#pandemic aid

[azuremist]

“Unfinished Painting” — Keith Haring

This painting was left intentionally incomplete. Haring began it when he was dying due to complications from AIDS, and knew he didn’t have much time left. The piece represents the incomplete lives of him and many others, lost to AIDS during the crisis.

“AIDS Memorial Quilt” — Multiple

This quilt is over 50 tons heavy, and one of, if not the, largest pieces of community folk art. Many people who died of AIDS did not receive funerals, due to social stigma and many funeral homes refusing to handle the deceased’s remains, so this was one of the only ways their lives could be celebrated. Each panel was created in recognition of someone who died due to AIDS, typically by that person’s loved ones.

“Untitled” (Portrait of Ross in L.A.) — Felix Gonzalez-Torres

This pile of candy weighs the same amount as Gonzalez-Torres’ partner, Ross Laycock, did. Ross Laycock had died due to AIDS-related complications earlier that same year. Visitors who see this piece are encouraged to take some of the candy. As they do so, the pile of candy weighs less and less, like how AIDS had deteriorated the body of Ross Laycock.

The SF Gay Men's Chorus

This photo was taken in 1993. The men in white are the surviving original members. Every man in black is standing in for an original member who lost their lives to AIDS.

“Electric Fan (Feel it Motherfuckers); Only Unclaimed Item from the Stephen Earabino Estate, 1997” — John Boskovich

After the death of his lover, Stephen Earabino, from AIDS, Boskovich discovered that his family had completely cleared his room, including Boskovich’s own possessions, save for this fan. An entire person, existence and relationship had been erased, just like so many lives during the AIDS crisis. Boskovich encased the fan in Plexiglass, but added cutouts so that its air may be felt by the viewer, almost like an exhalation. In a sense, restoring Earabino’s breath.

“Blue” — Derek Jarman

This was Jarman’s final feature film, released four months before his death from AIDS-related complications. These complications had left him visually impaired, able to only see in shades of blue. This film consists of a single shot of a saturated blue color, as the soundtrack to the film described Jarman’s life through narration, intercut with the adventures of Blue, a humanization of the color blue. The film's final moments consist of a set of repeated names: “John. Daniel. Howard. Graham. Terry. Paul". These are the names of former lovers and friends of Jarman who had died due to AIDS.

“Untitled” (Perfect Lovers) — Felix Gonzalez-Torres

Created by the same man who created the previous untitled piece, this piece was also inspired by his lover’s deterioration and death due to AIDS. This piece consists of two perfectly alike clocks. Over the course of time, one of the clocks will fall out of sync with the other.

In a letter written to his lover about the piece, before his lover’s passing, Gonzalez-Tourres wrote, “Don't be afraid of the clocks, they are our time, the time has been so generous to us. We imprinted time with the sweet taste of victory. We conquered fate by meeting at a certain time in a certain space. We are a product of the time, therefore we give back credit were it is due: time. We are synchronized, now forever. I love you.”

Please feel free to reblog with more additions

[razzek]

One thing that's starting to really get to me with the James Somerton stuff is a real strong undercurrent of disdain toward his fans. And yeah, I was one of them. A good scam artist isn't as easy to spot as y'all seem to think. You forget that you have all the information right now. Two days ago most of you had never heard of him and it would have kept going. Anyone can fall for a scam, nobody is immune. I would love to have had whatever resources you guys think we all should magically know about so I could have kept my sad $5 a month I really needed but thought was going to something worthwhile. Some of us can only devote so much energy into things and when you have no idea whatsoever that something is amiss of course you're not going to go digging for sources, why would you when everything is fine as far as you know? I really wish I could have seen the dissenting opinions on him but for many, many reasons that aren't just that the dissenting voices weren't widely circulating at the time all I had was the thought every now and again that "huh that doesn't seem right" and then go on with my day. And I think that happened to a lot of us. So yeah. Say what you gotta say about Somerton, he has more than earned it with the damage he's caused, but maybe don't shit so hard on his former fans because that is going to be you someday with something, it happens to everyone sooner or later.

[covidsafehotties]

[feminist-space]

"We are fundraising to purchase 288,000 3M 9501+ KN95 masks from government surplus!

Our goal is $9,000 to win the auction and pay for transportation of the masks from VA to mask blocs across the country.

These include mask blocs in DC, Northern Southern and Central Virginia, New Orleans, St. Louis, and Champaign Urbana, New York City, Kansas City, Tulsa, Knoxville, Long Island and more.

Currently, a pallet of 12,000 KN95 masks is 200 dollars each. We are aiming to buy as many pallets as possible and deliver them to whoever wants them! If you want to support but can't contribute, consider sharing this to your socials.

#MaskBloc #MaskDistribution ⁠fundraising #COVIDIsntOver #MutualAid"

"We’ve made contact with the seller, and they’ve agreed to sell them directly at $200/palette!

By buying directly instead of through the auction, we will definitely be getting these masks. The only question is how many.

The more money we raise, the more palettes we can buy, and the more transportation we can pay for to get these masks to communities across the country!

ALMOST HALFWAY THERE!!! LETS GOOO!!!! Thank you all for your support, sharing and contributions. Speaking on behalf of all of the organizers, we are so stoked that this campaign is going well and about how many masks we are going to be able to get. Thank you!!!

Alt text: Flyer with periwinkle and orange color scheme. Text at the top says “Mask Fundraiser. Joint mask bloc effort (14+ blocs). Bulk discount on high-quality KN95s at surplus sale. Every dollar makes a dent. Asterisks. $4=240 masks. $200=12,000 masks. Goal: 280,000 masks.”

Underneath is an image of a large metal shipping container with 10 big visible cardboard boxes. Next to that is an illustration of a hand holding a white respirator with ear-loop straps that shows the text “kn95 gb2626-2019.”

Text at the bottom of the flyer says “donate: tinyurl.com/bulk-kn95s. Going to mask blocs in: DC, Northern/Southern/Central Virginia, New Orleans, St. Louis, Champaign Urbana, Chicago, New York City, Kansas City, Tulsa, Knoxville, Long Island, Cincinnati, San Jose & more. To be distributed for free to all of our communities.” Asterisks mentioned at top of flyer are resolved here, with an asterisk next to text that says “Portion of money also going toward transport and associated costs.""

[guideaus]

okay, hi it's my birthday today and I also found out that the government recently withdrew an amount of aid I used in school in 2020 and 2021. this new bill is preventing me from starting my next semester. I'd really like to go back to school, buy a car, and eventually work on moving out which would improve my mental health. I'm also selling things online including manga and I can make gifs or icons if that interests anyone, just message me :) any support at all including reblogs would be appreciated, thank you for reading <3

Paypal

[fictionandmusic]

hiiiiii covid tumblr😷

some of my very close friends in our local mask bloc are working with ~30 other mask blocs across the US to raise money to purchase 360,000 masks to give away to our communities for FREE! (more details under the cut if you’re interested)

so far they’re raised $10,265 out of the $18,000 goal!! If you’re able to contribute, please do so at gofundme and please share with your friends!! any $ amount is hugely appreciated!!

this purchase will be coming from a large government surplus sale, as part of the pattern of governments getting rid of their Covid protection supplies because they don’t care enough to have precautions anymore! gov surplus sales provide a huuuge deal bc of the quantity & desire to get rid of stuff as soon as possible, BUT this also means there’s only so many surplus sales left since governments are no longer buying more masks. and that’s a big part of why this purchase is so important, because there may not be many more large surplus deals after this one!!

[roachemoji]

As much as I dislike Twitter, and frankly most other socmeds at the moment, I'm very scared watching how quickly it's declining, how quickly everyone's engagement is dying. I understand where people are coming from when they say not to put all your eggs in one basket, to branch out and post elsewhere, but people do understand how difficult that is, right?

As an artist you're doing the jobs of 6 people when posting online, and then to have the added expectation put onto you to join other sites, learn their algorithms, learn their trends, cater your art to the people who use it on top of all of that? And to have to do that 3 or 4 times??? Even more because you never know if the next new socmed will be The New Big Thing!!! No wonder everyone is so fucking burnt out.

This isn't even mentioning all the machine learning bullshit that's happening right now and the exploitation of every single creative across the fucking board.

People rely on Twitter.

People's LIVELYHOODS rely on Twitter.

As shitty as it's been in the past it's also one of the most reliable places I've seen people get engagement. Art shares, Portfolio day, Ocs shares, Raffles - the speed I've seen people reach emergency funding goals? I know it's kinder to some more than others, but it used to be much kinder.

It's terrifying watching what was once a pillar of engagement and outreach crumble. I'm very scared for our futures.

[lgbtqreads]

Reader's Guide: World AIDS Day 2023

Young Adult Another Dimension of Us by Mike Albo In 1986, Tommy Gaye is in love with his best friend, budding teen poet Renaldo Calabasas. But at the height of the AIDS crisis and amidst the homophobia running rampant across America, Tommy can never share his feelings. Then, one terrible night, Renaldo is struck by lightning. And he emerges from the storm a very different boy. In 2044, Heron High…

[blue-bec]

When I watched Todd in the Shadow's 90 minute plus video on James Somerton I didn't expect that I would want to rip Somerton's throat out. I had heard that he'd said stuff about the "boring gays", but when I heard the way he actually said it, I saw red and wanted him dead.

What an utter piece of shit

[gentlemanbutch]

bitch I knooooow you are not comparing covid to fucking AIDS! Like there's gotta be some confusion cause ain't no way.

Congratulations for having terrible reading comprehension!

I said both AIDS and COVID fuck up your immune system and that it’s sad to see queer people ignoring it, when my generation constantly talk about how sad it is to not have elderly queer people in our lives because of AIDS.

Wow! What a wild comparison! What a wild thing of me to say. What a wild thing to feel disappointed by the ableism within my own community. Wild. Absolutely wild. 🙄

And there actually ARE a lot of parallels between COVID and AIDS (“parallels” doesn’t mean “it’s the exact same thing,” just to make sure you’re following), from how queer, BIPOC, and low income folks are more impacted, to some of the specific ways it harms your immune system, to how the media is underreporting/downplaying it, but I’m not going to waste my time spelling it out for someone who isn’t engaging in good faith.

[nando161mando]

Estimated 28.5 million dead thus far during our ongoing pandemic (per Economist models)—including the near three quarter million dead in just the last 3 months—places it third among modern (through 20th century) epidemics:

⒈ 1918 Flu: est. 17-100 million

⒉ HIV/AIDS: 43 million to date (over 40+ years)

⒊ Covid-19: 28.5 million to date (over 4+ years)

⒋ Third Plague (Bubonic): 12-15 million (over 100+ years)

⒌ 1968 Flu: 1-4 million

⒍ 1957 Flu: 1-4 million

⒎ 1918 Russian Typhus: 2-3 million

https://www.reddit.com/r/HermanCainAward/

[lgbtq-archives]

Dear Joe, thanks a lot for sharing your life story with the LGBTQ community.

[bisexualspace]

you truly can't follow any tags can you

[insteviewetrust]

How to watch your brother die by Michael Lassell

[savage-rhi]

Magggennnttaaaa!

[rikaklassen]

Yesterday was Long COVID Awareness Day. Glad to see ACT UP NY (Instagram outlink) being in solidarity with Long COVID survivors.

Way too many queer folks forgot (links to a zine) about the HIV/AIDS denialism in the '80s and '90s.

If you're interested in agitprop posters designed based on old HIV/AIDS awareness campaigns (Wikimedia outlink), Anna, aka X/@_copy_of_a_copy, has a series of "ACT UP/MASK UP" posters (Google Drive outlink) along with a long list of resources. mx. papaya (Carrd outlink) created a series of "Where is your RAGE?" posters and "CDC Kills" (Google Drive outlinks). Cohost/@edania has also produced a few posters here and here.