Blogswarm: Revise the FDA's Ban On Gay Men Giving Blood

Currently, the FDA bans gay and bisexual men (and any other man who has had sex with men [MSM]) from giving blood.  If a man has had sex with another man even once since 1977, he is permanently disqualified from donating blood.  The ban is a relic of the AIDS panic of the 80's, when HIV/AIDS was "the gay disease", couldn't be tested for reliably, etc.  It made sense then.  But now?  Now, HIV affects every demographic.  Now, it can be detected by testing within 2 weeks of exposure.  And yet the rules are still such that if a man once had protected sex with another man 30 years ago, he will never be allowed to donate blood, while a man who has had sex with a known HIV-positive woman is only deferred for a year, after which he may donate blood again.  This is anti-gay (and apparently is sometimes used as anti-trans, depending on the personnel at a given blood center) discrimination, pure and simple, and it needs to go away. 


Right now, the FDA is convening a committee on whether or not to reconsider the ban.  They are open to public comments.  Please, email Dr. Holmberg - jerry.holmberg@hhs.gov - to encourage the committee to replace the ban with a policy grounded in science in fact, rather than discrimination.  Additional talking points and a form letter can be found here, if you want to use that.


Please email!!

Lacy-Drawered, Limp-Wristed, Will Still Kick Your Ass.

Arizona, I'm sorry.  I've tried to be patient.  But in the last two years, you gave us McCain, two separate towns have had freakouts over showing PoC on murals, you've started constructing a tent city in the desert in anticipation of all the "illegals" you're going to round up under your new Show Me Your Papers law, and now Yuma's mayor let a heaping bucket of fail fall out of his mouth during Memorial Day Weekend, on DADT.  I may have to start making "let 'em secede, no really, please!" jokes about you the way I used to about Texas.*

So what did Mayor Al Krieger say, about allowing LGBs to serve openly in the military?

“I cannot believe a bunch of lacey-drawered, limp-wristed people could do what those men have done in the past...We need solid, strong men to fight those battles.  Not pacifists.”

...Yeeeeah.  This is so stultifyingly full of fail, I hardly know where to begin.  With the erasure of women in the military ("We need solid, strong men")?  With the refusal to acknowledge that there are already LGBs serving, there have been LGBs serving throughout our military's history, that they were some of the "solid, strong men" fighting our nation's battles, they just couldn't do it openly?  With the assumption, founded on absolutely, utterly nothing, that gay=pacifist?  With the "lacy-drawered, limp-wristed" shit, drawing on ridiculous and offensive stereotypes a few decades old which have never, ever been true across the board?  With the erasure of lesbians - because going by the stereotypes this jackhole seems to be working from, gay men aren't capable of fighting, but lesbians are supposed to be as solid and strong as any man, and twice as scary?


Oh, and for a megafail bonus round, Mayor Krieger defended his statement by invoking the names of George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, claiming that they would have backed him up so it's ok to be an offensive shithead who's wrong about everything.


Can we please stop acting like DADT is somehow going to "let gays into" the military?  LGB servicemembers are already serving in the military.  There are "lacy-drawered, limp-wristed" gay men already fighting these battles, so that a fuckwit like Mayor Krieger can run his mouth and denigrate the very people who have given, are giving, will give their lives for this country we share.  


You can let Mayor Dipshit know what you think of his asshattery by emailing him at Alan.Krieger@YumaAz.gov

*I know not all Arizonans are on board with their state's terrible policies of late; this doesn't change the fact that AZ is earning a metric shit-ton of horrid publicity lately, and yeah, I'm going to joke about it from time to time.