Tamar W. Carroll
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- January 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781469619880
- eISBN:
- 9781469619903
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of North Carolina Press
- DOI:
- 10.5149/northcarolina/9781469619880.003.0005
- Subject:
- Sociology, Urban and Rural Studies
This chapter demonstrates how ACT UP created a supportive queer community for people infected by HIV, as well as how the group changed the nation's response to the AIDS crisis. Through its art and ...
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This chapter demonstrates how ACT UP created a supportive queer community for people infected by HIV, as well as how the group changed the nation's response to the AIDS crisis. Through its art and actions, ACT UP developed an oppositional understanding of AIDS that rejected homophobia and sexual shame and instead called for universal health care and sexual privacy as human rights. Unlike MFY or NCNW, ACT UP generated a community based on affiliation, shared consciousness, and desire. ACT UP members embraced a fluid rather than fixed sexual identity, embracing the term “queer” to signify their rejection of normative sexuality, jettisoning binary understandings of sex and gender.Less
This chapter demonstrates how ACT UP created a supportive queer community for people infected by HIV, as well as how the group changed the nation's response to the AIDS crisis. Through its art and actions, ACT UP developed an oppositional understanding of AIDS that rejected homophobia and sexual shame and instead called for universal health care and sexual privacy as human rights. Unlike MFY or NCNW, ACT UP generated a community based on affiliation, shared consciousness, and desire. ACT UP members embraced a fluid rather than fixed sexual identity, embracing the term “queer” to signify their rejection of normative sexuality, jettisoning binary understandings of sex and gender.
Emily K. Hobson
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- May 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780520279056
- eISBN:
- 9780520965706
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520279056.003.0007
- Subject:
- History, American History: 20th Century
Although AIDS direct action is generally described as beginning with ACT UP, it first developed as activists drew tactics and ideas from Central American solidarity and the anti-nuclear movement. ...
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Although AIDS direct action is generally described as beginning with ACT UP, it first developed as activists drew tactics and ideas from Central American solidarity and the anti-nuclear movement. Anti-militarism catalyzed AIDS direct action in the Bay Area; its influences appeared in 1984, took on force in 1986, and by 1987 shaped national networks of AIDS activism. The groups Citizens for Medical Justice and the AIDS Action Pledge paved the way for the formation of ACT UP/San Francisco and Stop AIDS Now Or Else. AIDS direct action stood as the culmination of the gay and lesbian left even as it marked the start of a new queer politics. However, these radical genealogies were obscured with the deaths of many activists.Less
Although AIDS direct action is generally described as beginning with ACT UP, it first developed as activists drew tactics and ideas from Central American solidarity and the anti-nuclear movement. Anti-militarism catalyzed AIDS direct action in the Bay Area; its influences appeared in 1984, took on force in 1986, and by 1987 shaped national networks of AIDS activism. The groups Citizens for Medical Justice and the AIDS Action Pledge paved the way for the formation of ACT UP/San Francisco and Stop AIDS Now Or Else. AIDS direct action stood as the culmination of the gay and lesbian left even as it marked the start of a new queer politics. However, these radical genealogies were obscured with the deaths of many activists.
Tamar W. Carroll
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- January 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781469619880
- eISBN:
- 9781469619903
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of North Carolina Press
- DOI:
- 10.5149/northcarolina/9781469619880.003.0006
- Subject:
- Sociology, Urban and Rural Studies
This chapter explores coalition between two reproductive rights activist groups—ACT UP and WHAM!. The two work for improved prevention and treatment for HIV/AIDS, and support women's rights to bodily ...
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This chapter explores coalition between two reproductive rights activist groups—ACT UP and WHAM!. The two work for improved prevention and treatment for HIV/AIDS, and support women's rights to bodily autonomy. In the early 1990s, Operation Rescue and other antiabortion groups barricaded women's health clinics in often successful attempts to close them. Just as ACT UP had rejected sexual shame in relation to the AIDS epidemic, WHAM! protested that women should not be made to feel ashamed for expressing their sexuality and controlling their reproduction, including via abortion. Through their demonstrations, WHAM! illustrated a different model for thinking about reproductive rights as a necessary part of health care for women and of access to high-quality health care as a human right.Less
This chapter explores coalition between two reproductive rights activist groups—ACT UP and WHAM!. The two work for improved prevention and treatment for HIV/AIDS, and support women's rights to bodily autonomy. In the early 1990s, Operation Rescue and other antiabortion groups barricaded women's health clinics in often successful attempts to close them. Just as ACT UP had rejected sexual shame in relation to the AIDS epidemic, WHAM! protested that women should not be made to feel ashamed for expressing their sexuality and controlling their reproduction, including via abortion. Through their demonstrations, WHAM! illustrated a different model for thinking about reproductive rights as a necessary part of health care for women and of access to high-quality health care as a human right.
Jeremiah J. Garretson
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- January 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781479822133
- eISBN:
- 9781479824236
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9781479822133.003.0003
- Subject:
- Political Science, American Politics
The historical narrative of the book starts in this chapter through a recap of the primary events in LGBTQ movement history in the United States leading up to the 1990s. The origin of the concept of ...
More
The historical narrative of the book starts in this chapter through a recap of the primary events in LGBTQ movement history in the United States leading up to the 1990s. The origin of the concept of ‘homosexuals’ in the medical research of the late 1890s, the firing of lesbians and gays during the Cold War for fears of communist association, the founding of Mattachine society, the development of distinctive lesbian and gay subcultures and urban communities in the 1970s, and the rise of AIDS and the LGBTQ community’s response in the form of ACT-UP in the 1980s are all discussed. ACT-UP’s response to the crisis proved to decisive turning-point in LGBTQ history. The chapter ends by presenting data showing that, by targeting the national news media, ACT-UP normalized media coverage of AIDS and LGBTQ issues, leading to increases in coming out.Less
The historical narrative of the book starts in this chapter through a recap of the primary events in LGBTQ movement history in the United States leading up to the 1990s. The origin of the concept of ‘homosexuals’ in the medical research of the late 1890s, the firing of lesbians and gays during the Cold War for fears of communist association, the founding of Mattachine society, the development of distinctive lesbian and gay subcultures and urban communities in the 1970s, and the rise of AIDS and the LGBTQ community’s response in the form of ACT-UP in the 1980s are all discussed. ACT-UP’s response to the crisis proved to decisive turning-point in LGBTQ history. The chapter ends by presenting data showing that, by targeting the national news media, ACT-UP normalized media coverage of AIDS and LGBTQ issues, leading to increases in coming out.
Tamar W. Carroll
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- January 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781469619880
- eISBN:
- 9781469619903
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of North Carolina Press
- DOI:
- 10.5149/northcarolina/9781469619880.003.0008
- Subject:
- Sociology, Urban and Rural Studies
This introductory chapter explains how social activism in New York has been able to appropriate new meaning to the city's landmarks, specifically the joint protest of the AIDS Coalition to Unleash ...
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This introductory chapter explains how social activism in New York has been able to appropriate new meaning to the city's landmarks, specifically the joint protest of the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP) and the Women's Health Action and Mobilization (WHAM!) against a domestic ban on abortion, held on top of the Statue of Liberty. By selecting the Statue of Liberty as the site of their protest, these activists ensured that Americans would rapidly understand the connection they were drawing between individual freedom, misunderstandings of American exceptionalism, as well as women's reproductive autonomy. In relation to this, New York's many landmarks gave a range of unique venues for activism. Demonstrations, marches, strikes, acts of civil disobedience, and even poster campaigns provided global reach as print, broadcast, and online media inform the greater public.Less
This introductory chapter explains how social activism in New York has been able to appropriate new meaning to the city's landmarks, specifically the joint protest of the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP) and the Women's Health Action and Mobilization (WHAM!) against a domestic ban on abortion, held on top of the Statue of Liberty. By selecting the Statue of Liberty as the site of their protest, these activists ensured that Americans would rapidly understand the connection they were drawing between individual freedom, misunderstandings of American exceptionalism, as well as women's reproductive autonomy. In relation to this, New York's many landmarks gave a range of unique venues for activism. Demonstrations, marches, strikes, acts of civil disobedience, and even poster campaigns provided global reach as print, broadcast, and online media inform the greater public.
Tamar W. Carroll
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- January 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781469619880
- eISBN:
- 9781469619903
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of North Carolina Press
- DOI:
- 10.5149/northcarolina/9781469619880.001.0001
- Subject:
- Sociology, Urban and Rural Studies
Examining three interconnected case studies, this book demonstrates the ability of grassroots community activism to bridge racial and cultural differences and effect social change. Drawing on an ...
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Examining three interconnected case studies, this book demonstrates the ability of grassroots community activism to bridge racial and cultural differences and effect social change. Drawing on an array of oral histories, archival records, newspapers, films, and photographs from post-World War II New York City, the text shows how poor people transformed the antipoverty organization Mobilization for Youth and shaped the subsequent War on Poverty. Highlighting the little-known National Congress of Neighborhood Women, it reveals the significant participation of working-class white ethnic women and women of color in New York City's feminist activism. Finally, the text traces the partnership between the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP) and Women's Health Action Mobilization (WHAM!), showing how gay men and feminists collaborated to create a supportive community for those affected by the AIDS epidemic, to improve health care, and to oppose homophobia and misogyny during the culture wars of the 1980s and 1990s. The book contends that social policies that encourage the political mobilization of marginalized groups and foster coalitions across identity differences are the most effective means of solving social problems and realizing democracy.Less
Examining three interconnected case studies, this book demonstrates the ability of grassroots community activism to bridge racial and cultural differences and effect social change. Drawing on an array of oral histories, archival records, newspapers, films, and photographs from post-World War II New York City, the text shows how poor people transformed the antipoverty organization Mobilization for Youth and shaped the subsequent War on Poverty. Highlighting the little-known National Congress of Neighborhood Women, it reveals the significant participation of working-class white ethnic women and women of color in New York City's feminist activism. Finally, the text traces the partnership between the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP) and Women's Health Action Mobilization (WHAM!), showing how gay men and feminists collaborated to create a supportive community for those affected by the AIDS epidemic, to improve health care, and to oppose homophobia and misogyny during the culture wars of the 1980s and 1990s. The book contends that social policies that encourage the political mobilization of marginalized groups and foster coalitions across identity differences are the most effective means of solving social problems and realizing democracy.
Jeremiah J. Garretson
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- January 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781479822133
- eISBN:
- 9781479824236
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9781479822133.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, American Politics
Why Tolerance Triumphed is the first accessible, data-driven account of how the LGBTQ movement achieved its most unexpected victory---the liberalization of mass opinion on gay rights. The current ...
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Why Tolerance Triumphed is the first accessible, data-driven account of how the LGBTQ movement achieved its most unexpected victory---the liberalization of mass opinion on gay rights. The current academic understanding of how social movements change mass opinion---through sympathetic media coverage and endorsements from political leaders---cannot provide an adequate explanation for the phenomenal success of the LGBTQ movement at changing the public’s views. The book argues that these factors were not the direct cause of changing attitudes, but contributed indirectly by signalling to other LGBTQ people across the United States that their lives were valued. The net result was a huge increase in the number of LGBTQ people who ‘came out’ and lived their lives openly. Building on recent breakthroughs in social and political psychology, the study introduces the theory of Affective Liberalization. This theory states that meeting and interacting with lesbians and gays in person---or by watching lesbian and gay characters via entertainment media---leads to more durable attitude change by subtly warming peoples’ subconscious reactions to lesbians and gays. Using expansive date-sets and cutting edge social science methods, the book finds that increased exposure to LGBTQ people, triggered by ACT-UP’s activism, provides a singular, compelling and complete explanation for the success of the LGBTQ movement in changing mass opinion.Less
Why Tolerance Triumphed is the first accessible, data-driven account of how the LGBTQ movement achieved its most unexpected victory---the liberalization of mass opinion on gay rights. The current academic understanding of how social movements change mass opinion---through sympathetic media coverage and endorsements from political leaders---cannot provide an adequate explanation for the phenomenal success of the LGBTQ movement at changing the public’s views. The book argues that these factors were not the direct cause of changing attitudes, but contributed indirectly by signalling to other LGBTQ people across the United States that their lives were valued. The net result was a huge increase in the number of LGBTQ people who ‘came out’ and lived their lives openly. Building on recent breakthroughs in social and political psychology, the study introduces the theory of Affective Liberalization. This theory states that meeting and interacting with lesbians and gays in person---or by watching lesbian and gay characters via entertainment media---leads to more durable attitude change by subtly warming peoples’ subconscious reactions to lesbians and gays. Using expansive date-sets and cutting edge social science methods, the book finds that increased exposure to LGBTQ people, triggered by ACT-UP’s activism, provides a singular, compelling and complete explanation for the success of the LGBTQ movement in changing mass opinion.
Ramzi Fawaz
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- September 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781479814336
- eISBN:
- 9781479840021
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9781479814336.003.0007
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
Chapter 7 develops a case study of The New Mutants (1984), analyzing how in the late 1980s the series reinvented the trope of demonic possession as a metaphor for American historical ...
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Chapter 7 develops a case study of The New Mutants (1984), analyzing how in the late 1980s the series reinvented the trope of demonic possession as a metaphor for American historical atrocities—including Native American genocide, slavery, and imperialism—simultaneously reframing the superhero’s body as a map of the violence inflicted upon those excluded from the dominant narratives of American historical progress. Facing the demonic avatars of their individual histories as a collective force, the group’s members offered a novel conception of the superhero not as crime-fighter or icon of identity politics, but as a vehicle for forging political alliances across multiple axes of difference and diverse spiritual and ethical worldviews. Rather than depict a utopian mutant kinship based on shared genetic difference, The New Mutants presented its young characters in debate over the meaning and purpose of hero work, interpretations of the historical past, and multiple loyalties to kind and kin. It modeled a form of democratic practice between diverse superhuman characters that echoed the radical politics of contemporaneous social movements like ACT UP and early third wave feminism by presenting racial, sexual, and gender identities as flexible categories of affiliation open to rearticulation, rather than fixed biological realities.Less
Chapter 7 develops a case study of The New Mutants (1984), analyzing how in the late 1980s the series reinvented the trope of demonic possession as a metaphor for American historical atrocities—including Native American genocide, slavery, and imperialism—simultaneously reframing the superhero’s body as a map of the violence inflicted upon those excluded from the dominant narratives of American historical progress. Facing the demonic avatars of their individual histories as a collective force, the group’s members offered a novel conception of the superhero not as crime-fighter or icon of identity politics, but as a vehicle for forging political alliances across multiple axes of difference and diverse spiritual and ethical worldviews. Rather than depict a utopian mutant kinship based on shared genetic difference, The New Mutants presented its young characters in debate over the meaning and purpose of hero work, interpretations of the historical past, and multiple loyalties to kind and kin. It modeled a form of democratic practice between diverse superhuman characters that echoed the radical politics of contemporaneous social movements like ACT UP and early third wave feminism by presenting racial, sexual, and gender identities as flexible categories of affiliation open to rearticulation, rather than fixed biological realities.
Emily K. Hobson
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- May 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780520279056
- eISBN:
- 9780520965706
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520279056.003.0001
- Subject:
- History, American History: 20th Century
Narratives of the LGBT past have been constrained by exceptionalist narratives of Stonewall, the 1960s, and ACT UP. These narratives describe gay and lesbian radicalism as disappearing soon after ...
More
Narratives of the LGBT past have been constrained by exceptionalist narratives of Stonewall, the 1960s, and ACT UP. These narratives describe gay and lesbian radicalism as disappearing soon after 1969 and obscure the genealogies that fostered AIDS activism. The history of the gay and lesbian left counters these narratives, showing that across the 1970s and 1980s, radicals pursued an interconnected politics in which sexual liberation was the theory and radical solidarity the practice. Gay and lesbian leftists drew anti-imperialism from Black radicalism and the anti-war movement, engaged socialist and women of color feminisms, and redefined queer community by tying it to Central American solidarity. By the end of the Cold War these influences proved central to direct action against AIDS.Less
Narratives of the LGBT past have been constrained by exceptionalist narratives of Stonewall, the 1960s, and ACT UP. These narratives describe gay and lesbian radicalism as disappearing soon after 1969 and obscure the genealogies that fostered AIDS activism. The history of the gay and lesbian left counters these narratives, showing that across the 1970s and 1980s, radicals pursued an interconnected politics in which sexual liberation was the theory and radical solidarity the practice. Gay and lesbian leftists drew anti-imperialism from Black radicalism and the anti-war movement, engaged socialist and women of color feminisms, and redefined queer community by tying it to Central American solidarity. By the end of the Cold War these influences proved central to direct action against AIDS.
David L. Clark
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780823271030
- eISBN:
- 9780823271085
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Fordham University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5422/fordham/9780823271030.003.0006
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century Literature and Romanticism
Clark meditates on the Spanish artist’s “unsparing vision of the degradation of humanity.” Clark not only revisits the images of humiliation, torture, and horror that engraved in this series, he asks ...
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Clark meditates on the Spanish artist’s “unsparing vision of the degradation of humanity.” Clark not only revisits the images of humiliation, torture, and horror that engraved in this series, he asks what it means to “think Goya” today, a Goya who “imagines the worst and dwells with it.” Clark not only looks at the artist’s images but reads them, including the simple but arresting caption about seeing that Goya affixes to the engravings: “I saw it” (Yo lo vi). Clark’s Goya is the artist who not only confronts us with a horror to behold but who demands that we tarry uncomfortably with the images we behold and with the act of beholding. Clark concludes with a reflection on the notion of the political funeral of ACT UP as a form of mobilization profoundly proximate to the kind of thinking that Goya allows.Less
Clark meditates on the Spanish artist’s “unsparing vision of the degradation of humanity.” Clark not only revisits the images of humiliation, torture, and horror that engraved in this series, he asks what it means to “think Goya” today, a Goya who “imagines the worst and dwells with it.” Clark not only looks at the artist’s images but reads them, including the simple but arresting caption about seeing that Goya affixes to the engravings: “I saw it” (Yo lo vi). Clark’s Goya is the artist who not only confronts us with a horror to behold but who demands that we tarry uncomfortably with the images we behold and with the act of beholding. Clark concludes with a reflection on the notion of the political funeral of ACT UP as a form of mobilization profoundly proximate to the kind of thinking that Goya allows.
