“Building a Healing Community from ACT UP to Housing Works - An Interview with Keith Cylar” by Benjamin Shepard. Published in: From ACT UP to the WTO: Urban Protest And Community-Building in the Era of Globalization Edited by Benjamin Shepard and Ronald Hayduk Verso Press, 2002. Keith Cylar began our interview on AIDS activism and community building by explaining: For many of our clients the first step toward becoming whole is to forgive themselves for all the scary and insane things that happened to them, and they may have done to others. It requires the staff to develop a real sense of compassion as the clients often become abusive, self destructive and angry toward them because that’s how they relate to a world that has been hostile and abusive to them. And finally, it requires courage to face these behaviors and to begin to heal from these events and move forward with their lives in spite of having a life threatening illness that will kill them sooner or later. It wasn’t an unusual argument from the co-executive director of an organization whose mission is to reach the most vulnerable and underserved among those affected by the AIDS epidemic in New York City—homeless persons of color whose positive HIV diagnoses are complicated by a history of chronic mental illness and/or chemical dependence. In the ten years since it was found, Housing Works has had to balance between being a social service and social movement organization. Through programs such as their Second Life Job Training Program, Social Ventures Development Program, and primary care clinics, Housing Works utilizes the tools of community economic development to open up spaces for an often invisible population. Their literature suggests, “The Social Ventures Development Program includes several entrepreneurial ventures which were created to meet two critical challenges facing most AIDS service and anti- poverty organizations: the need to generate unrestricted income for our social service programs and the need to create employment opportunities for clients who wish to enter or re-enter the workforce” <http://www.housingworks.org/about.htm>. Despite its development role, the agency was founded within the trajectory of activism. Cylar and I talked about creating different kinds of spaces for a population the dominant culture would just as soon ignore. BS: When did HIV/AIDS first cross the path of your life? KC: 1984, and ’83, when I was in Boston and a very good friend that I had met. I had developed an incredible network of young black gay professionals, that were my core group of friends. It was an awesome support group of people that were gifted and lovely. In 1983, the first of our group died from some rare blood disease – it was AIDS, only the world didn’t know it. As the epidemic began to show its true nature, we became increasingly uncomfortable. And at some point around then, we began to count the years of unprotected sex and drug use against the years of monastic life behavior, knowing all the time that any one of us could be the next. And one by one they died. Of that circle, I happen to be, I believe, one of the last ones still alive, and I’m infected and scared. At that point I was having sex wherever. It was really schitzophenic; there was the fear of contagion, but the unforgiving presence of hormones and the need to have sex. I don’t regret it. I actually wish that I had more sex than I had back then but I was a prude. I was a nerd. I cried a lot back then because of how lonely I was. It was a very alienated world which didn’t necessarily know how to deal with a strong, black, intelligent, jock male who is also a faggot who loves men and loves kinky sex…. BS: A little of that James Baldwin feeling…? KC: Absolutely, James speaks to that kind of pain and isolation and where do you go to find safe harbors. And so as the epidemic began to rage, literally, we would count years. It was very painful coming up as a sexual person within the AIDS epidemic…which is another story that I really wanna write and talk about… BS: Now, what about your first arrest? KC: My first arrest was actually kind of amazing. It was at the Waldorf, probably ’88 or ’89. And it was an affinity group, whoever was president was coming there, right. And we thought we were so cool and so smart because we had rented a room (laughs) under somebody else’s credit card, not tied to ACT UP at all. You know, we all filtered in one by one and made our way up to the room. And we were doing a banner drop. And we thought we were going to handcuff ourselves on that big expensive clock in the middle of the lobby. We were going to leaflet and we had all the multi things going on that we were going to do while a banner was being dropped out of the roof. There was a demonstration on the outside and those of us going in were so cool. We were (whispers) and we had a password, all of that, all of that… just total covert. So we finally all get into the room and we have it timed, bom, bom, bom, bom… very James Bond, right? I go to the door of the fucking door of the hotel room that we are renting under this name and the fucking secret service had reversed the god damn key hole. They were fucking watching us…(laughs). You know? So we do the whole thing. we’re handcuffed behind the great big clock in the middle of the lobby. And the banner drop happens the demonstration is going on--all this craziness. And we’re arrested and we’re handcuffed. And my partner Charles was there to walk me through it. We spend a couple of hours in jail. They spring us. We’re done. And then it was like, for a while, an arrest here, an arrest there. Where are we getting arrested next? this action, that action. And the only arrest I missed that I wish I’d gone to, I was supposed to be part of the group, the Power Tools, that went down to South Carolina to drill themselves into Burroughs Welcome. I was supposed to go but I chickened out at the last minute. BS: How come you chickened out? KC: Because I’m a black man and going down to the South and having them put fucking handcuffs on me was more than I wanted to experience. I’m from the South. Majority Action/ ACT UP BS: So when did you first go to an ACT UP meeting? KC: In 1987, the love of my life died from AIDS. And he died within four days of the official diagnosis. And I didn’t know what to do and I just freaked. And I thought, I was going to die and I didn’t know where to go and I didn’t know what to do and I wanted my man back. Somehow I found out the I found out the Community Health Project was at the Gay and Lesbian Center. And they had this program for the worried-well, which back then gave information about drug use on your system and counseling; it was a very holistic center. I went there and my appointment happened to be on a Monday evening. And when I walked down after my appointment, quite shell-shocked, I saw this table full of paper and all of these people in black leather, this guy in drag with big earrings shouting at everyone and all these dykes. At that point in time, I was very much into wearing black leather. And they started talking about AIDS. Larry Kramer was up talking. And I saw all this literature and information so I walked in and I stood in the back of the room and I crossed my arms. There were all these faggots, people running around, and so I wanted to hear the information. So I listened and I took all of the information off the table. And the next week I came back. And what I would do was…I would stand in the back of the room. And I wouldn’t talk to anybody and I was mumbling, ‘get the fuck out here’ about all these white people. And I did that a couple of times. And this guy, Dan Williams, who was also black, was also standing in the back of the room. He started standing behind me. He could hear me. And I’d nod and he’d nod. And I’d listen to this craziness that was going on but I wanted the information so I had to come. The real deal was us dishing on everyone there. Then one day he said, “Hi, my name is Dan” and we started to talk and Dan decided I needed to come to the Majority Action Committee of ACT UP. It was [called] the Majority Action Committee because the majority of people dying of AIDS were people of color. Majority Action focused on Black and Latino issues in the epidemic. And I started to go there. And then they needed somebody to be a representative to Treatment and Data, which was the treatment committee of ACT UP where everything was happening with drug development and treatment issues.