Yes, Tim was slutty and selfish. But the only reason we know how slutty and selfish he was is because he told everyone, through his autobiography "Holding the Man" (1994), how slutty and selfish he was. Did you miss the part where he's the one who wrote the book this film is based on?
On a personal note, I came out in 1975 and I saw all of the hedonistic behavior that defined gay life then. I thought it was insane at the time; and that was before AIDS and before anyone knew they were making life and death choices. I just thought it was, bizarre. I can look back on it now and see it as a cauldron of crosscurrents: gay men claiming their sexuality, rejection from their families, churches, and communities, and no "check" (female polarity, possible pregnancy, parenthood) on their impulses. No one wanted to date. They just wanted to *beep*. *beep* was a clarion call for freedom. No one at the time, no, not no one, I knew at the time, how stupid that was. What I didn't know, and no one could know, was how deadly it was.
Who's left to say, "what the hell were we doing back then?" Virtually no one. And those who are still alive are most likely too embarrassed or ashamed to admit what a cluster-*beep*, literally, it was. Mostly the subject gets glossed over. I remember, very clearly, gay men of the time saying, "you'd better pay attention to this epidemic because it's coming for you next". Well, it didn't come for "them" next. It's still, everywhere but in Africa, primarily a gay male communities disease. And the reason is because of repeated overexposure to the virus. The heterosexual community has never lived in the petri dish that the gay community created for itself. Even though this virus is 100% indiscriminate, gay men are still its primary, by far, volunteers. Tim Conigrave is more honest than most who have dealt with this subject. He was not more "selfish or slutty" than your ordinary, run of the mill, kind of gay guy from that era. I do think that he, and others of that time, do deserve some slack here though. What happened in the early 80's was unimaginable. Whatever his, or John's, imperfections were they couldn't have known that they would pay with their lives.
I loved this film because there were a million Tims and Johns who's names and stories are not well known, but are still loved and remembered. Though imperfect, they were still good people who were failed by everything and everyone who was supposed to mentor them into adulthood. Instead they just flailed around into their 30's and then died from something they stumbled into straight out of a horror show.
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ivcooten
8 years ago
Thank you hughmann55!
It is Tim's brave honesty that makes this story extraordinary.
I think that most young people nowadays don’t realize that HIV was unknown back then. You just didn’t know that it was there. HIV and AIDS was killing people and they didn’t know what was happening. It took years before they even knew what was going on. I still remember the fear, the horrors, the unknown part. Friends who went for a test. And had to wait for the results. I saw the devastating effects in Southern Africa in the early nineties. Horrible. Tuberculosis Wards full of dying people. And people were really afraid of contracting AIDS by sitting next to a person with AIDS on the bus.
I cried a lot while reading the book, seeing the movie. This book will stay with me forever. It is Tim’s quality that he can bring back all those very bad years. That he can mix these horrible moments with humor. It’s his achievement that while crying you still have to laugh over a remark or thought.
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