PIZZA MATRIARCH

Fifty years ago, a frightened 15-year-old black youth checked into St. Louis’s City Hospital with unusual symptoms that puzzled doctors. His legs were swollen, and soon so was his entire body. Nothing seemed to work, not even seven weeks of antibiotics. Doctors suspected he may have acquired chlamydia from a same-sex partner, but the youth never said he had. For six months he continued to deteriorate, until in May of 1969 this sweet, shy teen lost his life to the disease that baffled medical personnel. His name was Robert Rayford, and he is the first known person to die of HIV in the United States. He died just one month before the Stonewall riots of June 1969, led by queer people of color, and which we honor each year with our annual June Pride celebrations.

At the time, no one knew what HIV was. It would be another 12 years before the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported a mysterious pneumonia and immune deficiency that had afflicted “5 young men, all active homosexuals.” Deaths started mounting in 1981, but HIV would not be identified by scientists until 1984, and it wouldn’t be until 1987 that HIV would be found in Rayford’s tissue samples. When it finally was, few noticed his story.

The CDC’s campaign Start Talking. Stop HIV rightly states the obvious, that we must talk about this virus with one another to stop it spreading and tell our collective stories to fight stigma. But, if we are really going to stop HIV, then we need to talk about how HIV continues to have a disparate impact on communities of color. We must tell the story of Rayford and so many more.

[…]

Since the virus was discovered, black people have made up 43 percent of all HIV deaths in the United States, yet African-Americans are only about 13 percent of the U.S. population.

Black gay and bisexual men accounted for 26 percent of all new HIV infections in 2016, despite representing less than 2 percent of America’s total population. Of the 1.1 million Americans living with HIV today, almost 475,000 of them — more than any other racial group — are black. Almost 150,000 of them are black gay and bisexual men.

“Here’s a pretty unbelievable story: Laurie Holden is an actress who plays Andrea on “The Walking Dead,” but she isn’t just an actress. Holden also works as a human rights activist with a group called Operation Underground Railroad. It’s an organization run by an ex-CIA agent named Tim Ballard that works to take down unsavory human traffickers and the like. So, Holden and the group went down to Colombia to try to take down a group of men who were trafficking in underage prostitutes. Ballard, Holden and co. ingratiated themselves into this group and set up an elaborate party in an effort to catch these men in the act….” Adam Pliskin, Elite Daily 

“For months, the group put together a massive sting operation in cooperation with Colombian authorities. They each had an elaborate cover story. Ballard’s story was that he was the best man in a wedding back in the U.S. and was looking to hire several underage prostitutes for a big bachelor party in Cartagena. The cover was meant to lure the sex traffickers into a setup so that Ballard and his team could rescue the girls, many of whom were under 18. … In order for Colombian officials to prosecute the sex traffickers, they have to catch them exchanging money for the girls on tape. … Holden’s job was to “keep [the traffickers] occupied by the pool area while Ballard and the undercover officers worked to catch the traffickers on tape exchanging money.” Candace Smith and Aristides Pinedo-Burns, ABC News 

“When the traffickers agree on camera to to pimp out the underage girls and the money is exchanged, the cops move in to make the arrests.  During the ordeal Holden works with social workers to comfort the girls, who fear they’re the ones who will be in trouble and that they won’t be paid. Holden is clearly heartbroken when interviewed after the fact. But she should also be extremely proud of her work.” Ian Cervantes, Complex

Emmett Till would have turned 76 today, July 25, had a white woman not lied on him. Roy Bryant’s wife, now known as Carolyn Bryant Donham after having divorced and married a few times (something not afforded to Emmett, by the way), broke her silence and admitted that she made up the most damning part of her testimony.

The 82-year-old confessed about 10 years ago to author Timothy Tyson, a Duke University senior research scholar, who was working on the book The Blood of Emmett Till.

“That part’s not true,” Donham reportedly told Tyson about her claim that Emmett made verbal and physical advances toward her.

Conveniently, Donham claimed that she didn’t remember exactly what happened in the store.

But Emmett’s family and much of the world were well aware of what happened to Emmett after she accused him of inappropriate advances. The terrified 14-year-old was kidnapped from the home of relatives by Donham’s then-husband and Milam. Emmett was beaten, mutilated and shot to death before the half brothers sank his body in a local river by tying a 75-pound gin fan around his neck.

Meanwhile, more than 60 years later, Emmett’s family is still seeking justice on behalf of their loved one, with his surviving relatives asking for the case to be reinvestigated after Donham admitted to lying on the teen.

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And don’t you forget it!