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The Internet Anti-Fascist: #42, Sunday, 30 November 1997 ______________________________________________________________________
WHAT'S WORTH CHECKING
AEGIS: AIDS Education Global Information System bills itself as the world's largest "HIV website with more than 500,000 documents on-line." AEGIS is run by the Sisters of St. Elizabeth of Hungary, San Juan Capistrano, California. "We don't try to be the flashiest web site on the net," says webmaster Sister Mary Elizabeth, "but we are the most complete." <http://www.aegis.com>
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FEAR OF SEXUALLY TRANSMITTED DISEASES AS ONE FASCIST IDEOLOGY: NOTES FOR WORLD A.I.D.S. DAY
"... by the use of all propagandistic means, the question of combating syphilis should have been made to appear as *the* task of the nation. Not just *one more* task. To this end, its injurious effects should have been thoroughly hammered into people as the most terrible misfortune, and this by the use of all available means, until the entire nation arrived at the conviction that everything--future or ruin--depended upon the solution of this question."
These words with the original emphasis were written by Adolf Hitler in _Mein Kampf_.
The right-wing attacks over AIDS have fallen most heavily on the gay populace even though international statistics show that the disease is more one of heterosexual than homosexual transmission. But homophobia is not the only irrational fear attached to the issue of AIDS.
The politico-phobias have a broad if unconscious character through the equation that "dirt = disease." You don't have to be Sigmund Freud to understand it; Nazi propagandist Julius Streicher repeatedly made the point in _Der Stuermer_, particularly in the cartoons linking the "dirty Jew (or Roma)" to vermin and disease.
The fear of disease expressed through the equation is used to scapegoat a large number of different forces today by conjuring up fears and directing emotionality against the targeted people. We have the traditional "dirty Jew and Roma" of the Nazi period, and by today's extension the "dirty immigrant." The same technique is used to attack the homeless as both "dirty" and therefore likely to spread disease.
These psychopathological--as opposed to reasonable adult--concerns over disease turn inward on themselves. Seemingly ironic, the sexually- phobic political forces do little to effectively combat the spread of the diseases. The same forces most phobic about AIDS are often those who combat AIDS-prevention activity like public health education, hypodermic needle-exchange programs, and condom distribution.
Many of today's forces most politically hysterical over AIDS want to cut back medical research funding, oppose efforts to broaden medical care, and actively strive to reduce Social Security Disability payments (thus increasing homelessness). Simultaneously, they push for the criminalization of different modes of sexual behavior and urge that more funds be allocated for cops, courts, and prisons. They are similarly active to increase border patrols against the "dirty" immigrants while seeking to deprive resident non-citizens of state- supported medical care and even free education for their children.
These events all show how little the forces whipping up psychopathological fears over rational concerns like AIDS do to actually deal with the issues as a broad social problem.
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Dispassionate Objectivity by Wayne Grytting
The German government has taught nations worldwide a valuable lesson in objectivity. It recently came to the attention of the German parliament that former war criminals have been drawing pension benefits for the past 50 years for injuries incurred in World War II. This has been occurring while many Holocaust victims still have not received compensation. Why? Because the appropriate officials felt that injuries and war crimes were two "separate issues," best handled by different departments. Our quiz question: how many years of education does it take to comprehend such distinctions? (Reuters 11/13)
-- Top NEWSPEAK Stories of the Week #91 Wayne Grytting <wgrytt@animal.blarg.net> <http://www.scn.org/newspeak>
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-- tallpaul Fascism: We have no ethical right to forgive, no historical right to forget.
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