Standing Room Only Men's AIDS Town Meeting Brings HIV Out of the Shadows (5/4/07)

Standing Room Only Men's AIDS Town Meeting Brings HIV Out of the Shadows
May 4, 2007

Washington, DC--Before the 6:30 PM start time on Thursday, May 3, an overflow crowd of hundreds of African American men had filled the largest hearing room in the Wilson Building to engage in "A Frank Discussion For Men-About Men-Between Men on Sex, STDs, Responsibility and Community" for Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton's (D-DC) HIV/AIDS Town Hall Meeting. Russ Parr, of WKYS 93.9 and a Co-chair of Norton's Black Men and Boys Commission, was the "Oprah Winfrey" of the evening, taking his microphone into the audience and energetically challenging the men of every age to come to grips with the behaviors that lead to the disease. Mayor Adrian Fenty stopped by to speak to the standing room crowd. Ward 5 Councilmember Harry Thomas Jr. and At-Large Member Kwame Brown helped lead the no-holds barred conversation, "keeping it real," as Councilmember Brown said, by bringing out into the open the whispers about how down-low, homophobia, sex addiction, denial and deceit in relationships, promiscuous behavior, and fear of testing lead to the spread of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) and AIDS. Norton opened the evening with a power-point presentation explaining the statistics that show D.C. with the nation's highest AIDS rate and the concentration of HIV among African Americans nationally. Then she turned the evening over to former police Chief Isaac Fulwood, Co-chair of the Black Men and Boys Commission, Brown, Thomas, and the men in attendance, who were eager to put issues on the table that are seldom discussed in public.

Norton said: "When I put out the call for a Men's Town Hall Meeting on AIDS, I wasn't sure who would come. Not to worry. The city's men showed up in record numbers. Most gratifying of all was that the discussion was dominated by the men who came." Norton said she invited Parr, Brown, Thomas and Fulwood to stimulate the discussion, but that they found the crowd more than ready to take charge of the evening. She said that Parr used the skill for which he has become a much admired radio personality to bring out sensitive issues for a civil discussion, and the two councilmembers helped move the conversation forward, intervening with insights and remarks that showed why they had credibility with the audience. She told the men that Brown and Thomas were "models of African American manhood, who like the many of you in this room, know streets well but, they also are married and raising children in the best traditions of our community." She said that life-long Ward 7 resident Ike Fulwood had set the example for them all by making mentoring a central part of his life's work.

Last night's Men's Town Hall Meeting was the second of five Norton meetings planned this year "to bring AIDS out of the shadows and drive it out of this town." The first town meeting was with the clergy, and the next will be a women's town meeting, followed by one for teens and ending with an all-city town hall meeting on AIDS.

Unity Health Care also provided free HIV testing at the men's meeting.