AID Atlanta's Gay Men's Outreach Program will host a discussion tomorrow, July 5, on sexual expression in the gay community from 7 to 9 pm.
Among the topics discussed will be how some sexual styles flourish in mainstream society while others are taboo. The group will also talk about the diverse sexual styles found in the LGBT community.
“Leather? Great. Threesomes? Okay. Roleplay? Sure. Strictly a top? Totally a bottom? Flip flopping versatile? However you choose to express yourself, we want to hear about it,” organizers say.
The meeting is part of a new series called “One Night Stand,” where attendees focus on one topic for one night.
15.4
Percent of gay and lesbian youth who reported drinking and driving in the last 30 days, compared to 7.8 percent of straight youth.
27.8
Percent of gay and lesbian youth who reported smoking more than 10 cigarettes in a day, compared to 9.1 percent of straight youth.
21.1
Percent of gay students who said they had not gone to school out of safety concerns, compared to 12.7 percent for bisexual students and 4.8 percent of straight students.
35.8
Percent of gay youth who used a condom during their last sexual intercourse, compared to 65.5 percent for heterosexuals and 53.7 percent of bisexuals.
30
Percent of gay youth who said they had considered suicide, compared to 11.7 percent of heterosexual youth.
10 tips to stay HIV negative and what to do if you find out you're positive
3
AIDS cases in Georgia reported in 1981, the first year the CDC began tracking a mysterious disease killing gay men.
39,460
Cumulative AIDS diagnoses in Georgia through 2009, the latest statistics available.
20,282
Cumulative Georgia AIDS cases attributed to male-male sexual contact, plus an additional 2,450 attributed to male-male sex and injection drug use.
6th
Georgia’s rank among all states for cumulative AIDS diagnoses.
3,229
New HIV diagnoses in Georgia in 2009, the latest statistics available.
The mysterious disease that would eventually become a global pandemic is approaching a milestone that it denied to thousands of gay men in the 1980s and ‘90s: On June 5, AIDS turns 30.
First identified as an unusual outbreak of pneumocystis carinii pneumonia by the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention, AIDS startled doctors with the way it targeted “previously healthy” young men and ravaged their immune systems with unprecedented speed.
“Patient 4: A 29-year-old man developed P. carinii pneumonia in February 1981,” read the June 5, 1981, Morbidity & Mortality Weekly Report, the CDC’s first official recognition of what would become known as AIDS. “He did not improve after being given intravenous [antibiotics] and corticosteroids and died in March.”
1981
• On June 5, the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention reports the first case of the illness that will come to be called AIDS.
• Number of known AIDS deaths in United States during 1981: 234.
1982
• The CDC links the new disease to blood. The name Gay-Related Immune Deficiency (GRID) is replaced with Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS).
1983
• The CDC warns blood banks of the risk of infection through transfusion.
SAFETY FIRST
If it’s oral, anal or vaginal it should be wrapped up before any penetration.
IDENTIFICATION
Know who you are and where your values lie. Confidence plays a great role not only in getting that sexy new catch, but also in standing firm in your decisions to protect yourself and your partners.
NEGOTIATION
Discuss HIV and safer sex with your partners before sex. This can help steer what kind of sex you have.
1. GET GROUNDED
Find support through friends, family, therapists, medical professionals or any combination of these. Without support, taking any additional steps can seem even more difficult and trying. Support groups can help bring a sense of camaraderie and fellowship to a seemingly lonely experience.
2. GUIDE YOUR TONGUE
Not everyone will be supportive. Initially, share this information with those whom you can trust to be uplifting and those whom will help you along your way to treatment and safety.
This is directed to HIV negative gay men. Listen carefully. This is your time.
I’ve lived with HIV more than half my life, and people often praise me far more than I deserve, simply for surviving. They use words like brave and courageous.
You know what takes courage? Getting an HIV test every few months. You, waiting nervously while your most personal sexual choices are literally being tested, waiting to find out if you’ve been good — or if you’re going to pay for a single lapse in judgment by testing positive, when the look on the faces of your friends will say you should have known better.
“I check the mirror for spots, irregularities, telltale signs.” — from The Adodi Muse, “It Begins”
This is a peculiar anniversary that marks a generation, a span from birth to full grown, three full decades, since the onset of the greatest public health issue of our time.
Loss is what this commemoration signifies most. Loss beyond measure, rendered in memorial quilt snapshots of real lives lived, loss evoked in the chants of survivors who touched the untouchable, fed their beloved, wiped up the puke and shit, and were given neither a passing mention nor a place at the mourning table. I am 25 years old when I first feel swollen lymph glands. I have only just begun when “It begins.”