Life through poetry

In observance of World AIDS Day on Dec. 1, the University chapter of Keep a Child Alive will be hosting a Poetry Slam contest to raise awareness of the dying AIDS movement. It is important for everyone to acknowledge just how prevalent AIDS still is on the world scale. In the U.S., the disease has become a manageable one at best. We have also moved beyond the ostracizing of sufferers. Elsewhere, it is not that simple. Now that we have a successful community organizer and socially conscious new president instead of a disaffected trust fund baby, we can begin to hope that the AIDS movement will regain the same fervor it achieved 20 years ago. This time, we will be fighting for the whole world, not just our corner of it. But in order for that to happen, more people need to be involved in the cause.

The AIDS scare and successive movement in the 1980s was far too recent to seem as distant as it does. Spreading like wildfire, the disease was affecting everyone, regardless of their race, gender and sexuality. 

Activists consisted of all those affected: The HIV positive, their relatives, and those who understood that this is not a disease that should be ignored. They fought the oppressive, ignorant strain of our government, doctors, pharmaceutical companies and societal shame and rejection. It was a long road, but advocates organized and fought for AIDS education, medical rights and collapsed the imaginary stigma.

But the job is not over - the movement is at a standstill. Just because we achieved what was needed here, we still need to group together and support the new AIDS movement - the crisis in Africa.

Keep a Child Alive and other like-minded organizations are creating this change. But they need our support. We elected a President based on his promise and passion of progress. Let us continue that path of support local efforts within our community toward global change.

The Keep a Child Alive Poetry Slam is a great place to start. Come to the event, pay a dollar and enjoy the works of your peers, all the while supporting a cause that is presently hobbled. Let us not let these lives perish, let us not let this cause die and let this newfound agency of "Yes We Can" thrive.