On Nov. 17, Charlie Sheen came out on national TV as HIV-positive. He’s a troubled actor often given to drug-fueled antics that cause him to run afoul of the law or the press, and mainstream media has scrambled to paint this news in the worst possible light. Of course, this is a gross violation of someone’s private health information. But to many people, HIVis so salacious, it’s hard to stay quiet.
I personally don’t care about Sheen. However, the narratives being established about his disease are very troubling, not to mention harmful, to the average person living with HIV in the U.S. Frankly, the coverage of his announcement has been so bad, it might as well be from 1985, during the earliest, most fear-mongering years of the HIV epidemic. While those days may be gone, HIV is still a reality for many.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports there are more than 1.2 million people living with the virus in the U.S.
While tabloids and other outlets may be scrambling to publish gritty details about Sheen’s health and sex practices, HIV advocates and activists want people to understand we have to be careful how we talk about the virus and people who are hiv-positive, sometimes called “seropositive.” This is important for the average hiv-negative person, who may not know how to speak about the issue. Here are some handy talking points from people living with hiv about how to discuss someone’s status.
Nobody deserves HIV.
I’ve seen people on social media proclaim that Sheen deserves to have HIVbecause he’s a self-admitted drug user. Some think if anyone should catch the disease, it should be someone like him.
This is, of course, ridiculous. Addiction is tough and is even tougher when dealing with a lifelong, complicated, potential deadly virus. HIV can make recovery a lot harder. There can be feelings of shame and disgust impeding steps toward sobriety. Trust me on this.
Additionally, people don’t deserve HIV based on how many sex partners they’ve had. The virus is caught through one exposure, not by being exposed to it many times. Additionally, sex is not only good but good for you.
Saying someone with HIVdeserves it because they have a lot of sex is puritanical and stigmatizing.
Calling HIV AIDS is wrong and hurtful.
It feels ludicrous to say this in 2015, but HIV is not AIDS. AIDS is a condition caused by hiv. aids just means that the body has been unable to fight off HIV, and opportunistic infections are occurring due to the body’s lack of immunity.
AIDS can feel scary. I was close to an AIDS diagnosis once, and it was an awful feeling. AIDS is a word that can mean death. It’s not a term to throw around lightly. Early stories that Sheen, who had previously dealt with HIV privately, was perpetuating an AIDS “cover-up” is inexcusable, especially since the majority of “poz” people being treated in the U.S. today are healthy.
Which brings me to:
Gossiping about one person’s HIV status is harmful to everyone.
Let’s be real. Your private health information is not my business. If you have cancer, diabetes or Crohn’s disease, most people will respect your privacy.
Not so with HIV. Before I tested positive, I was guilty of gossiping, and you may be, too. This hurts people living with HIV. The more we treat it as gossip, the more people spread the idea that hiv is scary, shameful and bad.
My disease is not bad. I am not ashamed of it, and you shouldn’t be scared of me. However, I face not only social rejection but also legal repercussions due to HIV stigma. In Washington state, someone can accuse me of not disclosing my status before sex, and I can be jailed.
Stigmatizing discussions of HIV not only make life hard for HIV-positive folks but have repercussions for those who aren’t. It discourages people from getting tested and finding out they may carry the virus. The CDC reports that more than 156,000 people in the U.S. are unaware they’re positive. People are more infectious when they don’t get treatment.
Whatever you think about Sheen, we have to understand how to talk (or not talk) about his HIV . If you know someone who’s doing it incorrectly, you can be sure that person is talking the same way about someone else.
That’s dangerous.
So think about what you say and encourage others to do the same. There are lives at risk.