by Alessandro Gherardi

My eyes are closed, my mouth is half-open, and my nose is just clear enough to be able to breathe. I lie here, buried in the midst of an expansive land, in an act of complete and utter liberation. My legs, my arms, and my chest, are all buried under the surface. I feel trapped, like a mummy covered from top to bottom. I’m not just buried in a piece of land; I’m buried within the infinity of the Earth. I feel fragile, as if anything would be sufficient to give me the coup de grâce.
     I keep my eyes closed because I prefer silent blindness as opposed to watching what’s going on in the world. Corruption, injustice, inequality—where should I start? Perhaps, from America. A country where only money is regarded and where words such as sensitivity and thoughtfulness have been barred from dictionaries. A country in which the masses are at the mercy of the minority in power; in which the poor and the “different” are subject to a metaphoric, yet effective, form of social violence. I hold my hands up in a sort of surrender to this violence. Society, please don’t shoot me! There is no attempt to comprehend that people are different, that people make mistakes, and that often those mistakes aren’t even their fault, rather, the product of an erroneous and outdated system which doesn’t support them and doesn’t educate them.
     So, who designed this system? What’s happening in other countries? Do people even know? It’s impossible to answer these questions without referring to the government, a group of corrupt and false individuals whose actions are solely motivated by what will get them re-elected. If these are the individuals who are to lead us toward future civilization, then we ought to be worried. Following Ronald Reagan’s election, what has politics brought us, if not a wave of conservative, homophobic individuals, who strive to convince people that homosexuality is a disease, instead of raising money and awareness for AIDS research. I was right when I printed Sub-Species Helms Senatorius, depicting senator Jesse Helms, a Republican from North Carolina, as a spider covered by a swastika. Hundreds of people are dying of AIDS every week. Plenty more are catching it. Several more are discovering they have caught it. And what does Helms openly state? That HIV is a punishment, sent to homosexuals from God; that it’s “unnatural” and “disgusting,” and that the Ryan White Care Act, aimed at federally funding AIDS research, should be opposed.
     In this society, as a homosexual affected by AIDS, I feel that I’m not even treated as a person anymore. I can’t express my ideas, nor fight for the issues that are close to me. The National Endowment for the Arts rescinded its funding for some of my photo exhibitions because my essay “Post Cards from America: X-Rays from Hell” was labeled too controversial. The American Family Association criticized my photographs—those campaigning in favor of homosexuality—because they viewed them as “pornographic.” Then they used them without my consent and reproduced them out of context, to trick the public, and silence the meaning I had designed for them. When I sued for copyright infringement, all I got was one dollar in damages. There is no fairness in this treatment. My views and opinions are worth one dollar; that’s how much I’m respected.
     Humans are given the gift of speech, and of conversation, yet I feel that anything I say could be considered abnormal, sick, or illegal. I feel like a soldier who could step on a mine at any moment, and who is constantly in fear of doing so. I feel like an outsider and a victim—the same way I’ve felt my whole life. I grew up being beaten and abused by my father while seeing the same happen to my brother and sister. Lacking a proper family home, I would occasionally sleep in Central Park and wander around Times Square. Unlike many young homosexuals, I couldn’t hide my orientation and being gay was dangerous, is dangerous. I was raped. I was once chased by a man with a knife. Those things are still happening to people today. Yet, the action of speaking out is considered blasphemous.
     While I remain awake, quivering at the thought of this brutality, there’s always a part of society that’s sleeping. People don’t realize that hope isn’t enough to obtain freedom— it won’t allow us to escape the social war we’re all a part of. We must act. Don’t you see what’s going on? We must promote education for our diseased society. We must inform, that we no longer live in a world dominated by nature, rather, in a man-made culture that can’t seem to accept anything beyond its closed, out-of-date mindset. A mindset that punishes “unorthodox” sexual orientation and silently contrasts any divergence in the way money is spent, whether it be to combat forms of poverty around the world, or to inform people about the causes and consequences of AIDS.
     In 1980, on the campaign trail, Reagan made it clear that he disapproved of the gay movement, stating: “it isn’t just asking for civil rights; it’s asking for recognition and acceptance of an alternative lifestyle which I do not believe society can condone, nor can I.” Could anything but an intolerant mentality have emerged under his term? Reagan first learned about the AIDS epidemic in 1981, yet it took him until 1985 to announce it to the nation, in a long-awaited press conference. No wonder there was opposition to the Ryan White Care Act.
     In my self-portrait One Day This Kid, I put forth my greatest fear: that when this close-minded outlook on humanity will turn into law, a homosexual “will be subject to loss of home, civil rights, jobs and all conceivable freedoms. All this will begin to happen […] when he discovers he desires to place his naked body on the naked body of another boy.”
     If this society is the product of evolution, then what on Earth have we evolved into? What have science and psychology led us to? The notion that homosexuality is a disease? I pray that this is all a bad dream and that if I were to wake up, I would find I’m home, in my bed, sweaty and scared, but happy. I wish that some supernatural force could just sew together all the different threads of society. Wouldn’t that make us all happier?
     I feel blocked, as if someone were forcefully keeping me underwater to drown. I struggle to breathe, just like I struggle to survive in this close-minded world. Yet, if someone asked me if to give up my principles to be able to step out of this hole, breathe, and survive, I would say no. The will to fight is what has kept me alive up to now and I don’t intend to give up. I’d love to hear the sound of silence but I can’t. So, I just imagine it, the same way I imagine a bright and promising future somewhere along the timeline. I continue to keep my eyes closed because it’s too difficult for me to live with my eyes open and because I’m in the process of creating a dream—a utopian scenario whereby freedom is a concrete, tangible element of social belonging, and equality represents the utmost celebration of humanity.

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