Location plays an integral role in the conveyance of a message. Activists group deliberately handpick the site of their demonstrations to provoke a certain emotion, or reach a certain audience. ACT-UP, or AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power, is a universal nonprofit advocacy group working to better the lives of people with AIDS, attempting to bring about new legislation, medical research, policy change, and medical treatment. With a motto such as “Silence Equals Death”, ACT-UP followed through with their promise and collectively spoke out on matters that were previously silenced. Their choice of utilizing “sacred space” also serves an amplifier for their already prominent voices. Certain institutions carry an air of respectability and convention, where one would intentionally soften the click of their heels upon entering the establishment. By intruding on the stern atmosphere and spreading awareness about topics that at the time were considered to be “taboo”, a juxtaposition naturally forms which propels ACT-UP’s message even further.
On March 24, 1987, ACT-UP held its first action on Wall Street to, “protest the profiteering of pharmaceutical companies on AIDS drugs” (actupny.com). An article in the NY Times described a 1986 Fortune Magazine cover photograph, encapsulating the atmosphere which surrounded Wall Street at the time: a young investment banker with an enormous cigar and smug look spread across his face (nytimes.com). By bringing reform dealing with AIDS to such a platform the controversy would spread the message even farther.
On December 10, 1989, ACT-UP followed through with an action that was labeled to be the most “audacious protest” where over 4,500 protestors disrupted Sunday’s morning mass at St. Patrick’s Cathedral. They protested, “the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York’s stand on sex education and condom distribution in the wake of the AIDS crisis” (thestarryeye.typepad.com). The Catholic church teaches that homosexual acts are “violations of the divine”; thus, by speaking out about the church’s homophobic and misogynistic policies, while located directly in the church, the impact ultimately becomes heightened.
Ultimately, activism becomes more effective when it occurs as close to the root of the problem as possible. ACT-UP’s acts were labeled as “rude, rash, [and] effective”. They blocked traffic by Wall Street by laying down with cardboard tombstones over their heads, they spread ashes of AIDS victims on the front lawn of the White House, they chained themselves inside pharmaceutical corporations, unafraid of being jailed or what social stigma will surround them afterwards. This boldness oversaw the limitations that were hauled their way, which is something today’s activism could benefit from, even in the Uber vs Yellow cab matter. Their activism did not condone violence against other people, but against the institution. With a collective consciousness, protestors calculated the weakest spots in society and targeted them, with each demonstration tailored to each location seamlessly. Activism is not sexist, nor is it racist; if there is a pressing concern in society, it applies to all of its citizens equally.
V.B.
