Gay Circuit Parties Debate - Fox "News"
BILL O'REILLY, HOST: In the Unresolved Problems segment tonight, they are called circuit parties, fundraisers for gay charities and AIDS prevention. They're happening all over the USA.
The problem is these parties may be spreading AIDS, according to a survey by the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta. Of nearly 300 men who have attended circuit parties, things are pretty much out of control. Ninety-five percent of the men admitted they took at least one illegal drug at the parties, 95 percent. And 28 percent of men said they had unprotected sex at those parties.
With us now is journalist Michelangelo Signorile, the author of the book, Life Outside; and Richard Elovich, the former director of HIV prevention at the Gay Men's Health Crisis.
All right, Mr. Signorile, you don't like these parties?
MICHELANGELO SIGNORILE, AUTHOR, LIFE OUTSIDE: Well, my problem with the parties is not about necessarily what's going on in terms of it being bad or immoral or terrible or anything like that. My problem with them is about HIV prevention. I'm an AIDS activist. I always have been, you know, through much of my career and I'm concerned about it.
And in my book, I went and looked at them and studied them and talked about how AIDS organizations should not be promoting them by hosting them. You know, I'm not about shutting them down. Parties are going to happen, you know, spring breaks, heterosexual teenagers are all partying. But the organizations that are supposed to be standing up and providing information about being responsible about safer sex should not be promoting them to the community and telling gay men come to our party and be part of this.
O'REILLY: Yeah, I mean, it looks like a wild orgy here, Mr. Elovich. I mean you got a third of the people attending having unprotected sex and almost everyone under the influence of narcotics. I mean what say you?
RICHARD ELOVICH, FORMER DIRECTOR OF HIV PREVENTION, GAY MEN'S HEALTH CRISIS: Well, first of all, I think that you're -- you've picked, you know, sensationalized images of the parties. So for example...
O'REILLY: Well, wait, wait, wait. Did -- the study from the CDC said 95 percent of them. I mean, how much more can I sensationalize?
ELOVICH: I went to a Neil Young concert dates, myself. Recently, I went to a Neil Young concert and people returned to their seats with two glasses of beer. I would suspect there's a lot less damage going on at these parties than what's happening at a lot of, you know...
O'REILLY: Mr. Elovich, you're flying in the face of facts. Ninety-five percent say they use an illegal drug and a third of them say they have unprotected sex at the party. They don't even wait until they go home. See, that's what most people do.
ELOVICH: So let's take that...
O'REILLY: OK.
ELOVICH: Let's take that for example. When we have prohibition in terms of alcohol, did that mean that every one who was using alcohol was abusing alcohol? Some of the real problems that we're having in terms of these drugs that people are using -- and we're talking about adults. You have it with kids who are supposedly in a supervised environment, 50 percent of kids are smoking pot.
O'REILLY: You're deflecting all of this all over the place, Mr. Elovich. Look, to me, I'm saying to you -- if 50 percent of the AIDS virus in this country is being passed by homosexual men -- and that's a stat, all right -- and then you want to raise money to fight that, yet at the event, you're having people, almost all of them intoxicated, 95 percent...
ELOVICH: No, there's no -- no, there's no evidence -- I'm sorry...
O'REILLY: Ninety-five percent.
ELOVICH: It says 95 percent use drugs.
O'REILLY: At the party.
ELOVICH: At the party. Would you say...
O'REILLY: They're intoxicated.
ELOVICH: ... that 95 percent of people at a bar drink? Does that mean they're intoxicated?
O'REILLY: There's a difference between taking a drug and having a beer. Go ahead, Mr. Signorile.
ELOVICH: I just want to tell you what -- the CDC did not say "intoxicated."
SIGNORILE: Let me -- let me...
O'REILLY: No, I'm saying it.
ELOVICH: So you're making that jump.
SIGNORILE: Let me...
O'REILLY: I'm making that jump.
SIGNORILE: Let me give a little more depth to what we're talking about here. We're not talking about a Neil Young concert where a bunch of people go to an event and go home that night. We're talking about events that take place often in resort hotels for an entire weekend. We're talking about gay men flying in from around the country and around the world, a community in which HIV is highly prevalent, doing drugs.
Every study we've seen connects drug use to unprotected sex, doing drugs, having sex maybe at the event. But all weekend at these hotels where these events -- there's one in Palm Springs that goes on all weekend. There have been several overdoses throughout the weekend every year. There have been numerous occasions of people engaging in unsafe sex, writing about it, talking about it. So, we know that that is what is happening. We're not talking about one event here. We're talking about weekends in which people are coming together and there is a lot of unprotected sex.
O'REILLY: Yeah, but people want...
(CROSSTALK)
ELOVICH: If you are really interested in HIV prevention, where are the rates of HIV prevention where HIV is really skyrocketing is amongst young men, right?
O'REILLY: Yeah, but that's -- they're at the party.
ELOVICH: ... 22 years old. No, they're not at the party.
O'REILLY: They're not at the party.
ELOVICH: The ones who go to the party can afford $35 per ticket and they're...
O'REILLY: But Mr. Elovich...
ELOVICH: ... largely middle-aged white men.
O'REILLY: I don't understand why you can't -- wait.
(CROSSTALK)
O'REILLY: Wait a minute. OK, I've got to ask Mr. Elovich something. I don't understand...
ELOVICH: But you're not going to make a program about black and Latino men getting infected and where they actually need services.
O'REILLY: Hey, look; if there's a reason to do it, I'll do it.
ELOVICH: You're going to do it on -- if you wanted HIV prevention to be there, that's where it would be. It's not at these parties.
O'REILLY: Mr. Elovich, time out. Time out. You are trying to justify these parties when these parties are putting people at risk. And I'm not getting that. You should be saying, if you're, you know, somebody who wants to cut down on AIDS transmission, hey, we'll have our parties, but we're not going to allow any illegal drugs in there and you're going to behave yourself. Why aren't you saying that?
ELOVICH: Illegal drugs don't equal unprotected sex.
O'REILLY: Every study shows...
(CROSSTALK)
ELOVICH: No, it does not. No, it's not. I'll tell you...
SIGNORILE: Every study we've seen shows that.
ELOVICH: That's not true.
SIGNORILE: And you are being totally...
ELOVICH: What the studies show is...
SIGNORILE: You're being dishonest.
ELOVICH: Don't personalize this.
SIGNORILE: You're being dishonest.
ELOVICH: In fact, what the study shows is that very often people want to have -- they want to have sex without barriers...
SIGNORILE: You're being dishonest.
ELOVICH: ... and in the same way as you and your wife might turn down the lights, that's what people are doing very often with a beer, with taking a toke from grass. What people are doing is if you want to have...
SIGNORILE: You're being dishonest to say...
ELOVICH: No, you're not. You're dishonest.
SIGNORILE: ... to say that men...
(CROSSTALK)
SIGNORILE: ... men in that age group are not -- men are...
ELOVICH: You closed down the morning party...
SIGNORILE: Can I please speak? Can I...
ELOVICH: You moved -- you moved...
SIGNORILE: Can I speak, Richard? Can you shut up for a minute?
ELOVICH: ... HIV out of the...
SIGNORILE: Can you shut up for a minute?
ELOVICH: ... out of the morning party.
SIGNORILE: Can you shut up for a minute?
(CROSSTALK)
O'REILLY: All right, time out, fellows. Time out.
(CROSSTALK)
O'REILLY: All right, I'm going to give you both a last statement, but I'm going to tell you, Mr. Elovich, that your thinking is wrong. It's salacious and it's dangerous. The facts show that a third of the men that attend these parties have unprotected sex. If you care about the spread of AIDS, you would condemn that and you would condemn any steps that could possibly lead up to it.
All right, now I'm going to let you have your statement and then, you'll have yours. Go.
SIGNORILE: First of all, for him to call me a demagogue, I am a card-carrying member of the liberal media establishment, Bill. I am -- forget about it on everything from abortion to our president, George W. Bush. So for him to...
O'REILLY: All right, just make your point.
SIGNORILE: ... you know position me a moralist is really demeaning, one. Two, he is being dishonest to say that that age group -- what, it doesn't matter?
And when you talk about teenagers, what are our AIDS groups, our organizations...
O'REILLY: All right, wrap it up.
SIGNORILE: ... saying to young people...
O'REILLY: Richard, go ahead, last statement.
ELOVICH: OK, first, you took -- you represented as fact the fact that people are using drugs. Therefore, they're intoxicated. We know this around alcohol. People can drink.
O'REILLY: All right, anything else? You made that point. Anything else?
ELOVICH: The second is that effective HIV prevention is not finger wagging, shooding (ph) on people. What you see is helping people, bringing this out in the open. What -- Michelangelo, if you would do a story is about someone like Chris Mann...
O'REILLY: All right.
ELOVICH: ... a doctor who was sports medicine...
SIGNORILE: You would be surprised...
O'REILLY: Gentlemen, gentlemen, we have to rush. We have to rush.
(CROSSTALK)
O'REILLY: Listen...
(CROSSTALK)
O'REILLY: That's it. That's it.
SIGNORILE: You are...
ELOVICH: You just won...
O'REILLY: Guys! Guys!
(CROSSTALK)
ELOVICH: This is about the...
O'REILLY: All right, we'll be right back. We will be right back. And these guys will argue into the morning. We'll be right back. |
