Subject: Michael Callen: Sheer Guts & Will From: ww@blythe.org (Workers World Service) Date: Sun, 09 Jan 94 00:08:02 EST Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit MICHAEL CALLEN - 1955-1993 Sheer guts and will By Leslie Feinberg If sheer guts and the will to struggle could have ultimately saved his life, Michael Callen would be alive today. The militant AIDS activist died in Los Angeles on Dec. 27 at age 38. Callen was the longest known survivor of AIDS in this country. He is survived by his lover Richard Dworkin. Callen strongly believed his determination to live and fight back was a material factor in prolonging his years. "If we could change our paradigm of AIDS," he stressed, "if there weren't that notion that it's all ultimately hopeless and pointless, it might actually increase survival rates." Michael Callen fought like hell. In 1983 he was a plaintiff in the country's first AIDS discrimination lawsuit when his physician, Dr. Sonnabend, successfully fought a Greenwich Village co-op that tried to evict him because he was treating people with AIDS. Callen was a founder of the Manhattan-based People With AIDS Coalition. Angered by the tortoise pace of drug development, he helped found the Community Research Initiative--a group of doctors and people with AIDS who conducted their own drug trials. He co-authored one of the first guides to safer sex--"How to Have Sex in an Epidemic: One Approach"--and later wrote "Surviving AIDS" (HarperCollins, 1990). Callen also raised his voice in song. And what a voice! The Los Angeles Times attributed to Michael Callen "an upper register that Joan Sutherland would surely envy." He sang in cabarets and with the New York City Gay Men's Chorus. And his voice was an unforgettable component of The Flirtations, an a cappella group whose music has fueled passion and pride for many gay men and lesbians. The popular quintet can be seen in the current movie "Philadelphia." His solo album, "Purple Heart," was released in 1988. `My Naivete Shattered' I first met Michael when he was 27 years old, two years after his diagnosis with AIDS. I interviewed him for this newspaper. It was the summer of 1983, and marked the beginning of a decade-long friendship. Simultaneous angry gay and lesbian demonstrations in seven cities had brought the public-health crisis to light only months before. The media still referred to AIDS as GRID--Gay Related Immune Deficiency. Right-wing hatemongers were trying to demonize gay men and Haitians. In this poisonous political climate Callen's anger was directed as surely as a river knows its course. "I was always pretty politically naive," Michael told Workers World. "It wasn't until I was fighting for my life and it looked like only the vast resources of the federal government could save me that I had my naivete shattered. "The government demonstrated by its virtual non-response that it didn't care if I lived or died." He contrasted the tight-fisted federal AIDS allocations to hand-over-fist military spending. "I have wondered," he said, "what it actually cost the United States government to move, say, one nuclear-powered warship from Japan into the waters around Nicaragua. And what does that say about the meaning of the word priority?" He denounced divisive federal attempts to divert money from sickle-cell-anemia programs "in an attempt to pit minority group against minority group. We will not permit it! New money is needed! "It's simply shortsighted to allow prejudice, bigotry, racism to stand in the way of what clearly is research that will benefit all." Michael concluded: "Because of whom I choose to love the government was not there for me when my life was at risk. The same is true for people of color, for women and for poor people. "I think that it's time to re-examine what we may have in common with other movements and to begin to forge necessary coalitions." Michael Callen fiercely fought for life and change with every breath and sinew. Fortified by his legacy, other hands will now lift the struggle to new heights. -30- (Copyright Workers World Service: Permission to reprint granted if source is cited. For more information contact Workers World, 55 West 17 St., New York, NY 10011; via e-mail: ww@blythe.org.) +----------------------------------------------------------------+ + 212-675-9690 NY TRANSFER NEWS COLLECTIVE 212-675-9663 + + Since 1985: Information for the Rest of Us + + e-mail: nyt@blythe.org info: info@blythe.org +