"Coming OUT of Hiding: A Retrospective Journey Through AIDS..."
A Memoir * Michael Wallace Connett"
A Memoir * Michael Wallace Connett"
"I used to be afraid of dying, but I'm not anymore.
I'm more afraid of what happens to the people who live..." from "And The Band Played On"
I'm more afraid of what happens to the people who live..." from "And The Band Played On"
"What I am PROUD of, as a gay man, is being a SURVIVOR..."
NHTD MAYORS CAMPAIGN
This year, the National Association of People With AIDS National Association of People With AIDS (NAPWA) will be hosting the eighth annual Mayors Campaign Against HIV. Mayors are requested to support National HIV Testing Day (NHTD) by hosting HIV testing campaigns in their cities, conducting press conferences to discuss local HIV testing resources, or issuing proclamations in support on NHTD. Moreover, to assure communities have the resources to mount an effective HIV testing campaign, NAPWA makes available materials to local health departments, community clinics, and other community-based organizations that participate in NHTD. These materials can be downloaded from NAPWA’s Web site at www.napwa.org.
For more information, contact NAPWA at 240-247-0880 or visit their Web site at www.napwa.org.
Michael Connett shared Steven L Frank's status: Interesting, Steve! What happens when the CUSTOMERS aren't Happy & The Stakeholders are throwing a Party OR Vice versa... I can think of at least 2 situations we're wrestling with currently ;-)
"I have been reading a book on Government called Building High Performance Government Through Lean Six Sigma. It has reinforced much of my critique of government: that we should be treating our residents and businesses as valued customers and that it is the customer's perception of quality and value of services received from government, not the stakeholders. Stakeholders are interested parties who do not directly consume the product. In education, the children and their parents are the customers. They can vote with their feet and leave your community... thereby leaving you stranded costs say in unused or underutilized school buildings. Teachers, administrators, state educrats are stakeholders. As the book states, "When it comes to evaluating what your organization does and why it id important, it is customer opinions thst matter more than anything else. A more subtle reason for considering customer opinoon first is thst making your customers happy is the way to keep your stakeholders happy." I would say that that is true in healthy organizations. In dysfunctional ones, the workerd and administrators opinion counts for more than the customers. In business this resolves itself quickly in bankruptcy. In government, the torment can go on for way too long."
Someone recently posted this good news for me: "I myself am personally offended by his lack of restraint with the vulger language. I feel that if he is angry by something someone posts, before he spews obscene language on this page, he should also rememeber that not only the person he has directed to is going to see it, PRECISELY, MY POINT!? everyone on THE INTERNET this site will see it. If he has crude comments with obscenity in them he needs to post, I feel he should instant message his offender and not make the rest of us have to deal with his anger agenda" How couldn't Zuckerberg not invented FB in College; IM is slow & uncertain these days, LOL...
I hope that there are wheels in motion by The Commission to acknowledge that JUNE is also National HIV Testing Month as well as LGBT National Pride Month. As @SoBankQueenBee of The South Bank HIVe; I'd also like to Recognize Covington's High Standards for Human Rights & Diversity by also proclaiming it as a time to express OUR "C+V=G" PRIDE
"I have been reading a book on Government called Building High Performance Government Through Lean Six Sigma. It has reinforced much of my critique of government: that we should be treating our residents and businesses as valued customers and that it is the customer's perception of quality and value of services received from government, not the stakeholders. Stakeholders are interested parties who do not directly consume the product. In education, the children and their parents are the customers. They can vote with their feet and leave your community... thereby leaving you stranded costs say in unused or underutilized school buildings. Teachers, administrators, state educrats are stakeholders. As the book states, "When it comes to evaluating what your organization does and why it id important, it is customer opinions thst matter more than anything else. A more subtle reason for considering customer opinoon first is thst making your customers happy is the way to keep your stakeholders happy." I would say that that is true in healthy organizations. In dysfunctional ones, the workerd and administrators opinion counts for more than the customers. In business this resolves itself quickly in bankruptcy. In government, the torment can go on for way too long."
Someone recently posted this good news for me: "I myself am personally offended by his lack of restraint with the vulger language. I feel that if he is angry by something someone posts, before he spews obscene language on this page, he should also rememeber that not only the person he has directed to is going to see it, PRECISELY, MY POINT!? everyone on THE INTERNET this site will see it. If he has crude comments with obscenity in them he needs to post, I feel he should instant message his offender and not make the rest of us have to deal with his anger agenda" How couldn't Zuckerberg not invented FB in College; IM is slow & uncertain these days, LOL...
I hope that there are wheels in motion by The Commission to acknowledge that JUNE is also National HIV Testing Month as well as LGBT National Pride Month. As @SoBankQueenBee of The South Bank HIVe; I'd also like to Recognize Covington's High Standards for Human Rights & Diversity by also proclaiming it as a time to express OUR "C+V=G" PRIDE
PRIDE Lag; the Day After...
by Michael Connett on Monday, July 11, 2011
I never made it to any of the Northside Celebrations, perhaps because after all the years I worked at The Dock when Pride was in the parking lot I was "over it". I awoke this morning and saw this posted; "Oh my, haven't we come a long way since the mayor of Cincinnati declared it "Gay TOLERENCE Day"!" To which I replied: Yes & No! Someone said earlier; "Like jet lag... There is also pride lag!", however, it differs from jet lag in that it's more like a Hangover... Sure, we're more visible, vocal & tolerated, but we've used it recklessly to assume a higher position than others on the ladder of "Worthiness". Someone else said; "I'm thinking that gay pride weekends might really be about surviving with your pride still in tact. i think i saw some claws extend last night. funny funny." As I've said before, "The Intolerance of those pushing tolerance, never ceases to amaze me..." And when you try to point out the error of our ways; you're told to get a life because you seem to have too much time on your hands, just come have a DRINK and chill out. Unfortunately, I do not have too much time; according to current views, I've already used up 20 of the 25 years "the medicine" extends my life expectancy! Still, so much work left to be done...
On Pride... by Brad Crothers on Saturday, July 30, 2011
June was gay pride month and I didn't care. Why? All of my adult life I've always believed that being gay was not something I chose. Why would I be proud of something I had no part of? Likewise, why would I be ashamed of it? I'm white and I'm sure as hell not proud of that. So June being "Gay Pride Month" meant nothing to me and even less after Obama's empty gesture of proclaiming it as such. It was nothing to me but a way to distract people from the fact that he's not been equal parts talk and action. Don't get me wrong, I don't think we'd be any better off if anyone else had been elected. But I have a hard time respecting someone who says "This is done" when they clearly know it's only the beginning and then allows inactivity and worse to take the lead. You can label yourself a Democrat all you want, it doesn't make you one anymore than labeling yourself a Christian, Muslim or even Atheist.
Having said all that, within the past few weeks I've had a sort of revelatory change in thought. I still feel like being gay is nothing to feel proud or ashamed of.
What I am proud of, as a gay man, is being a SURVIVOR. I'm even more proud of the fact that I belong to a community who has survived the neglect, abuse, religious intolerance, hate, crime, spiritual rape and indifference of far too many people and we will continue to fight back against all of the above in order to continue surviving. It's sad that some of us have developed that as our greatest skill while others walk passively through life, paying no attention to those not afforded the same basic human rights as them. But make no mistake: We will continue to do so despite the attempts (successful or otherwise) to kill us and/or our souls and we will do it for our past, present and future selves. I've said this a million times before but it's the core of everything I believe: Feeling that one has no voice that's being heard is the root of most of the horrible things that people do to others and themselves. To quote ACT UP: "Silence = Death." So scream at the top of your lungs as if your life depends on it. It just might.
~Brad Crothers
If you've been tagged it's because you've contributed to the pride that I've discovered and hopefully share with you, and would like to pass on to others. Feel free to tag yourself and anyone else who you're proud of and SHARE!
Ryan Courtade in 
Fix Covington Schools--OPEN
Fix Covington Schools--OPEN
"Home is not a place; it is an attitude. It is an attitude which depends on how much we are able to feel at home with ourselves as well as with others.
Home is something which happens to a person; homecoming has less to do with geography than it has to do with a sense of personal integrity or inner wholeness.
The most important of all endeavors in life is to come home. The most terrifying of fears is loneliness. It means that one has become a stranger to himself, and consequently, to others. To be lonely is to feel fear, to be forever unsettled, never at rest, in need of more reassurance than life can give.
Someone truly loves us when he brings us home; when he makes us comfortable with ourselves, when he takes from us the strangeness we feel at being who we are. We are loved when we no longer are frightened with ourselves."
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