Time to speak truth to power- Why we can no longer afford to be silent

For this month’s “FOLKS” article, we wanted to go beyond the statistics and interview someone of the Diaspora between the age of 21 and 35, who is HIV-positive and willing to talk about their status. Unfortunately, after weeks of sending out emails and reaching out to my network, I was unable to find at least one brave soul in that age group who was comfortable with getting on the record and sharing their reality.

While the U.S. media has us distracted by the supposed down-low phenomenon, the real reason why the HIV infection rate is high in our community is because systemic racism and the stigmatization of the virus has our lips sealed and eyes closed. And as we remain silent 69 percent of Black teens between the ages of 13 and 19 are the new AIDS cases and the disease has become the number one killer of African-American women between the ages of 25 and 34.

During the 2007 Democratic Primary Debate, Hillary Clinton put it all in perspective and said: “If HIV-AIDS were the leading cause of death of white women between the ages of twenty-five and thirty-four, there would be an outraged outcry in this country.” It’s easier for our government and celebrities to help raise funds for HIV prevention and treatment programs in Africa, than to deal with the fact that African diasporic men, women and children are dying right here, in one of the world’s richest nations.

AIDS has gone from being viewed as a gay, white male disease to now a Black and Brown folk epidemic, because the gay community used the tragedy of losing loved ones as fuel for political mobilization. We must do the same and ring the alarm to save our lives.

To encourage discussion and action, Square Rootz has joined TheLoop21.com’s “Stop Black AIDS” initiative. For the rest of July, we will be posting HIV/AIDS news and facts in our site’s “SUBSTANCE” section and on Facebook, MySpace and Twitter.  Please feel free to join us with your stories, opinions and  information.

Check out TheLoop21.com’s “The Silent Killer: AIDS in Black America” panel discussion featuring: Kenya Byrd, senior editor of Essence; Terrance Dean, founder and creator of Men’s Empowerment and author of Hiding in Hip-Hop: On the Down Low in the Entertainment Industry From Music to Hollywood; K. Aletha Maybank, MD, MPH, assistant commissioner in New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene; Sonya Lockett, vice president of public affairs at Black Entertainment Television (BET) Networks; Chuck Creekmur, cofounder and co-CEO of AllHipHop.com, Angela Yee, host of Lip Service on SIRIUS Satellite Radio; and Blogxilla, blogger on Blogxilla.com.