06/26/2019
By the start of the 1990s, increasingly large demonstrations and street actions* signaled that the demand for AIDS support services (the virus had pushed thousands into poverty) and research leading to effective treatment had become a mass movement.
Including one at Trump Tower in New York, staged by ACT-UP on Halloween, 1989. “The Trump Tower protest was organized by ACT UP’s Housing Committee, which hoped to draw attention to the lack of housing for homeless people with AIDS,” wrote Stephen Vider in Slate. “Through the rain, protesters maintained a picket line, carrying a range of printed and handmade signs: ‘Silence Equals Death,; ‘In NYC 10,000 Homeless PWAs, 64 Beds,’ ‘Money For AIDS Not For Malls.’ Two participants hung a banner, ‘10,000 Homeless With AIDS,’ from the windows across the street.”
How the AIDS Epidemic Catalyzed the Medical Ma*****na Movement Dennis Peron was the Rosa Parks of the medical ma*****na movement, the one who would not move to the back of the bus. Dennis refused to accept that anybody —any cop or DA or judge— could tell him he didn’t have a right to smoke mar...
