The international HIV/AIDS epidemic of the 1980s shaped activist intentions throughout national

communities such as that of Northalsted, or “Boystown”, Illinois and NYC, due to a grassroots-level

subjugation of gated LGBTQ+ communities, a generational trauma that has rooted itself into the

present-day interactions between urban LGBTQ+ communities.

Throughout this essay, I will address and create a comparative study of the regional effects of the

HIV/AIDS epidemic in these cities and of New York and the Chicagoland area. Another aim of this essay

is to inspect the small-scale effects of the epidemic upon individual livelihoods and how the rise of

activism that has grown from each experience. While listening to many interviews, I examined how each

experience noted, or highlighted, a moment of change and recognition of discrimination from a

devastating health crisis. For each interviewee, the targeted social attacks and discrimination by the

unaffected majority consequently initiated AIDS activism and, in a parallel manner, brought to light the

larger disparities and social constructs that were often shrouded by the safety of separated communities.

Such instances raised questions and topics such as the equality of medical treatment, the increased anxiety

of separated communities and subjugation, as well as the safety of such gated communities.

In my first sourced interview, I studied Catherine Gund’s experience as a member of ACT UP in

New York. Within Gund’s family social circle, may of whom were gay men whose careers worked with

the art and humanities, she experienced loss. As a young woman growing up and exploring her identity as

a lesbian woman within this social phenomenon, Gund’s experience of the AIDS epidemic is somewhat

identified, or paralleled, with her life as a lesbian woman. As she grows to understand much of what the

gay community includes and how she identifies, she also increases her understanding of HIV and AIDS-

related social education, such as that of community and cultural work. However, as one who begins to

understand the personal expense of HIV/AIDS within her own community, her perception of

discrimination begins to shape her political and social motivations. “But for us here, to have people on the

street who were sick and dying of AIDS, and not have any attention to that was abominable.” (pg. 42)

Thus, her understanding of the epidemic shifts to the myopic education surrounding the epidemic within a
larger society, leading to her creation of the AIDS Counseling and Education (ACE) to create what she

recognizes as a “bridge”—a localized understanding between the inside of the afflicted community an

that of the unaffected. The larger disparities and misunderstandings created by the responses of an

ignorant and disconnected society divorced Gund’s comfort of the safety of community and instead led to

the recognition of the dangers of the gated community and the need of increased educatory programs. As

a result, ACT UP, the grounds of the New York City response to the social violence of the AIDS

epidemic, programs and measures, such as ACE were created to undergo an inclusive, educated,

perspective of the real devastation of the epidemic to combat the traumatic effects upon the present-day

community.

In comparison, Dr. Ross A. Slotten, a medical practitioner during the AIDS epidemic in Chicago,

shares his experience with the homophobic reaction of the medical field in regards to the epidemic. The

actions of primary care doctors and responsive units to the explosive epidemic during the 1980s was

abhorrently fearful, as the refusal of medical professionals to respond to the HIV/AIDS epidemic

promptly lead to the deaths of many victims and created widespread discrimination against afflicted

individuals. Slotten, who identifies as a gay man, emotionally responds to this as, not only as an attack on

his community, but with disappointment and horror as the medical field, co-workers and professionals

alike, turn down the treatment of the individuals within the community with which he identifies. As one

of the few doctors to attend to these patients, Slotten remembers the many individuals he attended to, such

as Robert, a black, gay man, with an operatic voice, who loses his life quickly to the symptoms of AIDS,

and a past lover, whom Slotten is shocked to see arrive to his hospital. Slotten is painfully aware of the

destructive tendencies of the medical community’s large oversights regarding the epidemic, as well as the

social failings of the larger community: “But Ronald Reagan, whom we otherwise despised for his public

homophobia and failure to address the AIDS crisis before it spiraled out of control, created the so-called

private practice option that allowed young doctors like us more freedom of choice.” (pg. 14) As the

Chicago gay community self-destructed due to the aid of medical practitioners and an exceedingly hostile
society, Slotten dedicates his time during the 1990s to research HIV/AIDS in West Africa. He furthers

development of treatments regarding the epidemic and provides significant attributions to the symptoms

and spread of HIV/AIDS. However, his experience with the devastating effects of the disease within the

Chicago gay community highlights his motivation to bridge the separation of community so often as was

found in communities such as Northalsted, Chicago.