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The stigma of HIV

sleazenation

23:07 / 29.01.05

Shortly after the revelation that Nelson Mandela's last surviving son has died of AIDS, British MP and former minister, Chris Smith has announced that he has been HIV positive for the last 17 years details here. Smith, who is due to stand down at the next election, has said that Mr Mandela's call for an end to the stigma surrounding AIDS, made after the death of his 54-year-old son Makgatho, had prompted him to speak out.

So, what do people think? Is this an important move to both decrease the stigma of HIV/AIDS and show to the world that it is not just something that affects Africa? Or is it a sign of how far we still have to travel seeing as Smith only appears willing to make this revelation at the end of his political career? Should he have revealed his medical condition earlier?

Tryphena Absent

23:29 / 29.01.05

Good for Chris Smith! I'm surprised he spoke out at all and I don't think we've really got a right to criticise him for keeping it to himself... but it's not a bad thing that someone who's been a cabinet minister would reveal this.

sleazenation

23:55 / 29.01.05

Certainly it makes it that much easier for an MP who isn't quitting at the next election to stand up and say that they also are HIV Positive. And lest we forget it has only been comparative recently that MP's have felt able to be open about their sexuality - Chris Smith does have the distinction of being Britain's first openly gay MP. But does this last fact help or hinder the cause for grater acceptence for people with HIV and AIDS?

Tryphena Absent

13:22 / 30.01.05

I'm not sure that people will realise how few openly gay MPs there are. Homosexuality is so talked about and talked up (in the South East anyway) that most of the people I know will probably think there are more and that can only serve in the favour of an event like this. And that's because it is negative to realise that Chris Smith is HIV+ but only if you're reading the tabloids.

Bill Posters

18:15 / 07.02.05

I'm surprised he spoke out at all

as was I, until I read in Private Eye that the Daily Hate Mail had planned to out him anyway. (So much for Mandela's son being an inspiration...)

Alex's Grandma

19:06 / 07.02.05

Yeah, he had to say something, it appears.

Although it hopefully goes without saying that Teh Mail had no business investigating 'that story' in the first place. Really, what on earth would possess you, as a hard-working journo with a family to feed, and all the rest of the tiring platitudes these characters routinely trot out to justify their appalling behaviour, to, even so, set out to attack, and publicly humiliate, somebody with a potentially terminal illness ?

Our Lady Has Left the Building

14:05 / 08.02.05

Because you work for the Daily Mail, you have a vicious right-wing Conservative vaguely Christian agenda, you want women to stop thinking they have a right to equal opportunities and to get back in the kitchen and have babies, and you'd like all gays quietly shot. As it's not sensible in todays wishy-washy liberal environment to say such things you'll just keep doing reports about how women who even think of wearing trousers will go bald, get prostate cancer and a beer belly and make sure that anyone reading knows GAY = AIDS.

Jack The Bodiless

11:27 / 22.02.05

Yes. That's right. Everyone working for the Mail is exactly like that.

ONLY NICE THINGS

00:41 / 23.02.05

Wayull... you can say that the Daily Mail has a specific editorial slant, and that anyone writing for the Daily Mail is likely going to have to follow that editorial slant, no matter how closely they resemble your own views. Fair?

Tom Coates

06:51 / 23.02.05

I'm quite conflicted about this one. Firstly, of course, we should enormously respect the man for maintaining such a demanding job - and I think politically the main benefit of that is that it'll help change the image of people with HIV as just waiting to die. So in that way, it's tremendously positive.

I have to confess though, that I do also think it reinforces the link between gay people and HIV in that the first out gay MP is HIV positive. Shamefully part of me wishes he was straight.

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