Cape, Tights & Undies Outside

If I could be any superhero in the world, I think my name would be The Rainbow Warrior. Even though I'm not one of those loud-and-proud kind of guys or even a flaming queen by any means, I'm very proud of being gay. When Chip and Reichen, two gay lovers, won series four of The Amazing Race, I leapt out of my seat and let out a triumphant roar. And when Anthony Callea finally came out (seriously though, who didn't know?), his act of courage so filled me with pride that my eyes welled up with tears. While I wouldn't be the first to volunteer to front the gay pride march, when it comes to defending the gay commmunity, you can't shut me up because I find every argument against homosexuality completely spurious and motivated by either lack of understanding or hatred.

But yesterday, I stumbled upon a subject that completely made my stomach turn and, dare I say it, feel shame for the gay community: Bug Chasing. No, Bug Chasing does not involve entomologists scouring the Amazon for new species of creepy-crawlies. It's when guys go out and bareback with the intention of being infected with HIV. You have the Bug Chaser (the HIV- guy who wants to be infected) and the Gift Giver (the HIV+ guy who will infect the Chaser). The whole concept is completely insane. But that's not the worst of it. This is where it gets really sick. There are events called Bug Parties. At Bug Parties, there is the host and the participants. There are a couple of variations to the set-up but a particularly sickening one of is where there is one HIV+ man amidst the crowd, whose status is only known to himself and the host. The remaining participants are HIV- but are aware that there is a Gift Giver among them. The crowd then participates in an orgy of unprotected sex. And so the night ends with one or more participants possibly contracting the virus.

There are cases where men deliberately place their partner at risk by not divulging their HIV status to them. One such case is Michael Neal, a 48 year-old Coburg man who not only lied about his HIV status but also admitted to deliberately attempting to infect other men with the virus. The reason for his actions? To breed the virus and widen the pool of men with which he can engage in unprotected sex. To me, people who deliberately infect others should be immediately castrated as punishment and prevention of further infection. But this case is different to Bug Chasing in that his partners did not actively seek to be infected.

So why on earth would anyone want to be infected with HIV? There are a number of factors that may explain why there are Chasers out there. One theory postulates that some men live with significant anxiety and feel that HIV infection is an inevitability. So they actively seek to be infected to 'get it over and done with'. In The Gift, a documentary about the Bug Chasing culture, one character says, "I was relieved, I didn't have to worry anymore. Do I need to be careful? Not anymore."

Another possible explanation attributes the Chasers' psychology to upbringing. Gay men grew up as boys who have always felt isolated and different from everyone else. Since HIV is almost synonymous with being gay, they feel that having the virus is like an initiation into an exclusive club; a matter of feeling like they belong. Then there's lack of education or a misunderstanding about the nature of the course of HIV/AIDS. Since the advent of antiretroviral therapy (ART), many people perceive HIV infection as a disease that can be held in check simply by taking a few pills. So fear of the illness has slowly dwindled over the years. Unfortunately they don't understand that there are different strains of the virus, with different levels of susceptibility to ART and can lead to different degrees of the disease's severity. Furthermore, the virus may become drug-resistant, therefore leading to a disease-state that is very difficult to manage or no longer manageable.

The culmination of these latter two factors is embodied in Doug, a character also featured in The Gift. Doug moved from America's homophobic mid-west to San Franscisco in search of the gay community. There, he became a Bug Chaser and when he was infected with the virus, he felt a sense of finally belonging to a community. Unfortunately he is now trying to cope with the unexpected severity of his illness.

The fact that there is this sickening sub-culture amidst an already ostracised and misunderstood community brings up so many mixed emotions in me. Many gay men feel or have felt an intense angst of loneliness, guilt and self-loathing when coming to terms with who he is because he was raised to believe that he is 'incorrect'. So on the one hand, I'm saddened that this bottled-up angst manifests itself through self-destructive activity. But on the other hand, I am angry that instead of building a positive and constructive face for the community where we are each others' keepers, there are those that choose to self-destruct, adding fuel for further misunderstanding from the rest of society. So this vicious circle continues.

I once said that I am a happy gay man because I refuse to accept society's irrational doctrine that gay men are warped and twisted (see entry: BB & P'n'P). But I shouldn't blame all of the gay community's problems on the way we are receieved by the rest of the world, especially now we are more widely accepted and welcomed than ever before. After all, we have to accept at least partial responsibility for our actions. But I wonder, what would happen if the blanket of disdain was lifted from us completely? Until then, I only wish I could don some tights and a cape and fly all over the world to protect my brothers from harm.

Karmic Return

What goes around comes around. That's a saying that's been ingrained in us since the budding of our consciousness. I've always thought that's a weird way to teach kids about honesty and generosity because it implies that acts of kindness are motivated by fear of retribution delivered by the rebalancing of the cosmos. But it works. Whatever the motivation for goodwill, as long as goodwill exists, the world is a better place.

I was out shopping for Christmas presents today. I don't care what anyone says, shopping can be exhausting, especially if you're scouring every inch of the city streets on an empty stomach and only two hours of sleep, searching for that perfect gift that holds still the precarious balance between functionality and sentimentality. But of course, it is still a fun experience nonetheless, despite the blow to the hip pocket.

So weary-eyed with tired legs, my friends and I relaxed our feet at a sushi bar to tuck into our dinner for the day. After the splurge, we put everything down, let all the weariness melt away the moment contact was made with our seats and partook in the act of exchanging the daily happenings and gossip of not only the day but the events of the week that has passed. This act of bonding and relaxation is certainly welcoming and blissful enough to make you forget all your world-weary blues.

After re-fuelling, we picked up our bags and were ready to leave. "But what is this?" I thought to myself when I was at the counter paying the bill when a strange fellow tapped me on the shoulder and asked me, "Is this yours?" He handed me my very expensive Prada sunglasses that I had absent-mindedly left at the sushi bar amidst the hubbub of conversation and mirth. I will leave justification for making such an exorbitant purchase on a novelty item for another blog entry. Suffice to say, I would have felt a lampoon shoot through my heart if my little piece of European designer-wear was forever lost in that sea of wasabi and raw fish.

My immediate thought was, "That was incredibly kind of him," a sentiment shared by my friends as well. He could've walked off with my prized sunglasses. But instead he showed some goodwill and empathy for a fellow human being and returned them to me.

Despite the cynicism with which I eye the world, this single act of honesty has somewhat restored a little of my faith that goodness does exist out there, even if it is a rare commodity. Perhaps what I'm feeling is hope. But that's not to say I'm blinded by this kind gesture; I will still lock the front door before I retire at the end of a long but glorious day.