High life
The Aids syndrome
Taki
kay it's an ugly subject, but so many high-lifers are dying from it, I think it's about time I broke silence and said my bit about Aids. First of all it's time for a little common-sense. It is not an accident that this disease has emerged as a public health menace. It is due solely to the peculiar `lifestyle' practised by homosexuals. As Larry Kramer, a founder of the Gay Men's Health Crisis, says, it was the homosexual political movement of the Sixties and Seventies that 'legitimised' promiscuity, that is the main cause. In fact it is because of political pressures that the disease is gaining. Just think of it. If lepers used bathhouses, they would be closed. When other infectious diseases are a potential threat to society, quarantines are imposed. Yet when sane people demand the closing of the New York City bathhouses they are described by the liberal newspapers as waging a violent campaign against homosexuals.
It is probably the first time in history that a potentially catastrophic disease has not led to public measures for control. Which demonstrates the political clout of homo- sexuals in America, and the weakness of the liberal media on that particular issue. The freedom demanded by homosexuals in the Seventies — the very same one that was granted to them by gutless politicians trying to get minority groups on their side — is the one that jeopardises public health and security. And before anyone from the Gay Liberation Defence League throws a bomb at 56 Doughty Street, let me add that these same gutless pols are still pulling their punches, and mincing their words. For example, they are afraid to come straight out with the fact that extreme promiscuity has led to the Aids epidemic. In an age where there is ubiquitous por- nography, expletive language in every movie and rock disc, and full-frontal sex on cable television at home, the yellow- streaked pols that lead us are refusing to say that Aids is a disease caught by men who bugger and are buggered by dozens or even hundreds of other men every year. The ironic part is that these very same men are the ones who have been fighting successfully in many cities to prevent clos- ing down the bathhouses which are the main centres of promiscuous buggery. Worse, instead of assuming responsibility for their own sexual habits, they demand that society undertake all sorts of crash programmes in order to find a quick cure so they can resort to their old habits, with impunity this time. I say that society's first concern should be protecting the innocent — people like haemophiliacs, for example, or the young who are born infected — by making an Aids test mandatory. There is a syphilis test before marriage, there should be one for Aids too. Especially where blood donors are concerned.
The only good thing to emerge from this dreadful disease is that it has made for interesting dinner conversation among the smart set. Even in Hollywood people have stopped talking about movies and are talking about people who might be car- riers. Needless to say, the rumours going around are fascinating. They also lead to people getting off diets and putting on weight instead. My good friend Mario Buatta, a decorator of note (he did my New York house and didn't screw me, either) is a perfect case in point. Mario is as heterosexual as I am, but had the misfor- tune of deciding to go on a crash diet as his 50th birthday was approaching earlier this year. He lost 50 pounds. He also lost a hell of a lot of social friends who panicked and ran. Where once upon a time he couldn't spare two minutes for his poor little Greek friend, he now calls and offers himself for both lunch and dinner. In the meantime he has taken my advice and is putting back on some of the weight. 'No man is an island,' was the way he put it over the telephone.
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