Welcome, My Friends
I’m an HIV positive gay man in recovery from drug addiction. What’s not to love?
Get ready for some frank opinion, inspirational writing, debate on sexual politics, videos of poz life featuring my family and friends, and even some infamous drag. And please follow me on Twitter and join the My Fabulous Disease Facebook page!
What If They Had an ‘HIV Testing Day’ and Nobody Came?
As press conferences go, the one held this week for the #SaveHIVFunding effort by the national advocacy group PrEP4All was a doozy. But not for the usual reasons. There were no shocking announcements from the slate of public health advocates and workers. There were no...
The Hardworking Humility of Craig Washington
Craig Washington could be forgiven if he has a certain strut in his step these days. His lifetime of community service, building one program after another that lifts up, supports and celebrates SGL (Same Gender Loving) Black men, is written across the history of...
Do You Feel Love?
More than ten years ago, when pop icon Donna Summer died, I wrote a tribute to the impact her music had made on me as a young gay man growing up in Louisiana in 1977. A few weeks ago, producer Becky Ripley at BBC Radio 4 in Bristol, UK somehow ran across that essay...
40 Years Ago I Tested HIV Positive. We Must Take the Streets Again.
“If this article doesn’t scare the shit out of you, we’re in real trouble... Our continued existence depends on just how angry you can get.” - Larry Kramer, “1,112 and Counting,” The New York Native, 1983 Forty years ago, on March 15th, 1985, I received my HIV...
People are Resisting. I Am Doing Nothing.
The phrase sat there on my Facebook feed, staring back at me like an accusation. “If you aren’t resisting, you are assisting,” the post read. I felt flush with self-conscious guilt. It wasn’t a familiar feeling, not after nearly forty years of speaking up and...
Exposed Document Links HIV Leaders to ‘Betrayal of People with HIV’
When Jeremiah Johnson was perusing the Gilead Sciences website last November, as one does when tracking one of the most insidious assaults in history against people living with HIV, an item he found buried deep in Gilead’s pulldown menus literally took his breath...
When Survival Ends
The casket of my friend Jesse Peel, an elderly longtime HIV survivor who died in 2023, was crafted of gorgeous wood—oak, I think. As I stood admiring it in the alcove of the church prior to his memorial, a powerful sense of déjà vu brought suppressed emotions rushing...
Atlanta Event Salutes the Writing of Mark S. King
At Out Front Theater on August 8, 2024, seven Atlanta community members performed essays from my new collection, My Fabulous Disease: Chronicles of a Gay Survivor. It was the last stop of a national tour that included events in Palm Springs, Ft. Lauderdale,...
Advocates Confront GLAAD Over ‘HIV Stigma Report’ Disaster
This is a story about GLAAD’s 2024 State of HIV Stigma Report and why its botched release generated widespread condemnation from advocates throughout the HIV arena. It is also the story of how community leaders who keep their eye on the ball can collectively work...
Remember Viatical Settlements? A New Film Brings It All Back.
Matt Nadel has quite a connection with the viatical settlement industry - the cottage industry created to purchase life insurance policies from largely gay men dying of AIDS. Based on their life expectancy, policies were purchased and a settlement offered the client,...
The AfterMeth: A Frank Conversation about Meth, Sex, and HIV
Honestly, my meth addiction still haunts me. It intrudes on my waking hours and sneaks seductively into my sexual fantasies. The wounds are deep, even after so many years of my recovery process. Dr. Dallas Bragg isn’t coy when it comes to addressing these issues. As a...
Final ‘My Fabulous Disease’ Event to Honor HIV Survivors in Atlanta
After ten cities, dozens of organizational sponsors and thousands of attendees, my book tour for My Fabulous Disease: Chronicles of a Gay Survivor will end the evening of August 8th in Atlanta. It feels wonderful to be ending the tour in my hometown, where much of the...
A Personal Farewell to Aidsmap from the Activist Who Was There
The abrupt closing of aidsmap.com, the stalwart HIV/AIDS information and resource site in the United Kingdom, has sent a mortal shudder through the ranks of those with a history in the HIV arena. The loss is incalculable. It is also a very personal milestone for...
Meth Still Kills
As Chuck Parker stood over his room-mate’s dead body trying to process what he was seeing, a 911 operator on the phone urged him to perform cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). Parker would have done it, if he had thought there were any chance he might revive his...
Miss Vaughan Will Shame You Now
Honestly, I was flattered to see a photo of me on Jennifer Vaughan’s social media feed. She posted it a few weeks ago, during the first days of Pride Month, and it showed me at the 2013 Atlanta Pride parade. I was a Grand Marshal that year, and in the picture...
An Upcoming Retreat for People Who are HIV+ and in Recovery
A retreat being held this summer, known as SoberPoz, will welcome anyone living with HIV who identifies as participating in a program of recovery of some kind. This kind of safe space is terribly important and I want to explain why - and then encourage you to share...
Managing AIDS Grief in the 1980s… by Making Silly Videos
This is a story about how the staff at the very first HIV/AIDS agency in Los Angeles managed to handle the stress of that time without falling apart - and a random, whimsical twist of fate that followed many years later. My first job in the AIDS arena was at the Los...
Kerry Thomas is a Free and Very Grateful Man
(This interview between myself and Kerry Thomas appears in the April/May 2024 issue of POZ Magazine.) When Kerry Thomas began serving a 30-year sentence in Idaho for nondisclosure of his HIV-positive status in 2008, becoming a prominent voice for people living with...
Oklahoma is Not Okay. These LGBTQ Leaders are Fighting for Its Future.
When an audience member gives a dollar bill to a drag performer in Oklahoma City, they bow ever so slightly in a kind of reverent curtsy when handing it over. Here at the County Line nightclub on a recent Saturday night, I watch it happen again and again. Maybe it's...
Take the ‘LGBTQ+ and Aging’ Survey Now
If there is anything I love sharing, it’s my opinion. I just love taking surveys. And talking to therapists. And writing blogs about myself. I think you see the pattern here. But my favorite kind of opinion-sharing is when it helps my community in a really tangible...
The Emotional Triumph of Playwrights Living with HIV
You should know the end of the story first, because the ending demands to be heard. It took place last month in the largest event space at The LGBT Center in New York City, where hundreds of people were excitedly greeting each other, grazing at the food table or...
The Many Children of Dr. Jesse Peel
The students who hang out in the Dr. Jesse R. Peel LGBTQ Center of East Carolina University (ECU) are welcome guests in a dynamic, welcoming space. Among them are all manner of gender expression and burgeoning sexualities. You’ll find them lazing on couches or typing...
Confessions of a Guy Who Used to be Hot
As I say in my recent interview for Dennis Hensley’s podcast (“Dennis, Anyone?”), it’s hard to talk about this without sounding like a total dick. But really, when has that ever stopped me before? Dennis has a way of entertaining his audience with zippy one-liners...
Once, When We Were Heroes
(I will never explain the early days of AIDS better then this, so I post this essay to commemorate World AIDS Day every year. This essay, written in 2007 for Southern Voice newspaper, won "Outstanding Opinion Piece" from NLGJA, the national LGBTQ journalism...
For Charles Sanchez’s Cabaret Show, ‘Life is Fabulous’ at Long, Long Last
Charles Sanchez is one busy New Yorker. There’s the writing he does for nearly all of the major HIV outlets, his regular Instagram show featuring community notables, and then his dashes to the gym to contend with the five pounds, give or take, that continue to mock...
The Day After He was Murdered, I Got a Card from Josh Kruger
My husband Michael and I were sitting on the front steps of our new home in Atlanta. I tell you this because it is one of those moments that gets seared into your consciousness, one of those Where Were You When moments. Michael was explaining where he wanted to plant...
Does This Book Release Make Me Look Anxious?
The day has come. Today, My Fabulous Disease: Chronicles of a Gay Survivor is officially released. This book represents - and I know how this sounds - my life’s work. It features essays culled from writing over the course of four decades. It is joyful and dark and...
Heading to USCHA 2023? Here’s Inspiration for You.
You know what a fan I am of the annual United States Conference on HIV/AIDS (USCHA), produced by NMAC. I’ve been writing about it for years, and providing videos and photo essays for those of you who couldn’t make it or wanted to relive the highlights. If...
How Do We Support Black Women in an HIV Arena Once Run by Gay White Men?
In the early days of the AIDS crisis, as a young gay white man finding my way in the emerging HIV arena, I was King of the Mountain even if I wasn’t conscious of it. I worked with people who looked like me, on behalf of people like me, at organizations founded and led...
Greg Louganis Praises ‘Bold’ New Book about Love, Sex and Survival
It felt presumptuous of me to believe I have much in common with historic Olympian Greg Louganis. His level of fame, his record-shattering sports career, and the worldwide scrutiny he faced when he went public with his HIV status in 1995 are all beyond anything I...
How You Can Preserve the Music Legacy of AIDS Icon Michael Callen
It isn’t very often that any of us can play a tangible role in honoring and preserving the legacy of one of the pillars of our shared history. Here’s just that opportunity. Michael Callen is someone many people consider to be the original long-term AIDS survivor. He...
Can We Create a Life Beyond HIV?
I’ve known my best friend Charles for more than 40 years. He knew me when I was HIV negative, for goodness sake. That’s how long we’ve been besties. When Charles was interviewed recently for a story about my advocacy, he said something that surprised me. “Mark almost...
Gay Comic Shuts Down HIV Gossip in Startling New Video
Writer and comedian Michael Henry has become a sly critic of gay culture and sexual politics, regularly tackling issues such as body image, masculinity, and every aspect of queer desire you might imagine. His sharp wit and social insight have endeared him to nearly...
Who Needs a World AIDS Museum, Anyway?
You’re never too old to learn how terribly ignorant you are. When I first heard about plans for a World AIDS Museum in Fort Lauderdale, FL, some years ago, I might have rolled my eyes a little bit. Who’s going to that? I wondered. Those of us who were there aren’t...
HIV Survivors Look Back, and Explore the Meaning of ‘Getting to Zero’
There are so many governmental and community programs that refer to “ending the HIV epidemic” that you might be excused for rolling your eyes a little when you hear about one. What do they even mean? Ending the HIV epidemic how, you might wonder. And for whom? Those...
How ‘The Denver Principles’ Changed Healthcare Forever
You must know this, because it matters. Because it has already changed your life, no matter who you are, and you may not even realize it. It was 1983. Just a year prior, Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) became the fearful nameplate for the murderer of gay...
The HIV Cruise Retreat Sails Again, Steered by a Brother’s Promise
The HIV Cruise Retreat, which has brought tropical fun and a sense of community to people living with HIV, their families and allies for the last twenty years, will sail to the Caribbean this fall. The fact the cruise is happening after the passing of organizer Paul...
ACT UP Veterans Have a New Pursuit: Their Memoirs
There must have been something in the water at those New York City ACT UP meetings back in the day. There had to be. The band of ferocious, cheeky AIDS activists (immortalized in the Oscar-nominated documentary, How to Survive a Plague) has produced scientists,...
The Saints & Sinners Festival Gives Queer Writers a Big, Cozy Hug (and Helpful Tips)
Any LGBTQ writer who has endured the gauntlet of getting their book to a reading audience knows what a frustrating, fitfully satisfying process it can be. God only knows how many queer masterworks are trapped in laptops because the writer has no idea how to navigate...
Advocates Try to Halt a Wacky, Dangerous Book from an HIV Denialist
We all know the saying about freedom of speech. It doesn’t mean you have the right to yell “fire!” in a crowded movie theater. That kind of speech can risk lives. But what if the theater is already burning on all sides, and someone tries to convince people not...
Surviving Life Itself
(I tested HIV positive 38 years ago today. My 2017 POZ Magazine essay still rings true.) The young woman sitting across from me on the bus is in her mid-20s. She turns to her companion and her voice grows serious. “I know someone who died,” she says in the hushed tone...
Why I was an Awful Jimmy Carter in My High School Mock Election
(As it appeared Tuesday, February 28, 2023, in The Atlanta Journal Constitution.) As a high school junior in 1976, I was selected to play former Georgia governor Jimmy Carter in our mock presidential election. It taught me a lesson in politics – and the performative...
HINAC is the HIV Event We Desperately Need. Here’s How to Get a Scholarship.
The issue of HIV criminalization used to intimidate me, because I didn’t understand State laws, much less how to change them. Thank God I got a scholarship to the first HIV Is Not A Crime Training Academy (HINAC) in 2014, because it opened my eyes and introduced me to...
AJC Opinion: ‘Atlanta’s history of battling AIDS will live on’
(As it appeared today, January 13, 2023, in the Atlanta Journal Constitution.) 'The bungalow that housed a mix of horror and heroics is gone, but its legacy isn't.' The humble, sagging bungalow that sat until recently at the corner of 12th Street and Peachtree Walk in...
Naughty ‘n Nice Holiday Videos with an HIV Twist
‘Tis the season, y’all. And you know how much I love a nice holiday video. Okay, maybe a naughty one, too. The folks at Mistr, the telehealth platform that provides free PrEP (pre-exposure prophylaxis) and STI testing, sure do have my number. They’ve just released a...
Reunion Project Town Hall to feature HIV fitness legend Nelson Vergel
We’re probably far enough along in the history of HIV/AIDS to tag various figures as, well, historic. Fitness expert Nelson Vergel qualifies for that category, having taken the lead from the earliest years of the epidemic to educate people living with HIV about...
Once, When We Were Heroes
(I will never explain the early days of AIDS better then this, so I post this essay to commemorate World AIDS Day every year.) My brother Richard smiles a lot. He has an easy laugh. But there was a time, years ago, when he held a poisonous drink in his hands and...
Five Takeaways from the 2022 U.S. Conference on HIV/AIDS (USCHA)
After scrapping the in-person USCHA conference for two years due to COVID, and efforts to locate the event in San Juan, Puerto Rico being threatened by two hurricanes – including Ian only weeks ago – it would seem the industrious folks at NMAC (which produces USCHA)...
WATCH: An HIV+ Man Confronts his Criminalization Accuser!
Among the many resources available to those who access the new (and entirely free) HIV Justice Academy, an online resource for those interested in addressing HIV criminalization, is a new edit of a video created ten years ago. At the time, Sean Strub was in the early...
A Free Online ‘HIV Criminalization Academy’ has Launched. We Need It.
“There is no greater form of stigma than when it is written into our laws.” SERO Project founder Sean Strub made that notable remark years ago, in regard to what he considers one of the great moral issues of our time: the prosecution of people living with HIV for no...
A Chat with New Reunion Project Director Jeff Berry
The Reunion Project has always held a special place in my aging heart, probably because the national network of long-term HIV/AIDS survivors addresses the very issues relevant to people like me, namely, what the hell will happen to us as we age, and where do we find...
The Thing about Being Naked with Damon Jacobs
Damon Jacobs is moving around his hotel room, setting up a tripod and attaching his camera, all the while chatting away enthusiastically about nothing in particular. His sunny attitude is disarming given the circumstances, and maybe that’s the point, because I’m...
What is Driving the Latest Monkeypox Messaging Battle?
The first AIDS joke I ever heard in the early 1980s, back when the threat seemed remote and I was young and insensitive enough to laugh at misfortune, was about who got AIDS. At the time, it was a disease that primarily affected gay men, intravenous drug users, and...
Georgia’s DeKalb County Does Monkeypox Vax Exactly Right
The big picture view of monkeypox in this country has been fraught with heated debate, acrimony, homophobia, and anxious uncertainty about vaccine strategy and distribution. And that's just on social media. What a breath of fresh air, then, to witness a ground-level...
CDC’s Daskalakis on Monkeypox, Stigma, and being ‘the Gay in the Room’
Dr. Demetre Daskalakis has had a swift, visible ascent at the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which snatched him away from a successful tenure at New York City's Department of Health after he created the progressive "HIV Status Neutral" program. His...
Two HIV/AIDS Survivors Discuss Life, Death, and Leaving HIV Activism
Tez Anderson is a truth-bomb talking poster boy of long-term HIV survival. As one of the founders of the Let’s Kick ASS (AIDS Survival Syndrome) program, he advocates ferociously for the needs and visibility of aging people living with HIV. Tez and I both know we must...
Here’s the Complete AIDS2022 Coverage from My Fabulous Disease
If you know anything about me, it’s that I’m not a clinician or researcher. I leave those stories to people who are better qualified. Instead, I view conferences like the international AIDS conference in Montreal (AIDS2022) through the lens of a long-term HIV...
WATCH: Monkeypox Activists Disrupt AIDS2022 with Rageful Protest
There was something more than the typical passion on display when activists stormed the plenary stage at AIDS2022 today to protest the slow monkeypox response by United States public health officials. The cries of the diverse crowd of protestors were urgent and...
The AIDS2022 ‘No Pants No Problem’ Party Lived Up to its Name
When Jessica Whitbread was twenty years old, her physician told her after her HIV diagnosis that she had maybe twenty years to live. She responded to the news by getting involved with a number of HIV-related causes, including the International Community of Women...
Who needs a ‘Positive Lounge’ at AIDS2022, anyway?
The server is dressed in a black bolero jacket, the kind of thing waiters in a fine restaurant might wear, and he is carrying a tray of juices to restock the food table. Clearly, he is conscientious about his work, because the table is a pristine assortment of baked...
HIV campaign “U Equals U” has been adopted by entire US government
The Prevention Access Campaign (PAC) announced that their global effort to educate people that people living with HIV with an undetectable viral load are unable to transmit HIV sexually (known as “undetectable equals untransmittable,” or “U=U”) has now been adopted by...
A snapshot of The Gays descending on AIDS2022 in Montreal
The poutine covering the fries in Brady’s bowl is suspicious. “It’s cheese curd,” Randy offers, and as the lone Canadian among us we figure he should know, but his explanation isn’t reassuring. The four of us, white gay men all, pick through the soggy mixture with our...
Can Gay Men Dial Back on Sex Until Our Monkeypox Vaccinations?
Years from now, there will be gay men who made it through a case of monkeypox who will have the scars up and down the shaft of their penis to prove it. Let me repeat that. Scars. On their cock. For the rest of their lives. I don’t think there’s a derma-peel that will...
Monkeypox is a gay thing. We must say it.
The mainstream media and public health officials are being so damn careful not to label monkeypox “a gay disease” that they’re doing a disservice to the gay men who most need important information about the outbreak – while misleading everybody else. In a July 18th...
Monkeypox brings up trauma for older gay men. Here’s why.
The World Health Organization has announced that it will convene a second emergency meeting next week to decide if monkeypox poses a global health threat. Case numbers just passed 10,000 globally. That figure is more than twice the number it was 10 days ago. Most...
Brian Thomas loved his Florida trip. Then the monkeypox blisters appeared.
The photo on Brian Thomas’ Instagram page was a typically sunny one for the social media personality, who has built a rising presence as a sex-positive gay nurse living with HIV. “Farewell Wilton Manors!” it read, alongside a photo of him grinning shirtless among the...
Meet the Gay Men Behind POZ Magazine’s “Meth Still Kills” Feature Story
No sooner had POZ Magazine editor Oriol Gutierrez accepted my pitch to do a feature story about meth, gay men and HIV than a stunning Facebook post came across my feed. Someone I knew, Mark Wingo, had died of a meth overdose, and his roommate, Chuck Parker, posted the...
Queer the Media: A Chat with the GLAAD Award ‘Outstanding Blog’ Nominees
Among the glittering nominees of Hollywood films, television and music honored at the annual GLAAD Awards, one category celebrates grassroots queer media like no other. The “Outstanding Blog” award honors ongoing blogs, typically written and curated by a single...
Buckle up! The ‘Staley vs Gilead’ lawsuit could cost Big Pharma billions.
This is big news indeed. Pay attention. The latest twist in the Staley vs. Gilead lawsuit could signal very bad things for Gilead Sciences and Janssen Pharmaceuticals. As the case barrels forward (a jury date is set for March 2023), it could eventually cost Big...
Join a Free Webinar on Social Isolation among Long-Term Survivors
There is a moment in a 1982 NBC News television report about the emerging plague that still stops me in my tracks. Keep in mind, the culprit for the mysterious illness and death of so many gay men – the primary cases in this country at that time – was unknown....
People Living with HIV Lend Our Expertise for Free. Let’s Stop It.
There’s a new survey produced by the Prevention Access Campaign (PAC) that addresses an important issue: people living with HIV being undervalued for their contributions. And too often, it is those of us living with HIV who let it happen. Speaking at an event....
My HIV Positive Test was 37 Years Ago Today. This is What I Know Is True.
In the early 1980s, I was a gay man living in West Hollywood, California, and the AIDS crisis was barely on the horizon. I remember hearing about people dying, maybe a friend of a friend, and thinking to myself, “oh, I think it must happen to really sleazy people....
Maryland Officials Frustrate HIV Community after ADAP Cyber Attack
People living with HIV in Maryland have lost insurance coverage and gone without medication following a December ransomware attack against the state health department that hobbled the Maryland AIDS Drug Assistance Program (MADAP). The health department, meanwhile, has...
Darian Aaron on Black Love, the White Gaze, and ‘The Reckoning’
The Reckoning, a blog site devoted to Black LGBTQ+ voices, has been producing kick-ass content for the last few years. It is also riding high these days, with the recent announcement of its second consecutive GLAAD Media Award nomination, joining previous winners Holy...
The Bitter Satisfaction of Judging the COVID Queens
Here’s a fun fact. If people had simply stopped having sex in the 1980s, AIDS would have been stopped in its tracks. But we didn’t and it wasn’t. The culprit was basic human need. Even in the face of our own mortality, we reached out to one another and we touched and...
The 2022 GLAAD Award Nominees Include Multiple HIV Stories and Outlets
The annual GLAAD Media Awards, which “honor media for fair, accurate, and inclusive representations of LGBTQ people and issues,” included several stories, writers, and outlets from the HIV community among their 2022 award nominees. For the first time, POZ Magazine has...
What Can 500 Sailors Possibly Learn from a Gay Long-Term HIV Survivor?
I grew up on Air Force bases. My father was an officer, Colonel Harol R. King, which was a handy thing to mention if the base police caught you lighting firecrackers in the street or running around the golf course like an idiot. Mostly, though, growing up meant...
Revisiting a Heartbreaking Music Video on HIV Stigma, 25 Years Later
When the short video “27000” premiered at London Pride in 1996, featuring a live performance from Jimmy Somerville, the world of HIV was a much different place. The new HIV drug "cocktail" that would finally curb the epidemic was only in its first weeks of use, with...
A Financial Disaster Hits HIV Agencies in January. Why Won’t Anyone Stop It?
A financial crisis that will curtail hundreds of millions of dollars to HIV clinics and the community-based organizations that run them is coming on January 1, 2022. It’s only weeks away. Meanwhile, our national advocacy groups are essentially frozen into...
COVID has Surpassed AIDS in U.S. Deaths. How Should HIV Activists Respond?
In less than two years, the COVID-19 pandemic has killed more Americans than have died from HIV/AIDS since the AIDS epidemic emerged 40 years ago. Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) indicate that more than 700,00 Americans have been lost to...
Review: Peter Staley’s Memoir “Never Silent” is a Real Life Thriller
Activist Peter Staley's much-anticipated new memoir, Never Silent, opens with almost unbearable nail-biting suspense, sweeping us into the behind-the-scenes machinations of an ACT UP takeover of the New York Stock Exchange at opening bell. It's legitimately dangerous,...
Probing My Aging Penis
File this under “things they don’t tell men about getting old.” If you qualify, this might help you. I am a long term HIV survivor at the magnificent age of 60 years old. They don’t tell guys that if you live long enough some clinician is going to slide a tube down...
A Day with HIV: Fire Up Those Camera Phones This Wednesday!
One of the sunnier, and always inspiring, HIV anti-stigma campaigns in our communmity will hit social media this Wednesday, September 22, when A Day with HIV takes place, and you’re invited. People living with HIV (and our wonderful allies) are invited to snap a photo...
Jessica Chastain is Starstruck by Gay AIDS Survivor
When Rev. Steve Pieters attended the red carpet premiere of the upcoming film, The Eyes of Tammy Faye, he never imagined he was about to meet his biggest fan -- the film’s star, Jessica Chastain. In 1985, Pieters appeared on televangalist Tammy Faye Bakker’s...
Dentist David Acer: the Murderous AIDS Monster Who Never Was
You probably don’t know his name, but you might have heard the name of his most famous “victim.” In 1990, dentist David J. Acer was accused by his patient, Kimberly Bergalis, of infecting her with HIV. It was the start of an onslaught of accusations from Acer’s...
‘Swan Song’ is an Emotional Gay Trip to Bountiful
“Where will we dance?” The elderly gay man asks the young queer bartender the question with all sincereity, confused about where gay men will be able to congregate, much less dance, once the small town’s last remaining gay dance club is closed. The criminally young...
For a Second Year, COVID Reduces USCHA to a Virtual Event
Ultimately, the organizers of the United States Conference on HIV/AIDS (USCHA) ran out of viable options for hosting the largest annual HIV conference in the country as an in-person event. For weeks, as the delta variant of COVID surged and the prospects for...
Not having as much sex? You’re not alone.
My sex life in the 1980s before AIDS came along was glorious. My endurance level was Olympian, my sexual response time was faster than a wink from a cute man, and body fluids went flying like they were shot from cannons. Today, I am 60 years old. It’s easy to wonder...
A Complete History of HIV/AIDS Will Depend on You
And when you’re gone, who remembers your name? Who keeps your flame? Who tells your story? Who tells your story? Who tells your story? — From the musical Hamilton In March of 1985, I stood in the kitchen of my West Hollywood condo. The phone was attached to the...
He Wrote That First AIDS Report in 1981. He Has a Lot More to Say.
Michael Gottlieb, MD (photo: Elizabeth Nathane) This June 5, 2021 marks 40 years since the famous report in a CDC publication, the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR), in which Dr. Michael Gottlieb outlined the troublesome cases of five gay men dealing with...
When Our Masks are Removed, What Will Be Revealed?
Last night I sat with my husband and a member of our pod (is there a more 2020 expression than that?) as we watched a perfectly sweet and entertaining movie that gets pretty sad at the end, and throughout its last twenty minutes I cried like my mother had just died. I...
Sir Elton John and Olly Alexander Absolutely Crush “Its a Sin”
Sir Elton John has always shown great generosity towards younger artists, especially those with whom he shares a sense of theatrical DNA. At the Brit Awards last night, the legendary performer and lifelong HIV/AIDS activist proved his taste for talent is still...
The Gay Men of “Jerker” Escape AIDS Through the Phone Line
(Readers: Please join me when I host a virtual screening of this play on April 28th, including a talk-back with the cast and crew. Details below.) When the monumentally important play Jerker begins screening online as the latest virtual offering of Out Front Theatre,...
HIV Genetic Data is Tracked and Shared. It’s Creepy and Dangerous.
If you are a person living with HIV, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and your local health department probably already have your HIV genetic profile. They have been examining it and comparing it to a genetic analysis of other people. People in...
The Politics and Pitfalls of HIV Community Language
Two broadcasts this week took a look at the words we use as people living with HIV - and the words others use to describe us. Those words can be hurtful or weaponized, even among ourselves. As a participant in both conversations, the question boils down to, “how...
What Black Women in the HIV Arena Do You Honor?
The Black women that have shaped and inspired my HIV activism -- and my personal growth -- weren’t present in my life before my HIV diagnosis in 1985. I’m trying hard to even place a significant Black woman in my (very caucasian) upbringing and early college years,...
Watch the Most Blissfully Bonkers HIV PSA Ever Made
If there was any question that Charles Sanchez is the Mad Hatter of the HIV community, his latest project should remove all doubt. “The More You Can Ho,” a completely looney set of new HIV public service announcements, is the brainchild of Sanchez and his SkippingBoyz...
Rush Limbaugh Mocked AIDS Deaths. These HIV Activists Outlived Him.
Rush Limbaugh once mocked AIDS deaths by playing disco music while gleefully reporting who died. Now that Limbaugh himself is dead, here is my first (and last) episode of "Rush Limbaugh is Dead," in which I name just a few of the HIV activists who have outlived him....
REVIEW: “It’s a Sin” Really Wants Somebody to Blame
The promise of a new, ambitious television series about “what happened” to gay men in the 1980s is tremendously exciting for long-term HIV/AIDS survivors like myself, starved as we are for representation in the media and for another chronicle of our history to be...
Why Mario Cooper is the Greatest HIV/AIDS Figure You’ve Never Heard Of
The Counter Narrative Project (CNP) continued their boundary-busting content creation by hosting a recent virtual event honoring the legacy of Mario Cooper. Cooper, who died in 2015, has been described as the "Nexus Between AIDS Activists and Black Leaders." Mario...
Should People Living with HIV Qualify for Early COVID Vaccination?
Karl Schmid, the plucky television broadcaster who revealed he is living with HIV in 2018, has been putting his notoriety and adorable Auusie accent to excellent use since his courageous announcement. Schmid has created Plus Life, a series of social media posts and...
He Planned a Bug Chaser Party as an HIV Fundraiser. Really.
Have you heard the one about the gay porn dude who tried to produce a Palm Springs event for this October that he called the “POZ Pride Fest” to raise money for HIV groups and it would include a “Chaser’s JAMboree!” sex party where HIV negative guys could meet their...
For This Black Woman Living with HIV, Grief Creates Power
Deirdre Johnson’s poem of grief and empowerment, below, begins a series of guest posts on My Fabulous Disease from Black women living with HIV. It’s my salute to Positive Women’s Network USA’s (PWN) upcoming “Celebrate and Honor Black Women in the HIV Movement Day” on...
The Viking Terrorist Deserves Ridicule. Not Sexualization.
Humor is subjective, and born out of our desire to process complex emotions. “Comedy is my only weapon,” Mel Brooks once said, a man who has made a comedy industry out of destroying Hitler with sight gags. And then here comes Jake Angeli, the domestic terrorist who...
I Can’t Take Down My Holiday Decorations Fast Enough
Who knew I had this final burst of energy, so wearying have the months been. But there I stood, running on one cup of coffee and without a bite of breakfast, tearing ornaments from the tree and dropping them inartfully into their tupperware tombs. Some were actually...
The My Fabulous Disease Holiday Spectacular!
(I can't resist posting this each Holiday Season. The video below is my very favorite, of the more than 70 I have produced over the years. Enjoy!) My mother's home here in Shreveport, Louisiana, was fraught with excitement last week. Christmas decorations littered the...
Watch the Inspiring and Hilarious ‘Birthday Bash’ for HIV/AIDS Survivors
The reviews (and donations) are in, and “Mark S. King’s 60th Birthday Bash” was one for the ages. Or the aged, if you enjoyed the many jokes at my expense about hitting the Big 6-0. Best of all, the event raised $20,616.00 (so far) for its beneficiary, The Reunion...
Sir Elton John and David Furnish Join Line-up Saluting HIV/AIDS Survivors
Sir Elton John and David Furnish have sent a special video message of support for long-term HIV/AIDS survivors, joining a growing list of celebrity guests for "Mark S. King’s 60th Birthday Bash" on December 16th. The event will also feature appearances by Olympian...
Once, When We Were Heroes
My brother Richard smiles a lot. He has an easy laugh. But there was a time, years ago, when he held a poisonous drink in his hands and begged his dying lover not to swallow it. A time when Richard held the concoction they had prepared together and wept. Emil couldn't...
Join my 60th Birthday Bash to Celebrate Long-Term HIV/AIDS Survivors!
Well, it had to happen, sooner or later, if my luck held out. This December, I’m turning 60 freaking years old. And what better way to celebrate during these insulated times than to throw a virtual party to celebrate all long-term survivors who are hitting major life...
Timothy Ray Brown, First Person Cured of HIV, Has Died of Cancer
Timothy Ray Brown, the first person to be cured of HIV, died today, Tuesday, September 29, 2020. He delivered messages of hope for the HIV community through social media and interviews until nearly the end of his life. The passing was announced on his Facebook page by...
Peter Staley Just Unmasked Anthony Fauci and It Is Fabulous
You know this will be an unusual interview, even for Instagram, when the host brings an enormous glass of wine to his lips and toasts his guest. “Let’s get into it,” Peter Staley says, and in the other chat box, Dr. Anthony Fauci laughs. The smile on the face...
As Timothy Ray Brown Faces Death, a Great Love Endures
Tim Hoeffgen did a quick google search of his Scruff date as he headed over to meet him. Tim was living in Nevada in early 2013, and the guy he had been chatting with on the dating app looked a lot like the man who was on the cover of the LGBTQ newspaper in Las Vegas...
Mark Addison Smith Creates Art from Eavesdropping
New York City artist Mark Addison Smith respects your privacy, he really does. He just can’t help himself. If he overhears you say something fascinating, he might need to turn your words into art. Every single day since November of 2008, because of a promise Mark made...
GMHC Founder Larry Mass on the ‘Unwritten Chapter’ of AIDS History
There are few nights more consequential in the history of gay men than the evening a group of gay men gathered at the home of Larry Kramer more than 35 years ago and began the business of creating the Gay Men’s Health Crisis (now known simply as GMHC). One of the men...
Don’t Worry, Thom Brennaman. We Know Exactly Who You Are.
It has been ages since I have heard someone say the word “fag.” God knows the word is regularly weaponized on playgrounds and hurled from passing cars. I suppose that members of Westboro Baptist Church still carry around signs that say “GOD HATES FAGS.” It’s been nice...
One Night with the Gay Man Who Slept with Thousands
(This essay appears in my collection of essays, My Fabulous Disease: Chronicles of a Gay Survivor, available now at online outlets or your local bookstore.) The ceiling fan isn’t twirling fast enough to cool our bodies, not after the cardio workout we just had. My...
‘My Fabulous Disease’ Wins GLAAD Award for Outstanding Blog
The 2020 GLAAD Award for Outstanding Blog has been awarded to My Fabulous Disease. The GLAAD Awards were established in 1990 to recognize “outstanding representations of the LGBTQ community in media.” Long-term HIV survivor and activist Mark S. King produces all...
Gay Brothers Grieve an AIDS Death in 1989… with a Funny Video
My brother Richard will tell you stories about his long-time partner, Emil Matzner, with great enthusiasm. Emil’s endearing quirks, their adventures as a couple, things like that. Richard might even provide details about Emil’s death from AIDS thirty years ago, but...
The Scorching Words of Ravyn Wngz are an Activism Manifesto
Ravyn Wngz, a Toronto Black Lives Matter (BLM) activist, never had to raise her voice on Sunday, when she delivered a scathing rebuke of systemic racism and privilege. Her beautiful words pierced the heart just the same. The words say everything anyone needs to hear...
‘Welcome to Chechnya’ is Traumatizing. Now Go Watch It.
Welcome to Chechnya, the unnerving new documentary by filmmaker David France, stopped playing in my living room a full hour ago and I’m still trying to shake it. That may take some time, considering the events of the film -- the kidnapping, torture, and disappearance...
This Anti-Trump Music Video is a Gay Disco Freakout
When POZ Magazine began work producing their online series, “POZ at Home,” editor Oriol Gutierrez came to me with a question. Would I like to come up with something, together with my friend and performer Charles Sanchez, that could be an entertaining coda to their...
When Facing the COVID-19 Rampage, Blame the Fire Island Gays
The judgment of the social media gods, decreed Monday morning, was withering and furious: the buff gay men on the Fire Island beach over the holiday weekend were nothing less than suicide bombers. Virtuous gays everywhere watched the video posts of these gurls gone...
Mark S. King Named the 2020 ‘LGBTQ Journalist of the Year’
“I’m just a guy with HIV and a keyboard,” I often say. It’s meant as a pithy remark, sure, but it also feels like I’m somehow diminishing my power, and I won’t do that right now. Today, the National Lesbian and Gay Journalist Association (NLGJA) announced the winners...
Film: Can a ‘Gay Leftie with AIDS’ Get Elected Mayor of a Rural Town?
Milford, Pennsylvania, is the kind of idyllic small town that Frank Capra romanticized in films like It’s a Wonderful Life. Nothing much rattles the citizens of this quiet country borough. They pay their taxes, vote conservatively, and don’t consider someone a native...
‘All Boys Aren’t Blue’ is the Audacious Memoir of a Black Queer Man
George M. Johnson could not have known about this moment in history when he wrote his memoir, All Boys Aren’t Blue, but for this white male reader, the sounds of courageous protestors in our streets were never far away. Johnson provides us an intimate, deceptively...
Shopping for Socks at the Mall with Larry Kramer
(This is a work of fan fiction, and Mr. Kramer loved it. See postscript below.) The mall was abuzz, with people darting in and out of stores, wrangling their kids and chatting on cell phones. I preferred it that way, because it kept Larry in a fairly calm state of...
My Message for White HIV Long Term Survivors
There's isn't any way to discuss HIV Long Term Survivor Awareness Day (#HLTSAD) this year (Friday, June 5) without discussing racial disparities. For that matter, we should "lead with race," as NMAC's slogan goes, from this moment forward. I'm going to try better in...
I Am Racist, and That’s a Good Place to Start
There is a fact I have always wanted to argue. I thought I was different from those other white men. If you just had let me explain, just let me tell you about me, me, me, then you would surely see the real truth for yourself, proven by my decades as an HIV/AIDS and...
A Message for HIV Vaccine Advocacy Day
To commemorate HIV Vaccine Advocacy Day in Nigeria on Monday, May 18, I recorded a brief video as part of an awareness project for the New Vaccine and Microbicide Advocacy Society. My message was simple. Vaccines take time, factual science, and patience. I will never...
Drag Philosopher Anita Mann Sings of Rainbows and Recovery
When a group of entertainers were creating an online fundraiser for the Triangle Club, a Washington, DC, facility providing meeting space for LGBTQ people in recovery from alcohol and drug addiction, I knew it was time for Anita Mann to emerge from the duffel bag in...
The ‘Plandemic’ Video Fooled People. Deborah Birx is Still Trying.
Hucksters and charlatans know their cue: their traveling salvation shows typically arrive when we are at the nexus of public panic and willful ignorance. It should have come as no surprise, then, to find Dr. Judy Mikovitz' dusty wagon come creaking into sight this...
Circus of Books: Among the Gay Porn, a Mother’s Beating Heart
Circus of Books, the Netflix documentary premiering Wednesday, begins with old home video footage of a large and boisterous family during domestic mealtime chaos. Children are tugging sleeves for attention while parents shoo away the camera. It is a fitting opening...
I Am Freaked Out and I Want My Mom
The first time it happened, a couple of weeks ago, I was waking up from a nap. My eyes were moist. The dream began to fade but the emotion lingered, and so did the central image. Mom was standing in the kitchen, looking at me fondly, saying something reassuring. It...
HIV Activist Performs Flawless, Unhinged Lip Sync While Driving
I really needed to get out of the house and escape COVID isolation, it’s as simple as that. So, I took a little drive around the neighborhood to give my car a spin. It’s been parked for more than a week. Do you know the Toni Tennille albums, recorded post-Captain? She...
Nursing Student Faces COVID-19 at Work and Fears at Home
There are trials by fire, and then there are trials by wildfire. Nursing student Brian Thomas never imagined his on-the-job education would transform into fighting on the very front lines of the COVID-19 pandemic, or that he would be forced to take extreme safety...
The Very Best of Humanity is Coming. So is the Worst.
The flyer was in my mailbox, folded and placed by an unknown neighbor. “NEED CORONAVIRUS HELP?” it read, explaining a local “Self-Quarantine Response Team” was here to support those “with compromised immune systems, those in quarantine – or even those who must work or...
Stop Comparing Coronavirus to Early HIV/AIDS. Just Stop.
People ask me if our lives today feel like the early years of HIV/AIDS, and I want to scream. There is no comparison. Just stop. No one cared about people dying of AIDS in the early years of the pandemic. The stock market didn’t budge. The President didn’t hold news...
This Sex Worker Survived Hell to Teach Us Forgiveness
Somewhere well into Every Grain of Sand, the mesmerizingly sad and ultimately transformative new memoir by recovering addict and sex worker David P. Wichman, the reader might wonder just how much more they can take. There are harrowing accounts of childhood abuse, of...
My ‘Trump Trauma’ is Real. And I am Not Alone.
(This essay appeared in the Jan/Feb 2020 issue of POZ Magazine. It plays off the fact that it was written in advance of publication, in late 2019, and how fast-paced the downfall of our democracy news cycle can be. One thing is certain: my Trump Trauma remains, and I...
NMAC Changes Conference Name from ‘AIDS’ to ‘HIV.’ So What?
First things first. I don’t believe the national HIV agency, NMAC, acted thoughtlessly toward people living with AIDS – only one of the accusations leveled against them -- when NMAC decided to change the name of their annual conference from “the United States...
The Uproarious Launch of ‘Merce 2’ in Photos
Something struck me, maybe halfway through the uproarious screening of the new, second season of the musical comedy web series, Merce. I surveyed the packed room at the LGBT Center in New York City, the audience laughing, clapping, cheering on the characters and...
My Fabulous Disease Nabs 5th GLAAD Award Nomination
Well, I’m nothing if not consistent. My Fabulous Disease has received its fifth GLAAD Award nomination in the category of “Outstanding Blog,” becoming the first blog to receive a nomination for the last five years the prize has been bestowed. It has never won the...
The HIV ‘Bug Chaser’ Who Changed His Mind
The gay men online who get off on seeking HIV infection (“bug chasers”) aren’t exactly known for their thoughtful introspection. After all, they are eroticizing something that works exactly once -- and has life-long consequences. So, a tweet posted a few weeks ago...
How Dare Leo Herrera Pretend AIDS Never Existed?
What would the lives of gay men be like today if AIDS never happened? Filmmaker Leo Herrera’s answer to that question is a genre-busting web series Fathers. A dreamlike mix of actual historical information and clever wish-fulfilment -- with plenty of sex for good...
The Fabulously Bonkers HIV Musical ‘Merce’ is Returning. Brace Yourselves.
Charles Sanchez has audacity, you have to give him that. Not only did he create a web series, Merce, drawn from his own life as a gay New Yorker living with HIV, he made it a musical comedy, people. With original music and a cast of lively singers and dancers. Oh, and...
Today is ‘International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers’
Today is International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers. A great way to show support is to encourage members of Congress to co-sponsor and support the Safe Sex Workers Study Act, introduced by Reps. Ro Khanna and Barbara Lee and Senators Elizabeth Warren and...
The Italians Honored World AIDS Day with Heart, Music, and Activism
What a distinct pleasure to be in the company of spirited Italians for the week of World AIDS Day in early December. I was honored to be the guest of Plus Onlus, their national coalition of gay men living with HIV and their allies, and on Saturday, November 30th, they...
Positive Women’s Network USA Honors ‘Trans Day of Remembrance’
The Positive Women’s Network (USA) has always stood up for gender expression and equality, and that is especially true of their unyielding support of trans women, a population heavily impacted by HIV/AIDS. Today, for Trans Day of Remembrance, PWN has released a...
Sex Worker Jacen Zhu on Meth, HIV, and Racism in Gay Porn
The fact that sex worker Jacen Zhu is a fiercely intelligent and community-minded young man shouldn’t really come as a surprise, despite our habit of keeping porn stars in their porny boxes. The advent of online opportunities like "Just for Fans" pages on Twitter,...
Solving the Mystery of the Queer Angel
When the photo appeared on social media only hours after the Atlanta AIDS Walk last week, it produced gasps and tears. There, standing pensively among the panels of the NAMES Project Quilt display, is a gloriously dressed man in white platforms heels. An enormous...
Bodybuilder Raif Derrazi Talks HIV Stigma. With His Shirt Off.
“I’m sorry to objectify you,” I said sheepishly to bodybuilder Raif Derrazi. For our videotaped interview, Raif was naked down to the nether regions of his sculpted abs, at my request. “Not at all!” Raif happily responded. “There’s a time and place for everything, and...
AIDS United Signals Change Following Gilead Controversy
AIDS United, the national HIV/AIDS policy, lobbying, and funding consortium of organizational leaders, has issued an apology and promised to review their policies and procedures after the posting of my (can I say bombshell? Humble bloggers never get to use that word,...
This ‘Gay Bar’ Cartoonist Devoted a Strip to HIV/AIDS History
Local Gay Bar is a super cute comic strip drawn by an artist known as Adam. The strip is usually filled with colorful go-go boys, handsome bartenders and the kind of bulges we usually only find in the work of a generous illustrator. I was surprised, then, that the...
Gilead Duped Me into Being Their Mouthpiece. Here’s How.
This is the story of the insidious influence of Big Pharma on our HIV/AIDS leadership and policy-making, and how an experienced activist like me was tricked into delivering messages for the HIV pharma giant Gilead Sciences. I was bamboozled because I didn’t do my...
BBC NEWS: Mark S. King on Gareth Thomas, HIV Stigma, and U=U
Okay, I will admit I had no idea who Gareth Thomas was, beyond hearing on Saturday that a major rugby star in the United Kingdom had disclosed his HIV status. But anyone living with HIV could relate to the heart-breaking video he released announcing he is HIV...
USCA Photos from Advocates in the Room Where It Happened
A choral performance during Plenary II of the USCA. (Photo: Luke Hammerman) A picture, and sometimes a video clip, can tell a thousand words. Sometimes they shout those words, or even sing them to you. In these amazing pictures and video clips from the 2019 United...
Watch Jade Elektra sing “Undetectable” at the U.S. Conference on AIDS
Toronto drag personality Jade Elektra captivated the Saturday plenary of the United States Conference on AIDS (USCA) with her live rendition of “Undetectable,” part of a program devoted entirely to the “Undetectable Equals Untransmittable” (U=U) movement. Jade Elektra...
Activists Halt U.S. Conference on AIDS to Protest CDC
Dr. Robert Redfield, the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) surely saw it coming. Protests are part of the DNA of the United States Conference on AIDS (USCA), and conference organizers have never shied from welcoming dissent from...
Barebacking is Dead. Long Live Barebacking!
Leave it to science and rational thinking to ruin a popular sexual taboo. The “bareback” label for sex without a condom has faded in the age of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) and U=U. People not living with HIV who are taking PrEP are protecting themselves from...
Four Podcasts on Gay Men, Meth, and Sex
Crystal meth addiction remains at epidemic levels. If you would like to learn more about the grip of the drug, and how it fuses with the sex lives of gay men, there are four new podcasts below that should enlighten you. The first three episodes come from a Canadian...
A Sexy Australian Show Untangles the ‘Descovy for PrEP’ Confusion
There is a lot to unpack about this week’s FDA Advisory Panel hearing on Gilead’s new cash cow option for pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), Descovy. I want to point you to the coverage that best suits you, including terrific reporting from an Australian radio show (!)...
ACT UP Had a Diversity Problem. Should ‘Pose’ Correct it?
To say that Pose is an unlikely hit is an understatement. It’s a goddamn miracle, and while we’re at it, Pose is also a gift to LGBTQ history, to the visibility of marginalized people, and to HIV awareness in the here and now. It challenged me, then, when the most...
HIV Groups Bash HIV Separation as Border Policy Gets Walked Back
A coalition of HIV activists have released a statement that tears into the recent testimony of Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) Chief Brian Hastings, while the policy he outlined to separate parents with HIV from their families is being walked back – but not, as of...
The U.S. Border Patrol is Separating People with HIV from Their Family
(UPDATE 7/26/2019: Are you as horrified by this policy as I am? Please re-post and/or tweet this story using hashtags #nofamilyseparation #closethecamps and tag your elected official if you can. One thing this has made clear: immigration is an HIV issue. We...
We Need to Talk About the ‘Pose’ Hospital Episode Right Now
Pose on FX is nothing less than astounding to me. So much could have gone wrong, with the era, the themes, the characters, and – the aspect of the show closest to my heart and my critical eye -- the disease that looms over it all. Trans writers and advocates are...
Larry Kramer Gives Us One More Chance to Wake the F*ck Up
Our friend Larry Kramer, the godfather of the AIDS activism movement, hasn’t lost his edge. That should surprise no one. In his speech at the Queer Liberation March on Sunday, however, Larry was nearly wistful, reminiscing on his legacy and acknowledging his advanced...
Larry Bryant at DC Reunion Project: We Must Reinvigorate AIDS Fight
For many years, I have viewed activist Larry Bryant, Jr. as one of the most highly regarded voices of conscience in the HIV/AIDS movement, and among Black men in particular. At the recent Reunion Project event in Washington, DC, a day of education and community for...
A Drag Queen Sings ‘Undetectable’ at an AIDS Vigil and Melts the Internet
When Toronto drag queen Jade Elektra, aka HIV positive activist Alphonso King, Jr., stepped to the stage of the 2019 Toronto AIDS Vigil on Tuesday night, she knew she had a message. It wasn’t simply that she would become the first drag performer to sing live at the...
IML Winner Jack Thompson on Sex, HIV, and Facing Transphobia
Jack Thompson, who just won the 2019 International Mr. Leather (IML), is a lot. And he carries it well. Jack is biracial. He’s gay. He’s transgender. He’s extremely kinky, depending on what scale you use to measure such things. Jack is also utterly transparent about...
I Left My Hospital Bed to Make an HIV Event. What Self-Care?
Fainting is weird, especially the third time it happened during one weekend. By that time, I knew enough to grab a safe spot – the front steps of the house, I had been admiring the blooms in the courtyard – before the queasy rush that had suddenly consumed me would...
Behind-the-Scenes Photos from the House Hearing on PrEP
On Thursday, May 16, 2019, the House Oversight Committee conducted a hearing to try and get to the bottom of the Truvada pricing and patent scandal. They were not messing around. The title of the hearing was, “HIV Prevention Drug: Billions in Corporate Profits after...
Five Reasons the Gilead Giveaway is a Steaming Pile of Truvada
Gilead Sciences, the pharmaceutical that makes Truvada, the only FDA-approved drug for PrEP, is having a great week in the public relations department. First, Gilead announced they were surrendering their patent for Truvada a year early, and now Federal...
A New Book Applauds the Straight Women of HIV History (Finally, right?)
My first job in AIDS in the 1980s was at the Los Angeles Shanti Foundation, an organization that provided companions for the dying. When our founding director, Daniel P. Warner, retired from the organization, the final candidates for his job met with the full staff...
These Drag Queens are Anal About Their Health
I’m a Southerner, first and foremost. We love beauty pageants and drag queens. So, the new video series Anal About My Health is right up my (ahem) alley. Produced by MPACT (Global Men’s Health and Human Rights), the cheeky series is based on the actual life...
All Aboard the 2019 HIV Cruise Retreat!
This November, the HIV Cruise Retreat will celebrate its 15th Anniversary voyage with a cruise to the Caribbean from Ft Lauderdale. As the host and MC, I can’t wait to join them. Grab a floppy hat and some sunscreen and come along! For many in our happy group, the...
AIDS WATCH: ‘Strong Interest’ in Hearings on Truvada Patent Profits
Advocates pressuring the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to claim royalties from sales of ‘Truvada as PrEP’ report “strong interest” in congressional hearings on the growing controversy, based on visits to the Hill today between HIV advocates and...
AIDS WATCH: Why is the CDC Withholding Billions in PrEP Profits?
You are going to read this story and think it is too outrageous to be true. You would be wrong. And, especially if you are an HIV advocate attending AIDS Watch in Washington, DC, this week, you must demand that our elected officials answer for it. Here’s the...
Finding Redemption on the ‘Ride for the Feast’
Angie Kelley found her redemption on a bicycle, somewhere along the 140-mile route of Ride for the Feast, the annual fundraiser for Moveable Feast. The arduous trail transformed a young woman with a troubled past into something entirely new. A queer advocate. A...
Steve Pieters is the Very Model of a Medical Anomaly
(Note: Be sure to read my piece on Steve's connection to The Eyes of Tammy Faye, as well as my post about Jessica Chastain becoming starstruck by Steve on the red carpet.) Brace yourselves, Gilbert & Sullivan fans. The Rev. Steve Pieters has a treat for you. Steve...
A Farewell to Project Inform from HIV Research Advocate David Evans
(The HIV community was dealt a sad blow this week when it was announced that the iconic non-profit HIV treatment advocacy organization, Project Inform, will end its programs. Project Inform’s Director of Research Advocacy, David Evans, has been working with the...
A Teenage Girl Made a Film on Greg Louganis and HIV. He Loves it.
(UPDATE: On April 27, 2019, Ella Johnson's video proceeded to Nationals. She ranked first in the "Senior Individual Documentary" division.) When Ella Johnson made a video documentary about Greg Louganis for her National History Day project, she knew most of her fellow...
Treatment Action Group Statement on New HIV Remission Case
(This nuanced press release from Treatment Action Group addresses the "another person cured of AIDS" story far better that I ever could. -- Mark) New York, March 4, 2019 – Treatment Action Group (TAG) welcomes the report today of a possible long-term HIV remission...
A Medicare Change Could Keep Us from Life-Saving HIV Medications
(I DISAVOW THIS EDITORIAL ENTIRELY, DUE TO THE UNDUE INFLUENCE OF GILEAD PHARMACEUTICALS ON THE EDITORIAL PROCESS. YOU CAN READ MY STORY ABOUT THIS HERE. This Op-Ed appeared in The Washington Blade on February 22, 2019.) When I was diagnosed with HIV in 1985, there...
Trump’s Cynical HIV Plan, Led by Extremely White Men
Today is National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day, so let’s hear it for the Trump USA team behind his master race plan to end the HIV epidemic by 2030. I’ve even included an actual photo of their meeting on January 6th with a diverse group of stakeholders. Oh, wait....
A Review of the HIV/AIDS GLAAD Award Nominees
The GLAAD Media Award nominations are out, and for the fourth consecutive year My Fabulous Disease has been honored with a nomination in the category of Outstanding Blog. While the GLAAD Awards have risen in stature over the years (now comprised of two star-studded...
A Gay Addict and a Clinician Explain Meth Addiction and Recovery
Dr. David Fawcett and I have an oddly symbiotic relationship. David has specialized in drug and sex addiction for many years, and I was a drug addict for many years. We’ve become close friends and have managed to use both of our experiences to speak out on the...
The Armorettes Celebrate 40 Years and $2.3 Million
The Armorettes never intended to become the longest continually running drag troupe in the country, or even to be known as the comedy drag show that has raised more than $2.5 million for Atlanta HIV charities. They were formed in 1979 as a group of cheerleaders for...
HIV in the Black Community: Tell the Story Right
(For the first time, the words I am posting on My Fabulous Disease are not my own. This piece is from Craig Washington, whom I have known since our service at AID Atlanta 25 years ago. He continues to teach me about the lives and issues of Black gay men living...
The Global HIV Community is Getting a Divorce
The breaking point has been reached. After months of activism that has failed to convince the International AIDS Society (IAS) to withdraw their “AIDS2020” conference from San Francisco, activists have now announced an alternative conference, “HIV2020,” to be held in...
Ryan White Confab: Trump’s New HIV/AIDS Council is a Bad Joke
“A Trump appointee walks into an AIDS conference” sounds like the beginning of a terrible joke, doesn’t it? Just wait until you hear the punchline. It’ll kill you. The sight of the Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Alex Azar standing before more than 4,000...
Drag Taught Me What It Means to be a Man
The musty gym bag stays in my closet, ironically enough. Inside, a crumpled black wig fights for space with a sequined dress, heels, a string of fake pearls and a bag of make-up. After more than twenty years since performing with the Armorettes, this is all that...
Once, When We Were Heroes
My brother Richard smiles a lot. He has an easy laugh. But there was a time, years ago, when he held a poisonous drink in his hands and begged his dying lover not to swallow it. A time when Richard held the concoction they had prepared together and wept. Emil couldn't...
‘The Stigma Experience’ Made Me Relive My HIV Test. It Wrecked Me.
Remembering the moment in March of 1985 when I learned I was HIV positive is difficult. I speak and write about it often, but the actual emotions aren’t easy to access. I know it was horrific because my brain tells me it was, but putting myself back into the mind of...
A Short Film for World AIDS Day has Arrived. Watch It Right Now.
Stop what you’re doing. An exhilarating new short film produced especially for people living with HIV (PLHIV) is about to grab your heart and make you stand up and cheer. To commemorate World AIDS Day 2018, the Sero Project has released Sing Your Song, a short film...
What 5,000 Phone Sex Calls Taught Me about Gay Men
(In my day, all you needed was a way with words. Now, with video conferencing in the age of COVID, the "suspension of disbelief" in an audio phone session has been ruined. Let me take you back to a simpler time...) The number might be a little low. Over the course of...
The History of HIV/AIDS in One Astonishing Poem
The team behind the 20th Anniversary Community Summit, being held in Atlanta this weekend and sponsored by ViiV Healthcare, knew how to open the event today on exactly the right foot. The first words attendees heard were the poetry of Mary Bowman, delivered by the...
This Drag Queen Will Steal Your Heart. Then Completely Destroy It.
The Kinsey Sicks have been at this a long time. The acapella singing group of gay men in drag are celebrating 25 years of performing shows that are equal parts camp comedy and very of-the-moment political humor. Benjamin Schatz is an original member of the group,...
Thirty Years Later, AIDS Activists Who ‘Seized Control’ Discuss Their Legacy
The AIDS activists who regularly stormed the homes, offices and even churches of the powerful beginning in the late 1980’s weren’t the only ones who were scared for their lives. Frank Young served as FDA Commissioner during the massive “Seize Control of the FDA”...
Stop Bludgeoning Young Gay Men with Our AIDS Tragedy
(This essay appears in my collection of essays, My Fabulous Disease: Chronicles of a Gay Survivor, available now at online outlets or your local bookstore.) Lesley was my closest friend to become sick in the 1980's, and he fought bravely until his death from AIDS....
How HIV Activists Helped Create the Jeff Flake Elevator Moment
Very little happens by accident. The most iconic moments in HIV/AIDS activism – the appearance of the early SILENCE=DEATH meme, the footage of AIDS activist Peter Staley being peeled from a building during a protest, the photos of Sen. Jesse Helms’ home wrapped in an...
In Praise of Sam Elliott (and the Night He Showed Up for People with HIV)
A moment of reverence, please. In 1975, I went to the movies and discovered everything I needed to know about men, sexual allure, chest hair and the masculine ideal that would fuel my fantasies for the rest of my natural life. The film was Lifeguard and the star was...
AIDS2020 Will Welcome All the Right People to the USA. What a Travesty.
It is every bit as absurd as it sounds. The International AIDS Society (IAS) plans to hold their global AIDS2020 conference in San Francisco – an insanely expensive and privileged city located in a country that has become dangerously inhospitable to the very...
Five Takeaways from the 2018 United States Conference on AIDS
“What family doesn’t have its ups and downs?” -- Eleanor of Aquitaine, The Lion in Winter The 2018 United States Conference on AIDS (USCA), the HIV advocacy, education and networking behemoth produced by the National Minority AIDS Council (NMAC), is the benevolent and...
The Truth About the 7,000: Why Are People Still Dying of AIDS?
(This essay, which originally appeared in the April/May issue of Poz Magazine, ignited conversations about "unexpected" AIDS deaths among those in our circle of friends. It is also the basis for a workshop at the upcoming United States Conference on AIDS (USCA)...
AIDS2018: The Complete Video Collection from My Fabulous Disease
One of the great joys of my HIV/AIDS writing and video blogging over the years has been capturing the sights, sounds, and incredible people of the International AIDS Society’s (IAS) biannual conference. I’ve spent sleepless nights in hotel rooms everywhere from Vienna...
My Fabulous Disease Will Report from AIDS2018 in Amsterdam
The International AIDS Conference will be held in Amsterdam on July 23-27, and My Fabulous Disease – that’s me! -- will once again be there to share daily video reports from the event. I have attended and provided video coverage for each of the bi-yearly conferences...
We Must Talk About Having Diarrhea. I’ll Go First.
I am the least likely person to be writing about diarrhea. Just typing the word is mortifying. I needed spell check just to get it right. It’s the double “r” that trips me up. My discomfort discussing anything butt-related is well documented (if you follow that link,...
Candidate Kevin Mack Includes Life with HIV in Maryland Campaign
The garden party fundraising event last month in Montgomery County, Maryland, had all the usual markers of a political candidate on the rise. Well-dressed children frolicked on the lawn of the stately home while guests helped themselves to finger foods and glasses of...
WATCH: Long Term Survivors of HIV/AIDS Speak Up About Their Legacy
“I have HIV antibodies older than you." -- Mark S. King, when having to contend with anyone under 35 years old Just in time for the annual HIV Long Term Survivors Awareness Day on June 5, The Reunion Project has released a new video in which people who have lived with...
Honoring My Older Gay Brother on ‘LGBT Elders Day’
It’s no surprise to me that the two causes I am most passionate about, HIV and addiction -- the two issues that drive my activism -- are both things that my older brother, Richard “Dick” King, cared about first. He showed me the way. May 16th marked the third annual...
REVIEW: Broadway’s ‘The Boys in the Band’ has Stars but No Wattage
Most of playwright Mart Crowley’s bitchy zingers hit their target in the first-ever Broadway production of his 1968 play, The Boys in the Band, that much should be noted. The starry cast, composed of nearly every prominent openly gay actor working today, made sure of...
Revered AIDS Doctor Gabriel Torres: Redemption after Meth Addiction
The article appeared in New York Magazine in 2008. I remember it quite distinctly. Titled “Another AIDS Casualty” and written by David France, the profile of once-famous New York AIDS physician Dr. Ramon “Gabriel” Torres was a heart-wrenching read. The story outlined...
Listen Now: Signorile and King Discuss ‘The Truth About the 7,000’
Mike Signorile has been sharing uncomfortable truths – or, at least, gay culture as he sees it – for a few decades now. I might know something about that. So, it was a pleasure to return to his radio show, now on Sirius XM Channel 127, to discuss my essay for POZ...
Name HIV Activists Fiercer Than the Positive Women’s Network. I’ll Wait.
You may have heard me sing the praises of The Positive Women’s Network – USA (PWN) before, but until now I haven’t had the opportunity to show you, up close and personal, why I believe they are the mightiest force of HIV advocacy in the country today. Now you can get...
I Wrote “The Truth About the 7,000.” Now What?
It began with a death and a lingering question. After a friend – an advocate who knew what to do to stay alive – died of an AIDS-related cause a few months ago, I was left wondering why. Together with other deaths in the news of people “unexpectedly” dying the same...
Broadway Sends Amazing Gift to Parkland Theater Students
As a longtime fan of the work of Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS (BC/EFA), the charity that has laser-focused their time and resources on the impact of HIV on New York’s theatrical community, I was incredibly moved by their recent outreach to the students of...
‘Versace’ Producer Corrects Offensive Remarks on HIV Stigma
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Hooray! HIV Stigma Is Over, Says Producer of Versace Series
Oh, to be a Hollywood producer. High-powered meetings and mimosas. Swimming pools. Movie stars. And as far as the eye can see, not a single person living with HIV experiencing stigma. That’s the candy-colored scenario presented by Brad Simpson, one of the executive...
Racquetball as an Exercise in Humility
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Why Are We Still Haunted by The Boys in the Band?
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amfAR Chair Kenneth Cole Must Be Replaced. Here’s Five Suggestions.
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The World AIDS Day Anthem We Really Need Has Just Arrived
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Antron Reshaud Olukayode Died of AIDS. We Must Say It.
This world lost a remarkable young man on November 12th, when Antron-Reshaud Olukayode, a 33-year-old HIV educator, writer, and performance artist from Atlanta died of AIDS. Antron lived with HIV for fifteen years. He died of AIDS. It is enormously important that we...
Punishing Disease: Turning People with HIV into Criminals
Sociologist Trevor Hoppe is a gay man with his finger on the pulse of gay sexual politics, a topic he has written about for years. He's also an over-achiever, defined as someone who is more productive than me. In his latest book, Punishing Disease, Hoppe tackles HIV...
‘BPM (Beats Per Minute)’ is the Sexiest Damn Film of 2017. Period.
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The Man Who Buried Them Remembers
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Did Dan Savage Just Throw People with HIV Under the Bus?
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This HIV Survivor Quit Smoking to Vape. Don’t Judge.
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That Time ‘Will & Grace’ Forgot HIV Exists. Again.
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Review: ‘The Death and Life of Marsha P. Johnson’ is Trans Film Noir
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‘After Louie’ Film Review: An AIDS Survivor, Barely Surviving
Sam Cooper, a shell-shocked gay veteran of the 1980’s, has invited Braeden, a much younger man, out for a hamburger after their sexual tryst. Braeden has been mindlessly chattering about his life and friends and how he negotiates casual sex outside his relationship....
DaddyBear Just Apologized to HIV+ Men. It Went Really Badly.
At some point you have to feel a little sorry for the bumbling app “DaddyBear." It’s the gay cruising app that promises to hook up “gay sugar daddies” with younger “bears” – but only if you’re HIV negative. After an avalanche of criticism and mocking stories about...
Watch: Right After Testing HIV Positive, She Found Her Voice at USCA
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Watch: USCA Plenary Halted by Trans Activists
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“As Much As I Can” Lifts Up Black Gay Men… and Blows Your Mind
As Much as I Can, the theatrical event playing at the historic Harlem Parish in New York City, May 8-24, 2018, isn’t content with merely showing you the lives of gay black men in a city plagued with high rates of HIV infection. Instead, this emotionally searing...
Comic Adam Sank Won’t Do HIV Jokes. OK, Maybe One.
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DaddyBear App Hooks Up Gay Men ‘Not Living with HIV’
The entire concept of the DaddyBear dating app – rich daddies are waiting by their iPhones to shower lonely bears with gifts and romance – is pathetic and hilarious. Their stated position on the HIV status of those daddies and bears, however, is frightening. In his...
Y’all Look! It’s the First Redneck HIV Prevention PSA!
The good people at Thrive Alabama has been working their butts off for years, covering twelve counties in northern Alabama with five free clinics and vans that travel country roads you would never find on your GPS just to fetch clients for appointments and get them...
My Best Advice for Those Who Test HIV Positive
This is a clever social media campaign: Healthline, an online health community, has asked people who have been living with HIV to create videos for those who have recently tested positive, known as "You've Got This." Think of it as "It Gets Better" for those with HIV....
After Uproar, UnitedHealthCare Reverses Truvada Prescription Policy
When it was revealed a few days ago that insurer UnitedHealthCare (UHC) had rejected a patient’s pre-authorization claim for the drug Truvada as PrEP due to “high risk homosexual behavior,” all hell broke loose. Advocates and organizations sprang into action with...
Insurer Denies Truvada Due to ‘High Risk Homosexual Behavior’
Discrimination against LGBT people is often once-removed, shielded under double-speak and fraudulent intentions. So, it’s refreshing, really, when a company comes right out and says in black and white that gay men aren’t worthy of the same protections as everyone...
The Terrifying Crystal Meth Story I Have Never Told
(This essay appears in my collection of essays, My Fabulous Disease: Chronicles of a Gay Survivor, available now at online outlets or your local bookstore.) When my guard is down, it comes to me. It flashes across my mind, an uninvited assault, sometimes when I am...
Revisiting The Most Influential Gay Porn Film Ever Made
(This essay appears in my collection of essays, My Fabulous Disease: Chronicles of a Gay Survivor, available now at online outlets or your local bookstore.) The annual Folsom Street Fair in San Francisco is noted for its unbridled embrace of every kinky star in our...
‘The Pox Lover’ and the Impact of Lesbians on HIV Activism
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‘Blood Disgust’ is Nothing New to People with HIV
It is coursing through our veins, sustaining life and fighting disease, and yet we fear it. The sight of a few drops can make an adult faint. A bucket of it in a movie is the very definition of horror. Even as Donald Trump contributes his perverted, sexist new layer...
Taboo Sex, Racism, and Gay Men: A Chat in Black and White
In thirty years of HIV work alongside black advocates, I have rarely written on the topic of race. It makes me uncomfortable, or perhaps I feel unequipped, unqualified. But it’s that very hesitancy, according to black gay academic Charles Stephens, that only...
New Chase Brexton CEO Seeks Trust as Staff Awaits Change
Patrick Mutch, the sunny and earnest new CEO of Chase Brexton Health Care in Baltimore, does not mind addressing the elephant in the room. In his first interview with My Fabulous Disease since being hired after a tumultuous year for the agency, he got right to the...
Finally! The Sexy Gay PrEP Video We’ve Been Waiting For.
Leo Forte, Chris Hanner, and Rock Evans in a scene from the video series "The PrEP Project." “PrEP is a prevention strategy that deals with sex, namely bareback sex,” says gay film student Chris Tipton-King, “and I got tired of people tip-toeing around that fact.” The...
Those Offended by #NoJusticeNoPride Should Learn LGBT History
No Justice No Pride protestors blocking the Capital Pride Parade. (Photo: Dylan Comstock) Hell hath no fury like a privileged white gay man who has waited too long for the next pride parade contingent to sashay by. When #NoJusticeNoPride blocked the DC Pride parade...
The True Love Story Behind Larry Kramer’s Novel ‘Faggots’
Larry Kramer, Kelsey Louie of GMHC, Mark S. King, and Larry's husband, David Webster. (Photo: Nathan Perkel) The new POZ Magazine feature article, “Finding Larry Kramer,” tells the behind-the-scenes story of how the iconic activist found his way back to GMHC nearly...
AIDS, Love and Desperation at the Louise Hay Ride
"The One You Need To Let Go Of The Most," by Jason Fritz & Matt Momchilov, based on images from the Louise Hay Ride. The hall, an auditorium in a West Hollywood park, was filled to overflowing. Hundreds of people, nearly all of them gay men, were crushed together...
The Enduring Legacy of Donna Summer for Gay Men
(May 17, 2017 will mark five years since the death of music icon Donna Summer. This is why her legacy still matters.) The music my friends liked when I was a teenager intimidated me. It was the head-banging rock of the early seventies, and it felt alien and...
A Second Chance at Death
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Sean McKenna: Life with AIDS Isn’t So Damn ‘Fabulous’
(Sean McKenna, as part of a portrait series by photographer David Meanix.) Last December I attended the most moving, transcendent World AIDS Day program I have witnessed in years. That’s not saying much, of course. These evenings are usually well-meaning but maudlin,...
Online Images of Murder and Chemical Attack are Snuff Porn
Amazing, really, that this needs to be said: stop posting images and video of the last moments of the lives of innocent people. This is snuff porn, and we’re contributing to it under the insane guise of “enlightenment” and “getting people to give a shit.” Such is life...
The Irony of Aging: The HIV/AIDS Seniors Conference
Thirty-two years ago this month, I received a phone call from a nurse at my doctor’s office telling me that I had tested HIV positive. We didn’t schedule a follow-up visit or begin a treatment plan, because there wasn’t a single medication approved for the virus,...
That Time 37 Years Ago I Won a Car on The Price is Right
When I was nineteen years old, I vacationed to Los Angeles and won a car on "The Price is Right." In the following years, if I really liked you and wanted to impress you -- or give you a small, wacky glimpse of my life -- then at some juncture I'd say "So hey, have...
What If I Told You the Project Inform Staff Was Hilarious?
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Bruce Richman is Totally Hot and Other HIV Activism Truths
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Examining Death, Including the One I Caused
Chris Glaser, author of The Final Deadline: What Death Has Taught Me About Life My memorial service will be fabulous, I can assure you of that. I first outlined it during the initial, deadly wave of AIDS in the 1980's, and have edited it here and there over the years,...
Fighting Trump: HIV Advocates to Watch in 2017
Donald J. Trump and the Republican-controlled congress are a threat to everything HIV advocates have been fighting for during the last thirty years, and that includes access to healthcare, HIV prevention programs like PrEP, and the dignity with which we treat those...
Activists Maintain Pressure After Chase Brexton CEO Resigns
Here's some news that might make our transition into the new year a little more satisfying. Richard Larison, the embattled chief executive officer of Chase Brexton, Baltimore’s largest provider of health care to the city’s most vulnerable communities, has resigned...
Adam Saleh: Exposing Racism for Fun and Profit
The video is dramatic and infuriating. A young Arab man is seen speaking frantically to the camera as he is being asked to leave a plane. In the video, he explains he was simply talking to his mother on his phone, and his use of Arabic upset other passengers so much...
Five Reasons ‘HIV Undetectable’ Must Equal ‘Untransmittable’
Image detail from AIDES France Révélation campaign about being undetectable. “We are not dirty, we are not a threat, and we are not disease vectors. In fact, we are the solution. People living with HIV who achieve viral suppression, who become undetectable, are...
New Short Film Unmasks Fear Behind HIV Criminalization
The making of the new short documentary, HIV Criminalization: Masking Fear and Discrimination, began in exactly the right place: with people living with HIV themselves, and their personal stories of being prosecuted because of their HIV status. Sean Strub, founder of...
The Compassionate Truce of Tim Murphy’s Novel ‘Christodora’
In the towering new novel Christodora, author Tim Murphy harnesses decades of personal and professional experience as an HIV journalist into a story that sweeps back and forth between the last several decades and beyond. It has the scope of great literature, but...
Sleeping with President Donald Trump
I am on my feet at the Thanksgiving table, and my fists are slamming into the linen napkins. Silverware is quaking, pottery is rattling. The force of a particularly hard blow to the tabletop sends a dinner roll catapulting from the bread basket. My screams are...
Video: Aboard the 2016 HIV Cruise Retreat
The spirit of the annual HIV Cruise Retreat can be summed up in one enlightening story. Matthew had some bad luck as he boarded the ship for our 8-day tour of the Caribbean. His luggage didn’t make it. He literally had his carry-on bag (which included his meds, thank...
My Gay Love for Monster Movies
My first boyhood crush was on a dead man. He was a zombie named Quentin Collins, with eyes that pierced my pubescent gay soul and sideburns the size of the Florida peninsula. He stalked across my TV screen on weekday afternoons at precisely 3:30, when the...
Revisiting My Sad and Trivial Night with Rock Hudson
(This essay appears in my collection of essays, My Fabulous Disease: Chronicles of a Gay Survivor, available now at online outlets or your local bookstore.) Over and over, footage of Rock Hudson standing next to Doris Day was playing on television, and he looked...
The CDC’s Gay Dance Video about HIV is Flat Out Fabulous
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My Attitude Adjustment About Sex, Gonorrhea, and Advocacy
Amidst the happy haze of good news about the efficacy of PrEP in preventing new HIV infections and the growing consensus that people living with HIV who are undetectable are not infectious, there is troubling news from the CDC in two new reports about the golden...
Pregnant Guest Kicked Out of ‘Charm Ball’ Over Protest Fears
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Catching Up with Chase Brexton’s ‘Fired Five’
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What It Feels Like for a Mom
(My mother passed away suddenly on January 13th. Her memorial, led by her six children, was moving and hilarious, which is exactly as she had hoped. I cannot properly describe how grateful I am for her willingness to be featured on my blog and to share her views.) I...
LEAKED: Five Point Internal Memo to Chase Brexton CEO!
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My Fabulous Disease Wins NLGJA ‘Best Blog’ Award
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The Human Toll of Chase Brexton’s Union-Busting Efforts
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When AIDS Activists Hijacked the Olympic Rings
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) is a very touchy organization, most especially when it comes to the Olympic rings. They guard their trademark jealously and litigiously, commonly suing anyone who dares to approximate the iconic rings for their own purposes....
AIDS2016: The Full Video Collection from My Fabulous Disease
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Follow My Blogs from AIDS2016 in Durban South Africa!
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Gay Collective: “The Virus Divides. It Doesn’t Have To.”
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My Muscles, My Disease: The Pitfalls of a Meth Addict
There is a folder, tucked within a folder, buried deep in my computer files. I shouldn't be looking at its contents, yet I can't bring myself to delete it altogether. It is labeled MARCUS, and inside the folder is my disease. During my years of crystal meth addiction...
My Response to Orlando in One Sublime Performance
I can’t watch the news anymore right now. I have it muted, but will admit to glancing in its direction every few minutes. On the screen there are police cars and flashing lights and footage of the injured and there is often someone in tears. It makes me wince with...
There’s More Room in a Broken Heart
So don’t mind if I fall apart There’s more room in a broken heart. -- Carly Simon, “Coming Around Again” When Will Armstrong emerges from heart surgery in just a few days, he will have weeks of hospitalization ahead. He will also have expensive new hardware in...
Reclaiming ‘Our Golden Years’ as People with HIV
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Surviving Life Itself: Reflections of a Longtime Survivor
The young woman sitting across from me on the bus is in her mid-20s. She turns to her companion and her voice grows serious. “I know someone who died,” she says in the hushed tone reserved for tales of mortality. Her friend looks up from his phone. “He was a good...
Checking Privilege at ‘HIV Is Not A Crime’ 2016
The issues of race, gender and privilege crackled through the recent HIV Is Not A Crime (II) conference like a live wire, throwing sparks at every turn. From the main stage to the hallways, attendees called out white classism, the utter failure of the criminal...
The Nearly Naked AIDS Advocate
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Into the Desert, After the Bomb
Daniel Cardone’s essential but relentlessly grim documentary about longtime AIDS survivors, Desert Migration, is fascinated with the bodies of the gay men it profiles. The film begins with lingering shots of each of the subjects as they begin their day. It follows...
The Comfort of Blaming Other People for New HIV Cases
The college student had real concern in his eyes when he asked me a question during a recent presentation at American University. “Isn’t it true,” he asked, “that the HIV epidemic continues because people who know they are positive keep infecting other people?” It is...
Mr Gay World Entry Gets Personal on PrEP and Testing Poz
When Sadiq Ali heard about a clinical trial for pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) happening in the United Kingdom in 2013, the athletic 26-year old hesitated. He worried about what starting PrEP might say to people about his sexual behavior. The stigma he associated...
The Sound of Stigma
Stigma is insidiously quiet. It is conjured in the mind, born of discomfort and fear, and then it is projected at “the other” among us. It judges them and isolates them. And it happens without a sound. Stigma lets us take comfort in seeing things in others about...
AHF Offers Loans to Louisiana Agencies They Are Suing!
In a bizarre press release issued by AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF), the $1 billion dollar agency has offered “no interest loans” to assist Baton Rouge HIV non-profits who are suffering financially as a result of being sued by AHF. Yes, their circular logic is...
Louisiana HIV Agencies Respond to ‘Shocking’ AHF Lawsuit
In a profoundly troubling lawsuit against the City of Baton Rouge and local HIV/AIDS non-profits, the AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) has forced federal funds to be withheld while AHF continues their litigious temper tantrum over not receiving a Ryan White Care Act...
Packing Up The Man Who Wasn’t There
When the health of my close friend Ron began to rapidly decline in 1987, he made the decision to leave Los Angeles to return home to rural New York to be near his family. “Just long enough to feel a little better,” he told me at the time. It was a common trajectory in...
The Challenging Web Series That Travels from ‘Unsure’ to ‘Positive’
In the gorgeous and sometimes maddening web series Unsure/Positive, we follow the life of a Boston gay man, Kieran, literally from the moment he gets his HIV positive test result. Kieran’s journey in the six-episode first season (available for only $3.99 on Vimeo)...
I Discovered My Brother Was Gay from The Advocate Magazine
It was 1975 and I was 14 years old, all gangly limbs and stubborn acne, and I was sitting in the passenger seat of a parked car. Splayed across my lap was the magazine, open to the page my companion had selected. I was staring at the photo with something like...
Feeling the Love for L.A.’s Dearly Departed Circus Disco
In a forsaken block of Santa Monica Boulevard, off the street and through an imposing industrial alley, a Hollywood disco opened in the late 1970s that made promises the other gay clubs were loathe to keep. The two-story face of a clown, with an enormous, yawning...
GLAAD Relents to Uproar, Will Honor Bloggers This Year
Chalk one up for the little guy. After community-based LGBT media and independent bloggers loudly and unanimously decried GLAAD’s decision to eliminate their “Outstanding Blog” award this year, the national media watchdog group released a statement last week...
I Watched Charlie Sheen on Dr. Oz So You Don’t Have To
Dr. Oz has a very strange verbal compulsion. He can't stop making lame metaphors. When taking an early morning jog with Charlie Sheen, in the first of their two-part interview for The Dr. Oz Show, the doctor sees metaphors everywhere. "You have to look down so you...
The Man Who Buried Them Remembers
When he conducted the funerals, Tom Bonderenko tells me, he always wore his priestly garments and white stole. Even when no one showed up for the graveside service. “It was important to show dignity and respect,” Tom says. He taps the coffee cup in his lap nervously....
16 HIV Advocates to Watch in 2016
They come from nearly every corner of the world. They are engaged in local communities and on the international scene. They include mothers, artists, a fugitive, a performer, and a drug smuggler. They are speaking out, acting up, and in some cases risking their...
Five Things I Learned Aboard the HIV Cruise Retreat
Each year, several hundred people living with HIV – primarily gay men, with a happy sprinkling of straight women and our supporters – embark on the HIV Cruise Retreat for a week of fun and frolic on the high seas. The event started with a group of HIV positive friends...
The My Fabulous Disease Holiday Spectacular!
(I can't resist posting this each Holiday Season. The video below is my very favorite, of the more than 70 I have produced over the years. Enjoy!) My mother's home here in Shreveport, Louisiana, was fraught with excitement last week. Christmas decorations littered the...
HIV+ Gay Men Have Their Say in “The Infection Monologues”
A variety of gay men spill their guts about their lives and HIV diagnosis. They are bracingly honest, sexually explicit, heartbreaking and hilarious. They are the men of The Infection Monologues, a theatrical event getting a 10th Anniversary staged reading at the...
The Charlie Sheen Moment You Probably Missed
The subtle moment came during the second segment of Matt Lauer’s explosive interview with actor Charlie Sheen. It impressed me so deeply I actually backed up my recording and watched it twice more. Sheen had already endured the first segment of his time with Lauer,...
Why I Wiped HIV Off My Face
Some years ago, I told someone that I was HIV positive before I agreed to his invitation for a date. “Yeah, I know,” he casually replied, and then he looked a little embarrassed, as if he shouldn’t have said it. It was too late, of course; I knew exactly what he...
Two Minutes of Advice for Those Testing HIV Positive
This is a clever social media campaign: Healthline, an online health community, has asked people who have been living with HIV to create videos for those who have recently tested positive, known as "You've Got This." Think of it as "It Gets Better" for those with HIV....
How Do We Solve a Problem Like Pintauro?
My discomfort began as I sat in front of my web cam, waiting to join Danny Pintauro in a segment on Huffington Post Live. Danny had recently announced on an Oprah special that he was living with HIV, which was big news for fans of “Who’s the Boss?” and those who loved...
Recovering from Meth, Rebuilding a Sex Life
For more than a decade I was an active crystal meth addict. They were the darkest years of my life. I suffered numerous relapses as I struggled to get clean, and my woeful journey back to crystal meth was always the same. First, small changes crept into my behavior;...
Catching Up with the First Miss America to Champion AIDS Awareness
When Miss Florida 1992, Leanza Cornett, competed for the crown of Miss America 1993, she didn’t just have gay hearts aflutter over our love for pageant competitions. We adored her because she proudly chose an AIDS awareness platform -- and she meant it down to her...
VIDEO: The 2015 United States Conference on AIDS
Not to get all southern gothic on you, but I depend upon the kindness of strangers. Especially when producing video blogs at conferences. “Excuse me, would you please just hold this camera and point it at me while I talk to these people?” I must have said that...
‘Small Town Rage’ Documents ACT UP in the Deep South
When Alana Oldham was only 17 years old, she found out the meaning of activism. A close friend had received an AIDS diagnosis and he wasn’t expected to live very long. Alana wanted to take action -- to make a difference and vent her grief and frustration -- but there...
The Wonderful, Stigma-Bashing ‘Wizards of Poz’
Any campaign that blends living with HIV with a sense of empowerment and joy always grabs my attention. Stigma remains one of the most damaging forces in our struggle to both combat new infections and support those of us with the virus. Australian Nic Holas 33,...
The Relentless Affections of Amy Ferris
“We ask ourselves, ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?’ Actually, who are you not to be?” -- Marianne Williamson The first time I met Amy Ferris, several years ago, she cupped my jawline in her hands and gave me a kiss full on the lips. There...
Five Reasons to Take the HIV Test Right Now
Sometimes it's helpful to get back to basics, and there is no more basic, effective tool to fight the HIV epidemic than to encourage testing. How long has it been for you, my friend? Here are five important facts about HIV testing that I hope will convince you to get...
Five Activists Give the Ten Worst Offenses of AHF’s Michael Weinstein
(I was proud to join four fellow activists contributing to this story, which originally appeared on the site HIV Equal. If you have ever wondered what all the fuss is about -- or think the conflicts activists have with AIDS Healthcare Foundation are just industry...
The Visual AIDS Web Gallery “Proud to be Positive”
June is Pride Month in the LGBT community, and I was honored to be asked by Visual AIDS to curate a "web gallery" on the topic. Immediately, I considered a question that I had once posed to readers of my blog. If living with HIV is nothing to be ashamed of, is it...
The Odds of Love
This post will never be as romantic as I would like it to be. And it could never be as romantic as the truth. On the evening of July 22, 2012, Michael Mitchell went to a mixer at Cobalt, a gay club in Washington, DC. The international AIDS conference was being held in...
What It Feels Like for a Mom
"A boy's best friend is his mother." -- Norman Bates, Psycho I was standing at the ticket counter of the movie theater and couldn't believe my ears. They were telling me that Theater of Blood, with the great Vincent Price, was rated "R" and they were not letting me in...
AHF Reinstates Advocacy Funding and They Totally Mean It This Time
AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) has quietly reinstated funding to a Louisiana AIDS advocacy event, two weeks after pulling their support because one of the event organizers is involved in a whistleblower lawsuit against AHF. But AHF is really, totally committed to...
IT’S NOT OVER: Signorile Rejects “Victory Blindness”
On October 1, 1991, I joined furious LGBT protestors who took to the streets of West Hollywood, California. The newly elected Governor Pete Wilson, who had met with advocates during his campaign and assured them he would support AB101, a state-wide LGBT...
Spilling My Guts at the ACT UP NYC Long-Term Survivors Forum
ACT UP has always intimidated me. In the 1980’s, while working at LA Shanti to provide emotional support to those dying of AIDS, I doubted my activist cred while watching the dramatic, inspiring actions of ACT UP. Everyone has a role to play, of course, but I so...
Did AIDS Healthcare Foundation Just Retaliate Against Whistleblower?
The AIDS Healthcare Foundation scandal has taken a downright creepy turn. Only one day after a stunning whistleblower lawsuit against AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) was made public, the embattled organization withdrew funding from an upcoming HIV advocacy event...
The Angry Fallout from the AIDS Healthcare Foundation Scandal
Michael Weinstein, the polarizing and famously litigious head of AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) just got a taste of his own medicine when a stunning Whistleblower lawsuit against AHF filed last year was unsealed and made public. The 34-page suit, brought by three...
The Video Series: The Real Poz Guys of Atlanta
Why Andy Cohen isn’t badgering me with phone calls to bring this series to Bravo, I’ll never know. At any rate, you will find all three videos of the series below. During the first year of producing my blog videos back in early 2009, it occurred to me how much of my...
The Night Miss America Met the Biggest Star in the World
It wasn’t easy keeping my composure when I interviewed for my first job for an AIDS agency in 1987. Sitting across from me was Daniel P. Warner, the founder of the first AIDS organization in Los Angeles, LA Shanti. Daniel was achingly beautiful. He had brown eyes as...
The First Man Cured of HIV to Join the HIV Cruise Retreat
The annual HIV Cruise Retreat will set sail this November 8-15 aboard the Ruby Princess, departing Los Angeles and cruising the Mexican Riviera cities of Mazatlan, Puerto Vallarta and Cabo San Lucas. This year, though, there will be a somewhat ironic special guest on...
Probing My Anal Phobia
My fear of all things anal began when I was an early teen. My older brother David took great delight in bursting into our bathroom to startle me, especially if I was on the john. And, since I was a pubescent redhead, his sudden visits included a lot of laughing and...
Our Transgender Teachable Moment
The lobby of the Melbourne convention center at the international AIDS conference last July was packed with scientists, community educators, and activists. I was busy wrangling interviews for my daily video blogs. Across the room I spotted JoAnne Keatley and Laxmi...
Sean Strub and the Legacy of AIDS
Before my interview with activist Sean Strub, author of Body Counts: A Memoir of Politics, Sex, AIDS, and Survival, let me share a revealing story. It was late 2011 and my life was in shambles. The breakup of a long term relationship had sent me into a spiral,...
About That GLAAD Media Award Nomination
For twenty-five years I have been writing about living openly as a gay man living with HIV. Along the way I have spilled secrets, opened up about sex and relationships, highlighted the work of those who inspire me, come clean about my history of addiction and...
My Gonorrhea Nostalgia
One of the times I contracted gonorrhea, which in my day was affectionately called The Clap, I was 20 years old and had just moved to West Hollywood, California. It was 1981, disco was still thumping in the bars, and the bath houses were packed. My dance card...
15 HIV Advocates to Watch in 2015
They come from different cultures and regions of the world, but these fifteen HIV activists all share one important trait: a fierce devotion to HIV issues and a commitment to leave their mark on 2015. Their advocacy has been noticed by some of the most prominent...
The My Fabulous Disease Holiday Spectacular!
(I can't resist posting this each Holiday Season. The video below is my very favorite, of the more than 60 I have produced over the years. Enjoy!) My mother's home here in Shreveport, Louisiana, was fraught with excitement last week. Christmas decorations littered the...
Once, When We Were Heroes
My brother Richard smiles a lot. He has an easy laugh. But there was a time, years ago, when he held a poisonous drink in his hands and begged his dying lover not to swallow it. A time when Richard held the concoction they had prepared together and wept. Emil couldn't...
VIDEO: This Gay Teenage Couple Defies HIV Stereotypes
When Chanse, a 19-year-old gay man living in Shreveport, Louisiana, tested HIV positive a few months ago, his mother reacted with understandable emotion and concern. And then she did something both odd and beautiful: she threw Chanse a coming out party. “We had a...
The Disguised Blessings of HIV+ Poet Mary Bowman
When Mary E. Bowman stepped to the stage five years ago at SpitDat, an open mic night in Washington, DC, she was 20 years old and terrified. She was about to perform “Dandelions,” her first poem to reveal a secret that her own family had long kept quiet: that Mary had...
Carlton’s risky denial of hustlers, sex, and HIV.
My friend Carlton is a chain smoker, even if all his cigarettes are imaginary. His standard pose consists of one hand resting on his hip -- elbow jutting out as if in the midst of a runway strut -- while the other arm is forever in motion, his hand swiveling...
Michael Loves Tyler: A Very Modern HIV Romance
Tyler Helms won't stop teasing his boyfriend during our video chat interview. He fiddles with Michael's ear, or tickles his face, from his seat slightly behind him. No matter if Michael Lucas, adult film producer and PrEP user, is trying to make a point. The childish...
Finding a Pain of My Very Own
I have twenty staples in my back holding an incision together. It hurts. Just making that rather gruesome statement leaves me feeling conflicted. Yes, I want sympathy. Yes, this pain has been a constant companion for the last two months, from throwing out my back...
VIDEO: Methtacular! The Addictive Musical Comedy
It is no secret that I am a crystal meth addict in recovery. But writing about it, at least in the often humorous style for which my blog is known, escapes me. My process of recovery feels too precious, too personal, and yes, even too delicate. So it was with some...
I Lost My Mind… Until the NIH Found It
When I moved to Los Angeles in 1981, my first job as a struggling actor was making popcorn at the Chinese Theater on Hollywood Boulevard. My encounters with celebrity was limited to serving Diet Cokes to the occasional sitcom star. Until, that is, one day when I was...
Damon L. Jacobs: The Calm in the PrEP Storm
In 1977, I ran for senior class president, hoping against hope that my penchant for wearing platform shoes and fellating men in my spare time might somehow get overlooked by my high school classmates in Bossier City, Louisiana. I lost that faith when my campaign signs...
AIDS2014: The Complete Video Blog Collection
The AIDS2014 International AIDS Conference in Melbourne, Australia, proved to be as colorful and exhausting as I had anticipated. There was no lack of images in the gorgeous city to share in my daily video blogs, and that included the faces of countless advocates from...
Going Down Under for AIDS2014!
(NOTE: My AIDS2014 coverage is exclusive to TheBody.com this year and you can find my daily videos on their main page beginning this Sunday, July 20th.) Are you ready for a theater piece about HIV that takes place on an enormous bed that doubles as a boxing ring? How...
(VIDEO) The Juicy SILENCE=DEATH Stories You Never Knew
There was no way I could attend a recent conference with Avram Finkelstein, one of the artists behind the iconic SILENCE=DEATH image, and not make him sit down with me and spill all the juicy details about the creation of that image. He agreed, and boy howdy, he did...
Sally Field, Rational Relating, and a Comedy of Life with HIV
Charles Sanchez skips a lot. It is a natural, vivacious skip, an outpouring of unabashed joy that melds the cheerfulness of The Sound of Music with the bliss of the Pharrell Williams "Happy" video. Nothing stands in the way of his delight. Not even life with HIV. It...
VIDEO: The Powerful “HIV is Not a Crime” Conference
The most powerful speaker at the recent "HIV is Not a Crime" conference was a man named Kerry Thomas. He held the crowd of more than 150 advocates spellbound for a full twenty minutes. And he never even took the stage. When one of the conference organizers, Reed...
Ten Things HIV Positive Guys Want Negative Guys to Know
When Donald Sterling dissed Magic Johnson for being promiscuous and unworthy, it was nothing new for people living with HIV. They’ve heard it all over the years. A lot of those misconceptions persist today, even (or maybe especially) among gay men. Our attitudes can...
Was I a Teenage Sexual Predator?
We're on a dirt road in the cotton fields, sitting in the back of his Plymouth. It had been my idea to stop and look at the sky, and it doesn't come off like a sneaky move now, because the moon is full and bright and gorgeous. I've been playing along but I wish he...
The Battle for the Soul of AIDS
I used to get saved at the drop of a hat. I loved the pageantry of church youth revivals, the thrill of coming forward to give my life to Christ, and that tingly feeling of being part of something greater than myself, of feeling truly blessed. Of being forgiven. The...
Secrets of the Masturbating Gay Male
May is National Masturbation Month -- Hurry, folks! Only a few days left to celebrate! -- and I will admit to feeling smug, because I have more experience with gay men masturbating than anyone else I know. During my years in Los Angeles in the 1980's, I owned and...
NEGATIVE: HIV Negative Gay Men Speaking for Themselves
"Talk to me like you talk to your friends when no one is around." That was my only request when I sat down with each of four HIV negative gay men to create a short film about their lives and attitudes (video below). They held back nothing, sharing details of their sex...
When People with HIV Became Suicide Bombers
Maybe we should blame the criminal prosecutions of people with HIV on the mythical legend of Gaetan Dugas, also known by his slanderous nickname, Patient Zero. Dugas was a gay flight attendant from Canada who, according to Randy Shilts' 1987 book And the Band Played...
Lessons Learned from Kissing a Straight Boy
Last night I kissed a straight guy full on the lips. Then he tenderly put his arms around me and kissed me back. Tonight I'm going to do it again. It sounds like conquest. Or breaking a taboo. At the very least it fulfills the fantasies of many a gay man. And it makes...
Will HIV Ever Be Safe Enough for You?
There is a classic episode of Oprah from 1987 that can still raise my blood pressure. That year, the tiny town of Williamson, West Virginia, became part of a national discussion about AIDS when Mike Sisco, who had returned to his home town to die of the disease, dared...
Our Problem with Being ‘CURED’ of HIV
In the late 1980's, I let this odd, fussy man into my office at LA Shanti, my first AIDS agency job. He seemed earnest and harmless and he just wanted a few minutes of my time. "I have the cure for AIDS," he politely announced. Sadly, he wasn't the first person to say...
What Donna Summer Still Means to Gay Men
The music my friends liked when I was a teenager intimidated me. It was the head-banging rock of the early seventies, and it felt alien and unappetizing. Most of all, it just felt… straight, in a way I knew I could never be. Alone in my room, I listened to my beloved...
The Fog of a Thousand Years
"Remember when Billy Perry gave you a black eye?" David asked me. He stood on a ladder with a screwdriver in his hand. I was holding up Mom's new light fixture while David attached it to the ceiling. We took on the project during a visit I made back home a few weeks...
The Sound and Fury of the PrEP Debate (and the Facts to Win It)
"We don't know the side effects of this drug. It's too expensive. Insurance won't cover it. It hasn't been studied enough. It will encourage slutty behavior. And why the hell don't people just use condoms?" -- Objections raised to the oral contraceptive progesterone...
Designing and Disclosing on Project Runway
If you're considering how to best disclose your HIV positive status to everyone you know, here's one suggestion: learn to sew. Television's long-running reality hit Project Runway could be holding a spot just for you. Over the course of a dozen seasons, the fashion...
The Top Ten ‘Fabulous’ Posts of 2013
The year 2013 was a game changer for My Fabulous Disease, and I want to thank you for your clicks, comments, and shares. I have more confidence as an advocate and a writer, thanks to you, and traffic for this blog more than doubled over last year! I'm bad at...
The My Fabulous Disease Holiday Spectacular!
What says Holiday Spirit more than Mom’s cookies, Santa, and candid interviews about loving a family member with HIV?
Once, When We Were Heroes
My most courageous self, the best man that I’ll ever be, lived more than two decades ago during the first years of a horrific plague.
Stop Bludgeoning Young Gay Men with Our AIDS Tragedy
To view young gay men and say, “if only you saw all the AIDS deaths I saw…” disturbs me on all sorts of levels, and it says far more about us than it does about them.
Aboard The 2013 HIV Cruise Retreat!
The 10th Anniversary cruise next year will sail on the #1-ranked Celebrity Cruises from San Juan, Puerto Rico!
Surviving Two Epidemics: AIDS and Meth
Maintaining a functional existence slipped away, just slowly enough not to alarm me, as if the drugs were quietly sneaking out the door with my life.
The Beautiful Sadness of “Dallas Buyers Club”
No one is healed and no one fully conquers their demons. The fact that the filmmakers make you root for them is a testament to a vexing main character you grow to love and admire.
Why aren’t you open about your HIV+ status?
I believe a lot more people could be open about their HIV status, and their only reason for not doing so is fear.
Two Minutes of Advice on Testing HIV Positive
I had to create a video in my own peculiar way — something that demonstrates the sense of humor that has served me well over the course of 30 years living with HIV.
The Most Important Gay Porn Film Ever Made?
The film is either a transgressive act of eroticism, or an act that demonstrates how to become infected with HIV. Or perhaps both.
The Inspiring Advocates of the 2013 U.S. Conference on AIDS
At the recent 2013 United States Conference on AIDS (USCA) in New Orleans, the word “stigma” wafted through the event, in workshops and throughout the exhibit hall, like an annoying new pop song you couldn’t stop humming.
The Real Poz Guys of Atlanta III
These guys must be getting the hang of this, because we discussed and revealed things like never before. From crystal meth addiction to our mothers, nothing was off limits.
Dealing with Shame can be a Drag
I would hear other gay men make disparaging remarks about drag and I withered, unable to admit I was playing to a packed room every Sunday.
Suicide: A Love Story
I knew about assisted suicide but had never heard of the mechanics of it firsthand… or had witnessed the haunted result like the one that now sat chain smoking across my living room.
A Totally Gay Tour of Congressional Cemetery
You haven’t lived until you have hosted a game show in a cemetery. Or heard behind-the-scenes tales of some juicy grave site mysteries.
An AIDS Death in the Family
We heard wheels, barely squeaking across tile floors, rolling out of the master bedroom toward the front door. A heavy door opened and then closed. I wanted to pull the shades wide open and see for myself, and I didn’t dare.
A Cure for AIDS: The HIV Advocates Turning Hope into Action
One can easily connect the dots between the activists shown in the Oscar nominated documentary “How to Survive a Plague” and these treatment advocates trying to take HIV research across the finish line.
The Trouble with Praising HIV Negative Gay Men
Hooray, HIV negative gay men! Let’s show some love for our negative brothers, who’s with me?
How ‘The Denver Principles’ Changed HIV/AIDS — and Healthcare — Forever
“We condemn attempts to label us as ‘victims,’ which implies defeat, and we are only occasionally ‘patients,’ which implies passivity, helplessness, and dependence upon the care of others. We are ‘people with AIDS.’”
The Fabulous Wizard of POZ
Negotiations between myself and POZ Magazine were heated, I will admit. First they claimed Leibovitz was busy and Scavullo was dead, and then they rejected my request for body painting at the studio to sculpt my abs. Oh, and I had to wear a shirt.
The New National Voice of People with HIV is…
At a recent town hall forum in Washington, DC for people living with HIV, the very idea of what it means to be positive -- and who is our national voice of advocacy -- was questioned. With the demise of The National Association of People with AIDS (NAPWA) earlier this...
What It Feels Like for a Mom
"A boy's best friend is his mother." -- Norman Bates, Psycho I was standing at the ticket counter of the movie theater and couldn't believe my ears. They were telling me that "Theater of Blood," with the great Vincent Price, was rated "R" and they were not letting me...
Revisiting My Sad and Trivial Night with Rock Hudson
In a final act of staking my claim, I asked the damp, drunk and spent star to scribble “All my best, Rock Hudson” on a piece of notebook paper before his hasty exit down the duplex stairs and out to the dingy street below.
Behind the Scenes of the Video Series “A Day in the Life”
I was knocked out by these people and their daily courage and fortitude. I really want to thank this group for taking me into their homes and lives and allowing me to share their stories with you.
HIV and Gay Media: The Vanishing Virus
What, then, is the responsibility of LGBT media in this climate of rising infection rates and a bored readership? Do they have a responsibility to serve as advocates for better public awareness?
The Increasingly Strange Case of Uncle Poodle
Thompson made up the prosecution story. He behaved in much the same way that most everyone does who tests HIV positive these days. He looked for someone else to blame.
Your Mother Liked It Bareback
We have come to the homophobic conclusion that when gay men engage in intercourse without a barrier we label it psychotic barebacking, but when straight people do it we call it sex.
Treating My Facial Wasting with Artefill
My dismay over my facial wasting pitted two strong emotions against one another: my pride in being a longtime HIV/AIDS survivor, and my shame for looking like one.
In My Humble, Closeted Opinion
How could I march in a gay pride parade with “No One Knows I’m HIV positive” emblazoned on my t-shirt but I couldn’t come out in a room of eight men?
Probing My Anal Phobia
My conundrum: exploring the pleasures of my tush while fighting the terror that something stinky might be going on down there. I suspect I am not alone in this anxiety.
The Private War That Killed Spencer Cox
When legendary AIDS treatment activist Spencer Cox died on December 18, 2012, the cause of death was AIDS-related complications, which is understandable if post-traumatic stress, despair, and drug addiction are complications related to AIDS.
Hurting Mom on My First Gay Christmas
There is so much distance in my mother’s eyes that I fear she may never come close to me again. Circling her stare are wrinkles of pain, betrayal even, and in her hand she holds the watch.
The Night Don Lemon Hugged Me
Don Lemon, who remembered our first visit and never mentioned the circumstances, who knew this interview meant growth for me, a sort of redemption perhaps, and who even knew a little about overcoming shame himself, reached out in a simple gesture of support.
On Board the 2012 HIV Cruise Retreat
The protective walls that often surround those of us living with HIV came crumbling down, replaced with new relationships, email addresses and phone numbers. By the time we docked back in Ft Lauderdale, hugs were long and new confidants had been established.
On Being Among Instinct Magazine’s “Leading Men of 2012”
If you have the privilege and ability to share your story of life with HIV – or as a gay or lesbian person, or as someone living with disability or hardship – I urge you to do it. The rewards may not be immediate but are nevertheless held in life’s cache.
Is there Pride in being HIV Positive?
During the 2012 Atlanta Pride parade and festival, Mark S. King takes in the sights with his usual humor and asks a simple question: if HIV is nothing to be ashamed of, is it something to be proud of?
The Truth is Bad Enough: What Became of the Happy Hustler?
Kearns’ story includes a bizarre intersection between us that I found so revelatory and disturbing that I had to actually put the book down for several days while I reexamined an entire section of my life.
My Muscles, My Disease: A Snapshot of Drug Addiction
Getting back in shape is an easy call. Except my mind puts physical fitness on the same crazy train as my drug addiction.
AIDS2012: The ‘My Fabulous Disease’ Video Collection
All of the six video blogs produced by “My Fabulous Disease” during AIDS2012 (the international AIDS conference) in Washington, DC, July 21-27, 2012.
AIDS2012: Farewell to the Voices of the World
In this farewell video posting, I pay tribute to the people on the front lines who are the very essence of this conference. They are the ones with the “star power,” and they fill me with renewed commitment and energy that might possibly last until AIDS2014 in Melbourne, Australia.
AIDS2012 Day Four: The Global Village
You’re about to meet drag queens who make their living handing out condoms, sex workers demanding an end to criminalization, young prevention workers from far-flung corners of the planet, a stunning photo exhibit from the Ukraine… the list goes on.
AIDS2012 Day Three: The March to End AIDS!
The people included in the video can speak for themselves, and quite eloquently. Maybe it was the emotions of the event — anger, nervousness, pride — but it was an exhausting day. I felt the residue of grief for lost friends in a way I haven’t experienced in years.
AIDS2012 Day Two: Stigma, Singers and Subways
With all the talk about the devastating effects of HIV stigma, I found validation in the unlikeliest of places: the Gallery Place subway station. With Lamar Rogers and Jack Mackenroth.
Opening Ceremonies at the International AIDS Conference (AIDS2012)
On the first official day of AIDS2012, the schedule is light but the party is rolling, with an outdoor concert steps away from the AIDS quilt featuring Weyclef Sean and Cornel West (!), dancing dignitaries, and a somewhat surprise ending!
“Gay Day” at the International AIDS Conference (AIDS2012)
Includes United States Rep. Barbara Lee, who has just introduced comprehensive HIV legislation; the advocates fighting laws that criminalize people with HIV, a little social research on Grindr), a chat with Positive Frontiers editor Alex Garner about getting rejected (and rejected others) while dating, and a visit to a poz social event.
Bridging the HIV Viral Divide with Friendship
Lynne is not a placeholder and she is not a substitute. She is a gift of my survival, and the right friend at the right time to help me conduct my advancing years with more maturity than I might muster alone.
‘Dawson’s 20 Load Weekend’ is the Most Influential Gay Porn Ever Made
It depicted a prevailing truth about gay sexual behavior “post AIDS,” and arguably encouraged risky sexual adventure-seeking. It led to the saturation of bareback porn online. To dismiss this film, to minimize its social and cultural impact, would be unwise indeed.
The Stupid Question: “Are You Clean?”
Anyone who questions whether or not HIV stigma is on the rise need look no further than online profiles and hookup sites, in which “Are you clean?” is asked with infuriating regularity. Or perhaps you have suffered the indignity of someone asking you “The Stupid Question” while negotiating a tryst. The sheer ignorance boggles the mind.
I am the man my father built.
“Never worry about making a fool of yourself,” he would say, “if it means taking a risk, Mark.” He would recognize my adolescent need to simply fit in with everyone else and he would deny me of it, locking his eyes onto mine. “You gotta take the risk.”
The Crystal Meth Connection of the Gay Porn Killer
“… the sheer madness of the crimes, and the killer’s insane determination to make it as shocking as possible, was sickeningly familiar to a recovering methamphetamine addict like me.”
Coming Out with Donna Summer
The music my friends liked when I was a teenager intimidated me. It was the head-banging rock of the early seventies, and it felt alien and unappetizing. Most of all, it just felt… straight, in a way I knew I could never be. Alone in my room, I listened to my beloved...
Remembering, and Saying Her Name
In the Summer of 2008, I received a curious package from Bonnie Goldman, the editor of TheBody.com. Inside was a Flip video camera, what was then a new-fangled device that allowed you to take video footage with a camera the size of a pack of cigarettes. It came with a...
The Unfortunate Pursuits of a Gay Porn Critic
Being a writer is not without its perks. I can’t exactly name one at the moment, but I’m certain they exist. Hold it, here's one. Starting sentences with “Being a writer…” Oh, and receiving gay erotic fiction from a guy who wants feedback on his work. This morning as...
Dealing with Shame can be a Drag
“We’re born naked… and the rest is drag.” -- RuPaulWhen I was nine years old, I took my parents’ album of the Broadway musical “Damn Yankees” and memorized every syllable of Gwen Verdon’s show stopper, “Who’s Got the Pain When They Do the Mambo?” Once I was satisfied...
Grave Hep C News… and oh yeah, the Oscars!
The image in my mind has never left me, even after many years of trying, of applying layers of wallpaper to that corner of my mind. I am in someone’s bedroom -- it could have been anyone, really -- and I am offered a syringe to inject crystal meth. The syringe has...
HIV Criminalization Face-Off: One Poz Man and His Accuser
What if you could witness a face-to-face confrontation between a man living with HIV and the sex partner accusing him of not revealing his status? Wouldn’t you like to be a fly on that wall? The fireworks could be mighty, as emotions raged between the furious accuser...
The Day Larry Kramer Dissed Me
The mall was abuzz, with people darting in and out of stores, wrangling their kids and chatting on cell phones. I preferred it that way, because it kept Larry in a fairly calm state of quiet attention, ever vigilant as to where and when his next mortal enemy might...
On Milford, and Finding Home Again
Even in darkness, in the bitter cold of northern Pennsylvania on a January night, the town of Milford can’t help displaying its charm. I’m walking through Main Street and the shops splash warm light in my path as strolling shoppers offer smiles and salutations. This...
HIV Positive Criminals: Have Sex, Go to Jail
This may be the defining HIV issue of our time, and it is a true test of our compassion and understanding of both HIV stigma and the law. Please read this closely. Around the country, and without leadership or guidelines from the Federal government, individual states...
The ‘My Fabulous Disease’ Holiday Spectacular!
My mother's home here in Shreveport, Louisiana, was fraught with excitement last week. Christmas decorations littered the living room, the almond scent of cookies filled the air, and last minute phone calls and arrangements made it all feel like a major production was...
The Value of Asking for What You Want
Remember when we were little, and if we wanted something we simply asked for it? It felt easy. It seemed natural. And if there was really something special we had to have, there was a golden opportunity every year to ask the person who made all things possible. Santa...
The Long Road Home from Relapse
Florida highways have lovely rest stops. You would expect that from the Turnpike, where toll booths charge a premium every so often, but the manicured picnic areas continue even as you drive further north and onto I-75. I'm on a cement bench in a concession area,...
(Not exactly) Like a Prayer
Soon, as many families take a seat at their Thanksgiving table, after the food is set but just before the feasting begins, a paralyzing moment will occur. What now? They'll wonder, glancing left and right. Should we pray? Uncomfortable seconds will tick by. Finally,...
Sailing on the 2011 HIV Cruise Retreat
It was my distinct privilege to serve as host and M.C. for a second time on The HIV Cruise Retreat, the labor of love by openly HIV positive travel agent Paul Stalbaum of Cruise Designs Travel. Paul has become the go-to man for gay travel groups " in addition to the...
Divorce, Stress, HIV… and no jokes.
This is a rather personal blog video, there's no doubt about that. I'm even a little apprehensive because it doesn't offer the usual helpful tips or the "entertainment value" of my other videos. But one of my problems has always been trying to be the life of the party...
Did I Abandon Family for Gay Community?
Panama City, Florida, with its sugar sand beaches and busy tourist trade, is affectionately considered the Redneck Riviera. Folks from Alabama and its neighbor states make the trip down Highway 231 and straight into the Florida panhandle, breezing through a...
Lessons Learned from Kissing a Straight Boy
Last night I kissed a straight guy full on the lips. Then he tenderly put his arms around me and kissed me back. Tonight I'm going to do it again. It sounds like conquest. Or breaking a taboo. At the very least it fulfills the fantasies of many a gay man. And it makes...
Playing the Last Scene of a Marriage
"I'm not in love with you anymore." He said this at the dinner table as he made the first cut of his steak, a beautiful ribeye he had grilled to perfection. I put down my own knife and fork and stared at him. "This isn't new, or else you haven't been listening," he...
Revisiting ‘The Real Poz Guys of Atlanta’
During the first year of producing my blog videos back in early 2009, it occurred to me how much of my health and happiness was the result of having a solid support network. I wanted to find a way of showing this through my blog, and the result would be two video...
Finding Support in an e-Patient World
You're part of a healthcare revolution in cyberspace, my friends. It's changing the way people find treatment information, relate to their doctor, and support one another. And you're about to meet some of the marvelous people who are leading the charge. Did you know...
The Twilight of the Redhead
According to family lore, my arrival at birth with a full head of orange hair was met with shock and awe. My five older siblings ran the gamut from blond to dark brown, but they otherwise lacked my peculiar genetic mutation. Although the hospital nursery staff was...
How the Denver Principles changed AIDS (and health care) forever.
You must know this, because it matters. Because it has already changed your life and you may not even realize it. It was 1983. Just a year prior, Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) became the fearful nameplate for the murderer of gay friends and lovers. The...
Those Doggone Days of Summer
July and August were almost frantically productive for me, and I've followed it by the longest period of, well, nothing, since I began producing this blog. Sorry. Sometimes an HIV guy just needs to lay around and catch up on Top Chef and Real Housewives (God bless...
7 Ways to Save Money on Meds
With all the doctor appointments and wellness activities we engage in, living with HIV/AIDS can be a full-time job. And the truth is, it doesn't pay very well. We've all been feeling the pinch of tough economic times. So I hope you'll find some savings in this new...
Facebook Put My Life Together Again
Today I accepted the Facebook friend request of someone I knew in high school. We haven't spoken in more than thirty years. She is married with a load of kids, and God knows why she wants to befriend the scandalous queer who wore knee-high platform boots to the junior...
I’m Gonna Wipe That AIDS Right Off of My Face
Several years ago, I told someone that I was HIV positive before I agreed to his invitation for a date. "Yeah, I know," he casually replied, and then he looked a little embarrassed, as if he shouldn't have said it. It was too late, of course; I knew exactly what he...
Outliving My Father
The descriptions of his decline, in whispered calls from back home, had a dreadfully familiar feel to them. Weight loss at a frightful pace. Losing interest in the world. Suddenly looking very old indeed. Most gay men of a certain age have heard those words, have seen...
The Entire 2011 ADAP Conference in Nine Minutes!
The 2011 ADAP Advocacy Association (aaa+) conference held July 5-7 in Washington, DC, was bursting with spirit. Dozens of advocates from across the country met for three days of workshops and speakers, and in this video blog, you'll see the entire conference boiled...
Should AIDS Activists and Pharma Just Get Along?
I'm having an identity crisis. Am I an AIDS activist, ready to question authority and demand high standards of service for those living with HIV/AIDS? Or am I a "resource" for the pharmaceutical industry, so that they might craft more effective community programs that...
Dab Garner’s 30 year story of survival.
Storytelling is a crucial part of our culture, and not simply for entertainment value. Sharing our stories can heal our pain, educate others, and help us relive our happiest triumphs. This video is quite simple, really. One man explains to you what happened to him,...
Why Are We Still Haunted by the Boys in the Band?
When I was 15 years old, I couldn't wait to attend a local community theater production of The Boys in the Band. I was intrigued by the play's dark and mysterious reputation, and had heard that it included a lot of homosexuality (funny how that word isn't used much...
The Dirty Little Secret of Gay Men and Meth
How addiction to crystal methamphetamine is threatening the gay community's long struggle to turn a corner on the AIDS epidemic. I really shouldn't be trusted. That's the problem with drug addicts like me. We've protected our addiction through a myriad of lies and...
For Dad: “I am the man my father built.”
Never in my short life had I been camping. I hated the grit of dirt and leaves, bugs, peeing outdoors, and the looming prospect of sleeping amongst it all. The woods looked like the terrarium for my pet alligator, and from what I could tell, Wally didn't sleep all...
Hiding from the “AIDS at 30” media storm.
I shuttered myself from most of the hoopla surrounding the "AIDS at 30" milestone (we seem to have agreed on June 5, 1981, when an item in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report reported deaths among gay men). The trauma of those early years is tough for me to...
My Surprising Lack of Gay Pride
For most of my life I've been judgmental and a little impatient with gay people who didn't just come out. Are the risks really that dire? I suspected they were just chicken shit, or unwilling to stand up to their family or to whatever screwed up religious upbringing...
Calling HIV Negative Gay Men: This is Your Time
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?...
Can I blame gay culture for my drug addiction, please?
After a lifetime of sporadic, recreational drug use, I became a full-blown crystal meth addict ten years ago, and then eventually got clean and sober in January of 2009. But why would I, or anyone as engaged in life as I was, morph into a drug addict? It seemed an...
How one Mom handles HIV/AIDS in the family.
God could not be everywhere, so he created mothers. ~Jewish Proverb My mother raised six children, topping off this great achievement with yours truly. Yes, I'm the youngest, which explains a lot, but not all. To understand the rest, you'd have to know the woman. Or,...
Vacations and Retreats for People with HIV/AIDS
Summer is approaching and vacation plans are being made " but have you ever considered a retreat or getaway with other people living with HIV/AIDS? It might sound odd to seek out a vacation event just for people with HIV. For me, my status is only a part of who I am,...
Trying to put away childish, damaging things.
When I became a man, I put away childish things. -- 1 Corinthians 13:11 We're on a dirt road in the cotton fields, sitting in the back of his Plymouth. It had been my idea to stop and look at the sky, and it doesn't come off like a sneaky move now, because the moon is...
The Hard Facts on Erectile Dysfunction: Pills, Pumps and Prosthetics
I suppose it was only a matter of time before HIV fitness guru and hottie Nelson Vergel and I ended up in bed together. After rummaging through my kitchen in a video blog about healthy eating, and then flexing his biceps at the gym when he instructed me on weight...
My sad and trivial night with Rock Hudson
(This essay appears in my collection of essays, My Fabulous Disease: Chronicles of a Gay Survivor, available now at online outlets or your local bookstore.) Over and over, footage of Rock Hudson standing next to Doris Day was playing on television, and he looked...
Walmart Gets Better.
They always say time changes things, but you actually have to change them yourself. -- Andy Warhol Yesterday I had a conference call with Walmart public relations manager Ravi Jariwala, and Crosby Cromwell, a manager for constituent relations. We discussed the fact...
Walmart, the G word, and internet activism.
Forgive your enemies. It messes with their heads. -- Unknown Walmart is selling the new It Gets Better book. Just don't call it gay. Okay, this is really a story of how a selfish act turned into a firestorm of activism. It has drama, self-righteousness and the hottest...
The Book with a Promise: It Gets Better
There were moments while reading It Gets Better, the new book inspired by the YouTube video project to help bullied youth, when my heart leapt to my throat and hovered there. It happened a few times, quite unexpectedly, usually while in the middle of some essay from...
A Very Special One-Year Anniversary Posting!
When Mark first started My Fabulous Disease, I was pretty sure it was going to directly result in the destruction of humanity. One year later, we're all still here. I can't believe I lost that bet. Myles Helfand, Editor, The Body, The Complete HIV/AIDS Resource My...
Touring an HIV+ gay sex club. Plus: the porn stars that got away.
The idea that HIV positive people still want sex is as old as The Denver Principles, the 1983 manifesto drawn up by gay men with AIDS that demanded "as full and satisfying a sexual and emotional life as anyone else." The document also stated that people with HIV/AIDS...
My Fabulous Disease: The Top Ten Postings of Year One
"The suspense is terrible. I hope it will last." -- Oscar Wilde, The Importance of Being Ernest How was this judged, exactly? I was afraid you might ask. Not on the number of hits or any formal voting procedure. I relied purely on feedback received through the year...
My Fabulous Disease: The Video Collection
Here is a brief description and link to the early collection of My Fabulous Disease videos, stretching back to the premiere episode in 2008. The videos have been viewed in classrooms, at conferences and in support groups, and you're welcome to re-post and share with...
Tabatha, take over my life!
(Note: Stay tuned for bonus postings at the end of this story!) I don't wish to hide the truth anymore. My blog is devoted to complete honesty about who I am, so brace yourself: I have a total gay guy crush on Tabatha Coffey. The snow-haired vixen hosts Bravo's...
The Hilarious Idiocy of Anonymous Gay Sex
The cute robots in this video are about to get down 'n nasty after hooking up through a gay chat site. There's just one problem: the horned up bareback bottom forgot to ask the top about his HIV status. What follows is a funny, pornographic (NSFW), painfully realistic...
Hitting the Gym with HIV Fitness Expert Nelson Vergel
I'm as vain as the next guy. And if the next guy happens to be modest, or straight, or comfortable in his own skin, then it's really no contest. I'm way more vain. Describing my vanity requires making up new words. Vainer. The vainiest. Psychovain. That must be the...
AIDS Activism 101: Steps to end the ADAP crisis.
Activists held an "emergency summit" this weekend to address the growing AIDS Drug Assistance Program (ADAP) crisis, and I'm taking you there. In this video episode of My Fabulous Disease, you'll learn about the panic over ADAP, and exactly what you can do to prevent...
My Muscles, My Disease: Portrait of a Gay Drug Addict
(This essay appears in my collection of essays, My Fabulous Disease: Chronicles of a Gay Survivor, available now at online outlets or your local bookstore.) There is a folder, tucked within a folder, buried deep in my computer files. I shouldn't be looking at its...
Five Things About HIV (They’re Not Telling You)
In the early 1990's, I was invited to participate in a roundtable discussion with national public health officials. They wanted to gauge what those on the front lines were thinking about HIV/AIDS prevention campaigns. I gave them an earful. "Why won't you tell gay men...
Fitness stud Nelson Vergel raids my fridge.
Nelson Vergel is not impressed with my refridgerator. Sure, it has double doors and a freezer drawer, but he's criticizing almost every damn thing inside it. Most of the items say "low fat" or "sugar free," but he claims it's all a terrible lie. Letting the HIV...
Carlton’s glorious, dangerous denial.
My friend Carlton is a chain smoker, even if all his cigarettes are imaginary. His standard pose consists of one hand resting on his hip -- elbow jutting out as if in the midst of a runway strut -- while the other arm is forever in motion, his hand swiveling...
Recovering Joy
"Joy to the fishes in the deep blue sea. Joy to you and me." " Hoyt Axton If you have spent any time wandering around this blog or watching my videos, you know I have an almost stubbornly positive view of things. I like to smile, I love to laugh, and if someone is...
Hurting Mom (or) My First Gay Christmas
There is so much distance in my mother's eyes that I fear she may never come close to me again. Circling her stare are wrinkles of pain, betrayal even, and in her hand she holds the watch. It was December of my senior year of high school, and things had calmed down...
Once, When We Were Heroes.
My brother Richard smiles a lot. He has an easy laugh. But there was a time, years ago, when he held a poisonous drink in his hands and begged his dying lover not to swallow it. A time when Richard held the concoction they had prepared together and wept. Emil couldn't...
(Not exactly) Like a Prayer
Soon, as many families take a seat at their Thanksgiving table, after the food is set but just before the feasting begins, a paralyzing moment will occur. What now? They'll wonder, glancing left and right. Should we pray? Uncomfortable seconds will tick by. Finally,...
My mega-blog week with The Bilerico Project
This week I am honored to be a "guest host" for The Bilerico Project, the leading online blogging salon for GLBT commentary, politics and culture. My job is to contribute three times a day and get out of my HIV rut! I'm having fun with pop culture topics you don't...
My t-cells could use a facelift.
Can I still complain about getting older if I was supposed to be dead twenty years ago? That's the dilemma of aging HIV positive guys like me. Feeling victorious over AIDS only takes your self esteem so far; there's no HIV medication to fight wrinkles. Oh wait, there...
Examining death, including the one I caused.
My memorial service will be fabulous, I can assure you of that. I first outlined it during the initial, deadly wave of AIDS in the 1980's, and have edited it here and there over the years, updating the songs I would like played or the video footage shown. Focusing on...
My video report aboard the HIV Cruise Retreat
If I clear my mind, I can transport myself back to so many fun moments during the 2010 HIV Cruise Retreat. Maybe I'm zip-lining through the rain forest of Costa Rica, or I'm gorging myself at the dessert buffet. The water slide high above the 3,000 passenger ship will...
The Price is Right, 30 years after coming on down
Within a few years of Coming On Down, there would be enormous differences between that video boy and myself, shaped by life events that would throw a wet blanket on my aw shucks optimism. I’ve tried to recover from them, to regain the hopeful, expectant glimmer found in the eyes of the kid from “The Price is Right,” with mixed success.
In Praise of HIV Negative Gay Men!
In the anxious world of sexuality and HIV risk, we could all use a little love and support. So, in the spirit of everyone getting the attention they deserve, allow me a moment to throw a party for HIV negative gay men. HIV negative gay men hear a lot about what they...
The 2010 HRC Dinner (in under four minutes!)
The Human Rights Campaign (HRC), the nation's largest GLBT political advocacy group, held it's annual black tie dinner in Washington, DC on October 9, 2010, and I was there to sit through all the speeches on your behalf. HRC has done commendable work for gay rights,...
Fighting Back Hard Against Bullying
"You've got to fight back. You've got to fight back hard." -- Abby, the young vampire of the new film Let Me In In the melancholy new vampire thriller Let Me In, the most unnerving scenes for me had nothing to do with fangs or bloodletting. They were the scenes of...
My Forbidden Love for Gay Monsters
Zombies are deeply misunderstood, in my mind. They're outcasts, picked on, and are the perfect stand-ins for things we fear or don't understand. Things like death. Or gay people. Or disease. Or getting a disease from gay people that could lead to death. Work with me...
Condoms & Bareback Sex at Gay Summit
While "gay men's health" as a concept -- aging, mental health, relationships, physical fitness -- tried mightily to get some respect at the 2010 Gay Men's Health Summit in Ft Lauderdale, HIV continued to dominate much of the workshops and discussions. The evergreen...
Dueling Videos: Oprah in 1987 and AIDS activism in 2010
In 1987, I was a 26 year old living in Los Angeles and trying to face the horror of having tested positive with HIV. Television blasted daily reports of the death toll, the suicides of people with HIV, and even the deterioration and death of Rock Hudson. But nothing...
HIV Stigma (and my lover Jack) at USCA
At the United States Conference on AIDS in Orlando, I've learned that HIV stigma is alive and well. Providers report that client will travel to distant counties to get services just so they aren't recognized -- and that's if they bother getting tested in the first...
Tracking the elusive HIV “Bug Chasers”
"I hate any suggestion that AIDS is a gift. A Mercedes is a gift." -- Mark S. King, "A Place Like This" I must admit my belief that bug-chasers are an extremely elusive and exotic form of pervert that aren't as much seen as talked about. For the mercifully uninformed,...
Sex while HIV Positive: The New Criminals
As you and I relax here surfing the internet, an HIV positive man is sitting in a Texas prison, serving a 35 year sentence for spitting on someone. In Michigan, an HIV positive man was charged for not disclosing his status under a bio-terrorism statute. And just weeks...
I am the man my father built.
Never in my short life had I been camping. I hated the grit of dirt and leaves, bugs, peeing outdoors, and the looming prospect of sleeping amongst it all. The woods looked like the terrarium for my pet alligator, and from what I could tell, Wally didn't sleep all...
Does the Gay Men’s Health Summit make me look fat?
I took more time than usual choosing an outfit this morning, because of two terribly conflicting forces. First, I was on my way to the first day of the National Gay Men's Health Summit and, diametrically opposed to this fact, I went shopping for pants yesterday and...
A Dance to an Atlanta Night
Stephanie's feet are bare, and she is on a sidewalk, and she is dancing. And everything in the world is exactly as it is supposed to be. We've already been hanging out with each other all evening, our group of a dozen or so. I'm visiting Atlanta for the weekend and...
AIDS2010 for Dummies: An entertaining review.
These are the sights and sounds of AIDS2010, from the people on the ground committed to their projects to the “feel” of such a massive event. From advocates to muppets to dancing sex workers to protesters, here is a detailed review of the video blogs created by My Fabulous Disease.
AIDS2010 in Vienna: A Final Look
I knew AIDS2010 in Vienna would be a great learning experience, but I suppose I didn't expect to feel such profound gratitude for my life and my advantages. Life is such an arbitrary thing; I was born here, you were born there, she was born over there... and that...
AIDS2010: The Art of AIDS
Everywhere you look at AIDS 2010 (the international conference in Vienna I'm blogging), HIV is being expressed artistically. It's as if the disease is so profound to people that simple words can't communicate their feelings. AIDS has been a productive artistic muse...
AIDS2010: Human Rights March with Annie Lennox
The AIDS2010 theme, "Rights Here, Right Now," took center stage on day three, with speakers, seminars and events focused on how important human rights are the the AIDS equation. Access to health care and treatment is a human right. Women deserve rights around the...
AIDS2010 Day Two: The Wisdom of Youth
Today was a blast, because I spent it with my intellectual peers -- puppets, show people and youth! In this video blog entry from AIDS2010 in Vienna you'll meet some amazing young people from around the world who are making a difference in their communities. You'll...
AIDS 2010 Opening Day: Sex, Drugs, and Annie Lennox
Wendy Knerr from The Pleasure Project really, really wants me to put a female condom inside my rectum. She keeps coaxing me, as if I'll go running to the men's room to try one on like a Ralph Lauren pullover. But her enthusiasm for the device is charming, and...
“Gay Day” at AIDS2010 in Vienna!
The AIDS2010 conference was still one day from making its grand arrival, so the MSM Pre-Conference took center stage, playing host to gay men and their advocates from around the globe. I'm here blogging for the best HIV resource of the web, TheBody.com, and here is my...
The Magic (and Gay Turks) of Istanbul!
My partner Ben and I are in Istanbul for five days. We're vacationing here until we move on to AIDS2010, the international AIDS conference in Vienna beginning on the 17th. I'll be producing daily video blogs from there as a correspondent for TheBody.com. In the...
AIDS2010, get ready for My Fabulous Disease!
My favorite online HIV/AIDS resource, TheBody.com, is sending me to Vienna for AIDS2010, the bi-annual international AIDS conference July 17-23. I will be producing daily videos from the conference, and I don't mean wonky, dry reports about research minutiae! This is...
The Man That AIDS Forgot: Safe Sex Architect Richard Berkowitz
The New York City of 1979 shown during the opening minutes of Sex Positive, the documentary now available on DVD, is awash in gay sexual liberation. Male couples strut their stuff arm in arm, sporting biker jackets and cocky mustaches and bulges in their denim that...
An AIDS Golden Oldie, Spinning Again
We can turn it around in our minds, trying various reasons on for size, but nothing ever fits. In the end, it doesn't matter how much he was adored by his friends or whether he ignored his better judgment or if he secretly hated himself. Steven is, simply and...
Live Video Chat with Mark S. King Scheduled
This Wednesday, June 30, at 2:00 PM EST, I will be the featured speaker on an online "Webinar" seminar, hosted by Wellsphere, a partner of TheBody.com. Meaning, if any of my video blogs have ever made you want to talk, argue or scream back to me, this is your chance....
Fantastic Voyage: How the HIV Cruise Retreat Transforms Lives
Although living with HIV, many of them have never been able to speak openly about their HIV status. Their HIV physician could be located hours from their home. But once a year, on a "family cruise line" far out to sea, everything changes. For passengers aboard the...
My 2010 Gay Pride PSA (that will never air!).
What would I talk about if I had my very own public service announcement? I'd probably waste the whole thing telling some embarrassing story about growing up gay. Or how much I hate being a queer man pushing 50. What if, though, I really allowed myself to cut the crap...
Hi Bilerico, hi POZIAM, hello World!
It's turning into a busy Summer. I'm looking forward to a return to POZIAM Radio next Sunday, June 6, from 9-10PM, when I'll be the guest of Robert Breining, the host of the weekly radio show devoted to those living with HIV. It's a cool set-up: you listen to the show...
Six Tips for Choosing your HIV Doctor
"Doctor doctor, give me the news I got a bad case of loving you..." -- Robert Palmer I had to say goodbye to my doctor recently. I was moving out of state, and Dr. David Morris of Pride Medical Group in Atlanta (pictured at right) had been nothing but a patient,...
Secrets of the Masturbatory Male
May is National Masturbation Month " Hurry, folks! Only a few days left to celebrate! " and I'll admit to feeling smug, because I have more experience with masturbatory gay men than anyone else I know. During my years in Los Angeles in the 1980's, I owned (and oh yes,...
The Day Larry Kramer Dissed Me
The mall was abuzz, with people darting in and out of stores, wrangling their kids and chatting on cell phones. I preferred it that way, because it kept Larry in a fairly calm state of quiet attention, ever vigilant as to where and when his next mortal enemy might...
You can always go… Downtown!
She is brushing a crimson polish onto her nails with breathtaking speed, all the while trying on pairs of high heels to match her fingers, the color of blood, and yet she still has the presence of mind to patiently answer my questions. "We ain't Nero fiddling while...
My Pretend Life without HIV
My mother-in-law is visiting us this week. She's still active at 84, engaged in life, and accepts me completely as her son's longtime partner and a member of the family. So it's a shame she doesn't know the first thing about me. That first thing is the fact that I am...
October’s HIV Cruise Retreat is coming!
Ahoy! Or as I say in the promo below, "Yahoy!" (I was still learning my sea-faring lingo.) This October I'll serve as one of the hosts for the HIV Cruise Retreat, and this is a friendly reminder that organizers need to hear from you if you'd like to go. There's a...
What it feels like for a Mom
"A boy's best friend is his mother." -- Norman Bates, "Psycho" I was standing at the ticket counter of the movie theater and couldn't believe my ears. They were telling me that "Theater of Blood," with the great Vincent Price, was rated "R" and they were not letting...
How the Denver Principles changed AIDS (and health care) forever.
You must know this, because it matters. Because it has already changed your life and you probably don't realize it. It was 1983. Just a year prior, Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome became the fearful nameplate for the murderer of gay friends and lovers. The virus...
Positive Lite: Humour and Living with HIV
Brian Finch knows a thing or two about "humour" and HIV. As a fellow HIV positive gay man (and addict in recovery) he has applied his entertaining world view to serving as editor of PositiveLite, an uplifting HIV/AIDS oriented site, and to his personal blog, Acid...
The Bilerico Project: The Fabulous Disease of Mark S. King
"Someone stepped in and helped me out. I was not capable of getting that needle out of my arm on my own. I'm the one who wouldn't leave the dance floor. I'm the one who couldn't get enough of anything. I tried every new drug that came along. I brought that attitude...
HIV Plus Magazine: It’s Just Sex?
Sure, you're HIV-positive, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't be having -- or don't deserve to have -- the most amazing sex life possible. This story just hit the stands in HIV Plus Magazine, and I am featured as a profile subject. The writing by Benjamin Ryan is...
The Shirt Heard ‘Round the World
So, living with HIV is still quite a shocker, it appears. Whether true or rumored, whether "HIV Positive" is voluntarily displayed as an act of activism or the status is maliciously spread on the internet, the label still packs quite a punch. And I have to wonder why....
My Very Last Night in a Gay Bathhouse
THE LAST TIME I went to the gay baths, some years ago, I stepped in poop. Actually, more like a pile of poop, because it crept up between my toes for a horrific second before I realized what my bare feet had stumbled across. I made the grim discovery while standing in...
Mr. Atlanta Eagle talks leather, crystal meth and HIV.
Chandler Bearden's smile is creeping through the phone during our call. I've just suggested that his winning the impressively sexy title of Mr. Atlanta Eagle 2010 might be a boon to his sex life, but he's laughing it off. "Just because I won a title doesn't mean I'll...
Has my AIDS crisis ended?
A few weeks ago I spent the day at the Florida AIDS Walk, and it was striking how different it was from the Walks I attended years ago. Smiling faces, racial and ethnic diversity, baby strollers, and most of all a feeling of happiness and celebration. That's progress,...
Five Fun Facts about Flatulence!
Lately, I've been filled with more gas than Rush Limbaugh on an Oxycotin high. It usually happens in bed at night, where my long-suffering boyfriend has a very limited retreat. "What food pyramid item was that?" he'll ask like a horrified Top Chef judge, his fingers...
Choose one: always “safer sex” or always tell your HIV status?
Once again, the HIV disclosure debate has heated up among prevention advocates, the media, and front-line sexually active men and women just trying to get laid. It all boils down to this: should sharing your status be morally mandatory, or does having protected sex...
Dixie Carter’s death leaves historic AIDS legacy.
In 1987, when nurses would still flip coins to see which would enter the room of an AIDS patient and politicians debated sending those with HIV to an isolated island, something truly remarkable happened. And the passing Friday of the great Dixie Carter, 70, is a fine...
Expert bloggers discuss Miley Nascar Porn!
When all the planets in our solar system align, you either get Mayan-themed global disaster, or you get... this. The leading queer bloggers in the country, a virtual hall of presidents, together on one stage. Such was the scene at the Gay and Lesbian Literary Arts...
Smokin’ Kraken: Why gay men love monsters.
Long before the Big Moment in the shamelessly delightful "Clash of the Titans" remake, somewhere between the Winnebago-sized scorpions and the fatal gaze of a slithering Medusa, it occurred to me that I've been squealing with delight at monsters longer than, well,...
Did the Bareback Time Machine kill Chad Noel?
Among the many online condolences to the family of Chad Noel ("Jim and Bonnie, so sorry to hear of the loss of your son...") are glimpses of the boy this young man was, while growing up in the ironic hometown of Laramie, Wyoming (where Matthew Shepard lived and...
Gay Otter Love: “Thus with a kiss, I die.”
Romeo and Juliet they were not. For, dear reader, they were but Otters, they of fur and fang. And hark! Hear more! For Juliet wouldst find no sister here, for these loves were brave and happy males! An otter typically lives to a ripe old age of 14, at the outside. But...
Tracking the elusive “bug chasers” of HIV
"I (have) always hated any suggestion that AIDS was a gift. A Mercedes is a gift." -- Mark S. King, "A Place Like This," pg. 180 I must admit my belief that bug-chasers are an extremely elusive and exotic form of pervert that aren't as much seen as talked about. For...
Win a car, bed a star in “a place like this…”
When I was nineteen years old, I vacationed to Los Angeles and won a car on "The Price is Right." And so begins my first book, "A Place Like This," about my years in 1980's Los Angeles. The book has been on my mind lately because of my work preparing a new one. Since...
“The Clap” is becoming The Applause!
After living with HIV infection for nearly 30 years, the thought of acquiring an STD like gonorrhea makes me feel... nostalgic. But my flip attitude may be put to the test by a recent report at the Society for General Microbiology's spring meeting in Edinburgh,...
We’re AIDS walking “post-crisis.”
While attending the South Florida AIDS Walk yesterday I was struck with the obvious. These walks just aren't what they used to be, and neither is the HIV/AIDS crisis. In fact, "crisis" is hardly a word to describe it anymore. This isn't simply about the fact that, for...
In My Humble, Closeted Opinion
This is the story of how one AIDS activist sold his soul for sixty bucks. Being queer can be expensive -- you never know when you may need to dash to The Gap for some damn thing. Or renew Vanity Fair. So I was happy to get on a list for a marketing company that would...
Facing Change
I recently made the move from my beloved Atlanta back to Fort Lauderdale, and it's been tough saying goodbye to my friends, my doctor and my support system. And the physical act of moving is hard. I've had to decide what is worth keeping and what to finally give up....
Medicare to pay for facial wasting treatments
In what may be seen as a controversial decision by some, the U.S. Medicare program will begin paying for facial filler treatments for HIV patients who have experienced the loss of fat in their face (facial lipoatrophy). The catch: those patients must not only be...
Scholarships exhausted for HIV Cruise Retreat
Well, they went faster than plasma TV sets on Black Friday. The capacity for financial assistance for fare on the HIV Cruise Retreat has been exceeded, and it's nice to know that the organizers will be able to assist some folks with expenses. Remember, the cruise...
Health Care Reform saves HIV-positive lives!
After decades of inaction, a year of work, unparalleled Republican obstruction and no small amount of leadership by President Obama, health care reform soon will be law. This bill will save lives. Millions who don't have health coverage now will. And insurance...
Anita came out to play last night…
Sometimes the old girl busts out of her shell (how she breathes stuffed in a gym bag in the back of the closet I'll never know) and takes the stage. She got her chance last night, when my drag alter ego brought some laughs to a group of friends in recovery with her...
There’s something exciting about this blog… It’s Alive!
This is a very exciting moment for me. After weeks of work, this blog site is going live. And since it's awards season, allow me to thank some people you might enjoying knowing. If you ever have a web site or design project that needs a patient and creative set of...
I’m MC’ing the HIV Cruise this October!
Warning: Very excited aging poz queen here. I'm so thrilled I'm leaking t-cells. I have the pleasure to announce that the coordinators of the annual HIV Cruise Retreat have invited me to join the voyage this year as M.C. I am humbled, flattered, and just plain damn...
Guess who’s headed to Vienna!
TheBody.com, the great HIV resource site that premieres each episode of the "My Fabulous Disease" videos, has invited me to join them in Vienna, Austria this summer for AIDS 2010, the international AIDS conference. I'll be blogging live from the event and also...
My interview on serosorting for HIV Plus Magazine
This month HIV Plus Magazine ran an article on serosorting, or the process in which people limit their sexual partners to those with the same HIV status (I'm quoted as part of the piece). As you might imagine, it's a controversial practice and hardly perfect. But what...
The Real Poz Guys of Atlanta
Social support means a lot when you're living with HIV/AIDS, especially from friends who tease you, insult you, feed you, and share their secrets with you. Once again, pals Craig, James, Eric and Antron came for an evening of laughs, chocolate and soul bearing (they...
Anita Mann performs “Funkytown” with the Armorettes
Back in 1997, while performing with The Armorettes (who still have a weekly show raising money for people with HIV/AIDS in Atlanta), I created the first of Anita Mann's signature act with this, a fun house freak-out of a number, "Funkytown" (also featuring the great...
Video promo for “Night of the Living Dead” on stage
My brother, Dick King, directed a stage production of "Night of the Living Dead" and asked me to re-create scenes from the movie on video, using the stage actors. What zombie horror movie fan could refuse? This project was a blast. Dick and I also did a television...
Chris Glaser leads the 2009 Atlanta Pride Parade
For more than ten years I had the pleasure of being the significant other of Rev. Chris Glaser, who has devoted his life to reconciling gay and lesbian people and the church. He's also a best selling author ("Uncommon Calling," "Coming Out to God") and speaker. In...
Talking zombies on the morning news
Since helping re-create scenes from "Night of the Living Dead" is too much fun to pass up, I visited Shreveport, Louisiana to help my brother Dick mount a production of the zombie classic. Here, I'm interviewed on the morning news while Dick clowns around as the late,...
Anita Mann as “Miss Pink Cloud”
My drag queen alter ego first appeared while in recovery at this event, which raised funds for Hotlanta Roundup, an annual gathering of gay and lesbian folks in recovery from drugs and alcohol. Here, Anita vies for the title "Miss Pink Cloud," and later in the evening...
Anita Mann’s infamous TV Set Number
Set to Nancy Lamott's "Don't Get Around Much Anymore," my drag queen alter ego battles herself locked in a TV set in this, her finest hour on stage. This performance was taped at a fund raiser for gay and lesbians in recovery from drugs an alcohol, since Anita (and I)...
My television commercials from the 1980s
In my distant youth, I did television commercials as a young actor in Los Angeles (described in my book "A Place Like This"). I specialized in nerd, dorks and geeks, as this video clearly demonstrates. Everything from McDonald's (the director kept asking me to place...
Winning a car on The Price is Right in 1980
I was a 19 year old gay man on vacation with my boyfriend Charlie (that's him in the audience in the matching outfit), and Bob Barker asks, "Do you have a girlfriend?" It's 1980, people, so don't expect me to have come screaming out of the closet on national...
Treating My Facial Wasting: An Update
Told more from the perspective of Dr. Gerald Pierone, this video takes you along on my third visit for facial fillers to treat my wasting (lipoatrophy) with Sculptra and Radiesse. Hope you're not afraid of needles.
Serosorting and Gay Sex Clubs
By far the most viewed episode of the series so far (was it the guided tour of a sex club? Hmm. I wonder.). Since serosorting (limiting ones sex partners to those with the same HIV status) has been written and discussed a lot lately, I interviewed Bill from...
Drag and Gratitude
My drag alter ego Anita Mann comes out to play in this video episode from December of 2009, when she read "Twas the Night Before Christmas" at a fund raising event for gay and lesbian friends in recovery. Just remember: we all have gifts in our bag. Why did I waste so...
When My T-cells are Old and Gray (original version)
Does surviving HIV infection for 25 years mean having the right to complain about getting older? In this funny and insightful episode from December 2009, I discuss Donny Osmond, butt padding and becoming an irrelevant, aging gay man by arguing with my younger, selfish...
You Gotta Have Friends
Is there anything more important than social support when living with HIV or AIDS? Four of my friends spent an evening comparing notes (and telling secrets) about sex, disclosure, and what our Moms thought about our HIV status in this video episode from April 2009. My...
Treating My Facial Wasting
After dealing with facial lipoatrophy (wasting) and seeing it so evident in my videos, I decided to do something about it by visiting Dr. Gerald Pierone in Vero Beach, FL and being treated with injections of facial fillers. Facial wasting and fat displacement are...
Mark’s R-Rated Sex Pig Blog
Barebacking, glory holes, casual sex and disclosing my HIV status are all discussed in this funny, provocative episode from January of 2009. Aging and negotiating sex as a gay man is as funny as it is frustrating, if you ask me. If you're new here, you'll wonder why...
The Drug Addict Takes a Holiday
Long after my former partner Ben ended our relationship when I ended up in drug rehab, I visited him in the home we had shared in Ft Lauderdale and tried to make sense of our past -- and what may happen in our future. This video from January of 2009 was a real...
Taking Care of Hal
I never dreamed I would be spending two months in Michigan helping my oldest brother through chemotherapy. But it got me outside of my head, beyond my own HIV diagnosis, and helped me focus on helping someone else. Sometimes, that's the best medicine of all.
Oprah Comes Calling
In this episode of my ongoing video series, Oprah reaches out to touch... me! It leads to bittersweet memories of Louise Hay (the "Hayrides" of the 1980s in West Hollywood), and of my gay brother Dick and his partner's struggle with AIDS. Also, I get an annual...
The premiere episode of “My Fabulous Disease”
In September of 2008, my video series "My Fabulous Disease" debuted on the best HIV resource on the net, TheBody.com. Here is that episode, which introduces me as a gay man in recovery living with HIV/AIDS.
Mauled Eagle ~ I love the Atlanta Eagle, but our community shouldn’t protest the police raid.
Click Here to read news clipping.
TheBody.com publishes an emotional interview with Mark about the early years of the AIDS epidemic in LA.
Click Here to go to the TheBody.com.
DRUGS, (phone)SEX, & ROCK (hudson).
As seen in David Atlanta.
The first review in print of Mark’s book!
Find out what this critic had to say... As it appeared in Southern Voice newspaper, January 18, 2008
Dirty Little Secret
How addiction to crystal methamphetamine is threatening the gay community's long struggle to turn a corner on the AIDS epidemic. As seen in Newsweek
Southern Voice columnist and Atlanta resident Mark King tells of his addiction in the film “Meth”.
Click Here to read Confessions of a tina queen.
