence on a core issue like HIV prevention policies is more glaring evidence of their failure to demonstrate bold leadership.” A whopping thirty-three pages, buried somewhere on the HRC website, is devoted to HIV. By contrast, four hundred thirty-six are dedicated to marriage. It seems weddings are more important than the fag dying in Louisiana because he can’t get meds. Right here, there are more than a hundred thousand New Yorkers living with HIV and thousands more getting it every year, all relying on the same scant resources.

Their Facebook event page is here.

BRITAIN: Activists Dump Cow Dung At Headquarters Of Anti-Gay Political Party

Via Gay Star News:

HIV activists embraced in a gay kiss as they dumped half a ton of cow dung outside the South London office of UKIP. They were disgusted by UKIP leader Nigel Farage and other politicians in the party saying people living with HIV should be barred from coming to Britain. The World AIDS Day (1 December) protest symbolizes a rebirth by the London chapter of ACT UP (AIDS Coalition To Unleash Power), a group which has had been less visible in the UK in the last decade. ACT UP activist Gary Hunter said: ‘We’ve had enough of UKIP’s misinformation and offensive attacks on minorities. We wanted to show Farage that people living with HIV aren’t going to take his BS any longer – so we’ve returned it. ‘The vile crap that UKIP keeps spreading stigmatizes and ostracizes people living with HIV, gay people and immigrants.

PREVIOUSLY ON JMG:  Early this year a UKIP member was suspended after declaring that God was ravaging Britain with floods because of same-sex marriage. Those comments spawned a social media campaign to return It's Raining Men back to the top of pop chart. The track did re-enter the chart and peaked at #21.

WaPo Profiles Signorile & Griffin

The Washington Post today published a lengthy profile of SiriusXM radio host Michelangelo Signorile and Human Rights Campaign head Chad Griffin. Here's a setup:

In 2004, 38 percent of respondents supported same-sex marriage, according to a Washington Post-ABC poll. Ten years later: 59 percent. And today, only a decade after Massachusetts ushered in same-sex marriage, Freedom to Marry says that nearly 44 percent of Americans live in jurisdictions that have legalized it — 19 states and the District of Columbia.

Even observers who welcome the gains often seem pleasantly puzzled: How did that happen so fast? But the changes are the result of decades of struggle, from early gay-marriage efforts in the 1970s along with AIDS and anti-discrimination activism in the 1980s and ’90s, to challenges at the Supreme Court in the new millennium. In Lawrence v. Texas, Lambda Legal, another major gay-rights group, won a huge victory in 2003, as the justices struck down state laws that criminalized sodomy.

Gay-rights activists — including the “Let’s get this done NOW!” camp and those who proceeded more methodically in order to build support — kept pushing. In a way, Mike Signorile and Chad Griffin framed a remarkable generation, each each representing a different historical moment, Signorile at the start and Griffin at the close. Here are their stories.

Hit that link, it's an interesting piece.

The Normal Heart Wins Emmy For Best Movie, Larry Kramer Joins Cast On Stage

Kramer took the stage with the aid of a bright pink cane and wearing an ACT UP hat. Director Ryan Murphy gave the acceptance speech and the audience responded with the first standing ovation of the night.

COMPILATION: Gay News In The 1990s

JMG reader Dave Evans has compiled an hour of gay-related news reports that aired in the 1990s. Among the topics: ACT UP demonstrations, the Boy Scouts, gay pride marches, the election of Bill Clinton, the enactment of DADT, the enactment of DOMA, and the murder of Matthew Shepard.

PREVIOUSLY ON JMG: Compilations of gay news in the 1970s, gay news in the 1980s, and the first ten years of HIV/AIDS.

Quote Of The Day - Elton John

"While The Normal Heart is a product of a specific time, it is not an artifact. There is still an AIDS crisis -- not only in sub-Saharan Africa, but right here in the America, in your state, in your community. And, just as in 1985, it is silence, fear and stigma that continue to drive the epidemic. Today, African-Americans represent 12% of the national population, but they account for 44% of Americans living with HIV, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Gay and bisexual men comprise only 2% of the American population, but they represented 30% of the nation's HIV infections in 2010.

"Around 4,000 Americans are infected with HIV each year because of injection drug use, and one in seven HIV-positive Americans pass through a correctional facility each year. The crisis is particularly acute in the American South, where homophobia is rampant. I hope HBO's production of The Normal Heart will compel a new generation to act up. There is so much work still to be done, but there's also so much potential. The characters in The Normal Heart, living as they did in the 1980s, didn't understand what they or their friends were dying of, and they didn't have treatments to manage the disease. They hardly knew how to protect themselves.

"Today, we know how to protect everyone, and we have the ability to treat every single person living with HIV. Yet AIDS continues to prey upon the most vulnerable in our society: the poor, the incarcerated, sex workers, drug users, and those living in regions where intolerance and stigma are facts of life. Today, as ever, silence equals death." - Elton John, writing for CNN. The Normal Heart debuts on HBO tonight at 9PM.

Larry Kramer's Fight For The Normal Heart

The HBO movie debuts on Sunday at 9PM.

Activists Protest Harlem Hate Church

Members of ACT UP and other activists protested outside Harlem's ATLAH Church on Saturday in reaction to the church's billboard calling for the stoning of homosexuals. Via press release:

Over fifty LGBT activists protested for over an hour in the rain yesterday outside ATLAH World Missionary Church in Harlem, demanding that the church’s controversial pastor, James David Manning, emerge and administer the stonings that his public sign recently called for. Until it was vandalized last week, the church’s marquee read, “Jesus would stone homos. Harlem is a homo free zone.” Holding a forty-foot rainbow banner and shouting chants like “Harlem queers under attack! What do we do? ACT UP! Fight back!” and “Hey hey! Ho ho! David Manning has got to go!” the multiracial crowd also brandished signs that read, “God is love” and “Let he without sin cast the first stone.” At one point the rowdy group moved to the side entrance of the church, repeatedly ringing the building’s buzzer and raising their fists while they shouted, “We’re here for out stoning! We’re here for our stoning!” Several church members watched from inside through a glass door, smiling and chatting.

In the top photo holding the sign is ACT UP member Ken Kidd.  At the right in the bottom photo is rainbow flag creator and Harlem resident Gilbert Baker.

VIDEO: ATLAH's Pastor James Manning responded to an earlier protest that took place on Friday.

TOMORROW: Activists To Picket Harlem Hate Church, Request Collective Stoning

Tomorrow ACT UP and others will picket Harlem's ATLAH World Missionary Church and demand that they be collectively stoned to death. Via press release:

LGBT activists in New York City are calling for a peaceful protest outside ATLAH World Missionary Church Saturday, March 29th, 11:30 a.m. The controversial Harlem church is located at 36 West 123rd Street at Lenox Avenue, on the Northeast Corner. (Take the 4,5,6 trains to the 125th Street stop. BX15, M116 buses to 125th and Lenox.) Harlem resident Jennifer Louise Lopez recently got tired of repeatedly viewing ATLAH Pastor James David Manning’s virulently homophobic public sign saying, “Jesus would stone homos. Harlem is a homo free zone.” Manning has a history of making strong homophobic statements that are often linked to attacks on President Barack Obama. The sign also recently read, “Obama has released the homo demons on the black man. Look out black woman. A white homo might take your man.” LGBT activists and supporters will sing songs and peacefully, and humorously, request a collective stoning. REAL STONES WILL NOT BE ALLOWED AT THE PROTEST.

I will post full coverage of the protest tomorrow afternoon.

Queer Nation Disrupts Final Sochi Promotion At Grand Central Terminal

Via press release:

Nearly three dozen members of Queer Nation held a raucous protest at the United States Olympic Committee's final "Road to Sochi Tour" event at Grand Central Terminal in Manhattan on February 23. The action began just as the event began in historic Vanderbilt Hall, inside the terminal, with protesters chanting "Don't Buy Putin's Lies" and unfurling two banners, one reading "Don't Buy Putin's Lies" and the other reading "Boycott Homophobia." Some members also carried signs that read "Gay Bashing Is Not An Olympic Sport." The banners were hand-sewn by Gilbert Baker, the designer of the original rainbow flag. Queer Nation was then forced out of the terminal by officers in the Metropolitan Transit Authority Police Department. The group briefly protested in front of a Road to Sochi tour truck on East 42nd Street and then marched to the west entrance of Grand Central Terminal, where the protest continued for over an hour. There were no arrests.

Video by ACT UP New York.

NEW YORK: State Endorses Truvada For Daily Use As HIV Preventive

The New York state Department of Health has officially endorsed daily use of the Gilead medication Truvada for the prevention of HIV infection.

After months of anticipation, the Health Department's AIDS Institute released thorough clinical guidelines for pre-exposure prophylaxis, commonly known as PrEP, which is a daily dose of HIV medication that people who are HIV-negative but at-risk of contracting the virus can take to drastically reduce their chance of infection. The drug, known by its prescription name Truvada, can reduce the chance of infection by as much as 73 percent, according to studies funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. However, the AIDS Institute stressed that PrEP alone was not enough to prevent new infections. "PrEP should not be offered as a sole intervention for HIV prevention. PrEP should only be prescribed as part of a comprehensive prevention plan," the report says.

Preventive use of Truvada, while supported by most HIV/AIDS groups including ACT UP and the San Francisco AIDS Foundation, remains controversial. In particular, the Los Angeles based AIDS Healthcare Foundation has long battled against the preventive use of Truvada. In July 2012, when the drug was first approved for daily preventive use, the AHF accused both Gilead and the FDA of "negligence bordering the equivalence of malpractice which will sadly result in new infections, drug resistance and serious side effects among many, many people." Last August the AHF declared victory in their Freedom of Information Act request which sought proof that Gilead colluded with the FDA on "what to say to get their unfavorable drug trial results spun in such a way that the FDA deemed them sufficient to approve the drug."

Truvada retails at an annual cost of up to $14,000 and its use as a preventive is not yet covered by all insurance plans. Today's guideline from the state recommends that AIDS groups focus on identifying the most high-risk persons who would benefit from its daily use.