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The gay community has taken care of their issues and problems in terms of HIV/AIDS. They have done an incredible job. We as heterosexuals need to learn from the gay community because they have rallied together. They have sent a lot of information out there. They go get tested.

I think so many doors have been opened for the gay community as far as the dangers and horrors of HIV. There is so much more out-ness now.

I think these last 10 years have seen just a huge shift in the psyche of this country as regards gay people. I think AIDS had a lot to do with it. So many families who really believed they'd 'never met one' were suddenly confronted with their sons becoming ill, and friends of sons. I think that brought a lot of it into the open.

In the '70s, the gay movement was really making strides. Huge strides. And then AIDS came along and slapped a judgment on it all and the Right Wing religious movement was like, 'See. This is why, we told you.' And it pushed back the movement 30 years.

People with HIV are still stigmatized. The infection rates are going up. People are dying. The political response is appalling. The sadness of it, the waste.

We must encourage people to get educated, to get tested, to get involved in the fight against AIDS.

You've got to watch the politics of AIDS. The politics of AIDS can work both for and against the victims of AIDS.

AIDS itself is subject to incredible stigma.

It's important not to lose sight of the fact people of all sorts are still putting themselves at risk. It happens to straight and gay, single and married. I have never been comfortable thinking of AIDS as something that 'other people' get.

The general population still thinks HIV is something that came in the 80s and went away, or that it only affects the gay population or intravenous drug users.