The Gist

Last night's Democratic debate: taking on homophobia and AIDS complacency, but then...weird homo-anxiety


Hillary Clinton had some great remarks about AIDS last night that drew a lot of applause at the All-American Presidential Forum on PBS, held at the historically black Howard University before a largely African-American audience, and hosted by Tavis Smiley. “You know, it is hard to disagree with anything that has been said, but let me just put this in perspective," Clinton said. "If HIV/AIDS were the leading cause of death of white women between the ages of 25 and 34, there would be an outraged outcry in this country."

And Barak Obama directly addressed homophobia in the black community and how it impedes efforts at battling AIDS: "One of the things we've got to overcome is a stigma that still exists in our communities. We don't talk about this. We don't talk about it in schools. Sometimes we don't talk about it in churches. It has been an aspect sometimes of our homophobia that we don't address this issue as clearly as it needs to be."

But there was an exchange that to me just seemed really weird and seemed to condradict the efforts at taking away the stigma of AIDS and the stigma of testing for HIV. Senator Joe Biden talked about how he got tested and pointed out that Obama did as well. And then, the two of them melted down in homo-anxiety, cracking uneasy jokes to make sure that no one think they might be gay -- or perhaps drug users -- and that they of course didn't need to get tested, really. It was Obama who drove it in this direction, and I found it both juvenile as well as undermining his initial message. Am I overacting or do you agree? From the New York Times:

Senator Joseph Biden of Delaware announced to the audience that he — and Mr. Obama — had been tested for HIV, the virus that caused AIDS: Mr. Obama peered quizzically at Mr. Biden as he shared this information.

“I got tested for AIDS, I know Barack got tested for AIDS,” he said. “There’s no shame in being tested for AIDS. It’s an important thing.”

When it was Mr. Obama’s turn to talk he clarified what Mr. Biden referred to. “Tavis, Tavis, Tavis, I just got to make clear — I got tested with Michelle,” referring to a test with his wife, Michelle, during a visit last summer to Kenya to highlight the medical necessity for wide-spread testing in order to slow the spread of the disease.

“I don’t want any confusion here about what’s going on,” he said with a grin.

Mr. Biden responded: “And I got tested to save my life, because I had 13 pints of blood transfusion.”