CSPG’s Poster of the Week is dedicated to Pete Jimenez, who died of AIDS last week at age 48. Pete was an amazing person who was fearless, funny, outspoken, gutsy, dedicated and committed. He was the quintessential activist, focusing on AIDS, anti-war, homophobia, universal healthcare, and militarism.

Over 300,000 U.S. AIDS Deaths
Jeff Schuerholz; ACT UP/LA
Photocopy, 1996
Los Angeles, California
33193

This poster was created for a demonstration on February 6th, 1996 in front of Chasen’s Restaurant, West Hollywood, where Ronald Reagan's 85th birthday/fund-raiser was being celebrated.

"We went there to spoil their party, the way they've spoiled our lives,"
said ACT UP Los Angeles member Pete Jimenez.

This was a very dramatic demonstration. Ronald Reagan did not attend the event for health reasons. 300 demonstrators banged drums, blew whistles shouted through bullhorns and created a very loud and boisterous disturbance about genocidal Republican AIDS policy. As Newt Gingrich, California governor Pete Wilson, Colin Powell, other Republican leaders and celebrities arrived, they were greeted with signs reading "You killed all my friends" and shouts of "Money for AIDS, not for dining!" Many demonstrators carried signs with a picture of Ronald Reagan and caption; "Over 300,000 US AIDS deaths - SHAME!" Several times the demonstrators surged toward the entrance of the restaurant only to be held back by the West Hollywood Sheriffs.

During his presidency, Reagan ignored his own Surgeon General and public health advisors, and allowed HIV/AIDS to spread unchecked with no concern for the mounting death toll.

The demonstration was organized by ACT UP/LA (the AIDS Coalition To Unleash Power). Other participating groups included ACT UP/Ventura, WAC (Women's Action Coalition) Being Alive: People with HIV/AIDS Action Coalition, AIDS Healthcare Foundation, and students from UCLA and LA High School for the Arts. Also Radical Fairies, The City AIDS Coordinators office of Los Angeles, members of the West Hollywood City council, some AIDS doctors, and scores of people with AIDS and their supporters.

This photo of Pete and Angela Davis was taken November 6, 2011, when Angela received CSPG’s Historian of the Lion’s Award.

To see a 2010 interview with Pete Jimenez and Jeff Schuerholz, President of CSPG’s Board, and Pete’s partner for more than 20 years, where they discuss this poster and more: http://activistvideoarchive.org/pages/PeteJimenezJeffSchuerholz.html

Two informative and moving obituaries:

http://lgbtpov.frontiersla.com/2012/04/15/his-one-queer-voice-pete-jimenez-february-12-1964-april-13-2012/

http://lgbtpov.frontiersla.com/2012/04/14/act-upla-protester-pete-jimenez-dies-at-48/

Poster of the Week

Poster of the Week – Commemorating the 25^th Anniversary of ACT UP

Silence=Death

ACT UP/NY, Gran Fury

The Silence = Death Project

Offset, 1987

New York, New York

27399

March 24, 2012 marks 25 years since the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP) held its first direct action on Wall Street to demand greater access to HIV treatment. ACT UP was formed by a coalition of activists outraged over the U.S. government’s mismanagement of the AIDS crisis.

ACT UP quickly became a national and world-wide movement, with one of its most effective chapters in Los Angeles. ACT UP/LA stopped the Rose Parade. They shouted down elected officials. They negotiated the building of an AIDS Ward in a public health system that left people with AIDS suffering in hallways due to lack of a dedicated place for them.

25 Years ago, ACT UP shut down Wall Street. To commemorate their original action on the world's financial center, ACT UP will stage an action, in cooperation with Occupy Wall Street, on Wednesday, April 25. “ACT UP + Occupy To End The AIDS Crisis” will demand a “Robin Hood” tax on financial transactions to increase HIV/AIDS funding.

CSPG’s Poster of the Week was designed by ACT UP/NY, Gran Fury, and The Silence = Death Project. Gran Fury was a collective of AIDS activists, born out of ACT UP/NY, who provoked direct action to end the AIDS crisis. They chose the name 'Gran Fury' after the brand of Plymouth automobile used as a squad car by the New York City police department. They manipulated sophisticated advertising strategies in print and video to render complex issues understandable, and to reach an audience not often addressed by governmental and corporate media. They also retaliated against government and social institutions that made those living with AIDS invisible.

The pink triangle was established as a pro-gay symbol by activists in the United States during the 1970s. Its use originated in World War II, when known homosexuals in Nazi concentration camps were forced to wear inverted pink triangle badges as identifiers, much in the same manner that Jews were forced to wear the yellow Star of David. Wearers of the pink triangle were considered at the bottom of the camp social system and subjected to particularly severe maltreatment and degradation. Thus, the appropriation of the symbol of the pink triangle, usually turned upright rather than inverted, was a conscious attempt to transform a symbol of humiliation into one of solidarity and resistance. By the outset of the AIDS epidemic, it was well-entrenched as a symbol of gay pride and liberation.

Sources:

http://www.democracynow.org/2012/3/23/how_to_survive_a_plague_as

http://www.aidsmeds.com/articles/anniversary_hiv_actup_1667_22130.shtml

https://www.facebook.com/events/208718522568785/

http://www.drkrm.com/actup.html

Poster of the Week

Disappearing Promises
Kaytee Riek and Max Ray
ACT UP Philadelphia
Health GAP
Digital Print, 2009
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

CSPG’s poster of the week comes from the 2009 G20 that took place in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The day before the G20 began, AIDS activists, dressed in black and marching behind coffins and funeral wreaths, held a funeral procession for the thousands of people with AIDS who have died and will continue to die as a result of the broken promises made by the wealthiest nations regarding global health funding. Activists said that the G-20 nations are using the financial crisis as an excuse to cut promised funding for global AIDS programs. In particular, activists called out President Barack Obama, who promised on the campaign trail to provide $50 billion over five years to global AIDS efforts.

The funeral procession was sponsored by ACT UP Philadelphia, Azania Heritage International, Black Radical Congress of Pittsburgh, Health GAP, Housing Works, New Voices Pittsburgh: Women of Color for Reproductive Justice, NYC AIDS Housing Network (NYCAHN), Proyecto Sol Filadelphia and Roots of Promise (a Thomas Merton Center project).

The poster was selected as the 2010 G20 opens this week in Toronto, Canada. Demonstrations have already started, demanding rights for First Nations, people with disabilities, LGBTQ, migrants, immigrants, women, children, and other marginalized communities, and opposing mining tar sands and other acts that contribute to global warming. In preparation for the G20, Toronto has been transformed into a fortress with a three-meter high and six-kilometer long $5.5 million dollar concrete and metal security fence encompassing the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. Within and around this armed camp are 20,000 law enforcement officials, 1,000 private security guards, closed circuit TV cameras, military-style checkpoints along with sound and water cannons. Behind these steel cages is a corporate-driven narrative of profiteering. *

History of G20

In 1975, leaders of France, Germany, Italy, Japan, UK, and the US, the world's leading industrialized nations, met as a forum for economic and trade matters. Initially known as the G6, it became known as the G7 and G8 after the respective entries of Canada (1976) and Russia (1998). In 1999, the G20 formed.

The G8s and G20s positive stance on globalization has provoked a vigorous response from opponents. Since 2001, there has been a tendency for the summits to be held in more remote locations, with the aim of avoiding mass protests. The lengths to which security forces have gone to shield the politicians from demonstrators serves to reinforce the summits’ closed-door image.

Countless thousands advocating for global justice gather on the streets every year to protest the closed door meetings of both G8 and G20 summits. As global inequalities continues to rise protests have grown; never at these mass convergences has a single protester serious harmed anyone. In response to the protests, many law enforcement operations have been employed, some of whom use force to disperse protesters. In Genoa, Italy in 2001, police surrounding Carlo Giuliani, a young Italian anarchist, shot him in the face.

*For more information on Toronto’s preparation for the G20 see:

Rabble.ca: Challenging Toronto's corporate security walls
By Harsha Walia and Stefan Christoff

Other sources:

BBC: Profile: G8

Wikipedia: G-20 major economies

Poster of the Week

Healthcare Not Wealthcare

ACT UP

Offset

1992