Speech #1050026972

For twenty years. this nation has treated persons with AIDS as uniquely responsible for their own condition. Despite what we know about smoking and cancer. we have not done to smokers what we have done to persons with AIDS. despite what we know about diet. we have not done to heartattack sufferers what we have done to persons with AIDS: despite what. we know about bucking horses and skydiving. we have not done to Christopher Reeves what we have done to persons with AIDS. Senators debating IUVinfected Immigrants have used. as their point of useful reference. "infested fruits"a double entendre on both "Infection" and the word "Fruit." And because we have labored against such stigma and deicrimlnation. such Ignorance and evil. we have not reached common agreement on the most basic of all understandings: That Americans with AIDS do not deserve their disease but do deserve our assistance. Failure to achieve consensus across moral and political lines on that fundamental reality has done more to contribute to the de. struction of the AIDS community than the virus Itself. So deep has the stigma been. so controversial the epidemic. that more than a hundred thousand Americans bad died of the disease before an American president dared say the word "AIDS" in public.