{"id":45342,"date":"2020-05-27T23:55:04","date_gmt":"2020-05-28T03:55:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.wendybrandes.com\/blog\/?p=45342"},"modified":"2020-05-28T02:09:45","modified_gmt":"2020-05-28T06:09:45","slug":"rip-larry-kramer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wendybrandes.com\/blog\/2020\/05\/rip-larry-kramer\/","title":{"rendered":"RIP, Larry Kramer"},"content":{"rendered":"

Larry Kramer, a writer and one of the earliest AIDS activists<\/a>, died today at age 84<\/a>. You can read his full resume in the many obituaries that have been and will be published but, in short, Kramer was a co-founder of two AIDS activism groups — Gay Men’s Health Crisis<\/a>, in 1982, which provided support services to people with AIDS; and the more activist ACT UP in 1987, which used both public protest and self-taught research skills to light a fire under scientists and politicians. In between, he wrote The Normal Heart<\/a><\/em>, an autobiographical play about the dawn of the AIDS crisis and the conflicts at GMHC, which played to acclaim at New York’s Public Theater in 1985 and raised awareness of AIDS outside the gay community. <\/p>\n

Kramer’s confrontational way of raising AIDS awareness within the gay community often made enemies and alienated would-be allies. In 1983, he published an article in the New York Native called, “1,112 and Counting<\/a>,” which began, “If this article doesn\u2019t scare the shit out of you, we\u2019re in real trouble. If this article doesn\u2019t rouse you to anger, fury, rage, and action, gay men may have no future on this earth. Our continued existence depends on just how angry you can get.” He was ousted from GMHC. Last year, he described his 1980s style:<\/p>\n

“…I was a loudmouth. People would walk across the street to not be near me. People would also thank me for what I was doing, and I would say, ‘For what? Why aren\u2019t you doing it, too?’ And they didn\u2019t like that either,” Larry Kramer, in Interview magazine, December 2019<\/a><\/strong>.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

However, when it came to applying pressure to the government to dedicate resources to the research of and treatment for a contagious new virus, he got things done. As Dr. Anthony Fauci has said, “There\u2019s medicine before Larry Kramer, and then there\u2019s medicine after Larry Kramer.\u201d <\/p>\n