By Steve Nakata, Administrative Services
PULLMAN, Wash. – The film “Dallas Buyers Club” will be shown in recognition of World AIDS Day at 6 p.m. Monday, Dec. 1, in the CUB auditorium at Washington State University. The free, public screening is sponsored by the Gender Identity and Sexual Orientation Resource Center (GIESORC).
The Palouse HIV Consortium and Coug Health will have tables at the event to share information about AIDS, its prevention and treatments.
Award-winning film
Matthew McConaughey won a best actor Oscar for his performance in the film as a homophobic, rodeo-loving Texan who contracts AIDS. He smuggles unapproved pharmaceutical drugs and distributes them to other AIDS patients by establishing the Dallas Buyers Club.
Jared Leto, who portrays an HIV-positive transgendered woman in the film, won best supporting actor.
Remembering the toll
Heidi Stanton Schnebly, GIESORC director, remembers walking the streets of San Francisco in the 1980s before people knew much about AIDS.
“AIDS was pretty much synonymous with a death sentence at that time because there was so much misinformation,” she said. “Gays were perceived as the outcasts of society and there was almost the mentality that this was what they deserved.”
World AIDS Day “is a time to take stock of what we have lost and what we have gained in terms of addressing AIDS,” she said. “Although AIDS is not a ‘gay disease,’ it certainly took a devastating toll on our community at the peak of the AIDS crisis.”
Contacts:
Heidi Stanton Schnebly, WSU GIESORC, 509-335-8841, hstanton@wsu.edu
Steve Nakata, director of communication, WSU Administrative Services, 509-335-1774, nakata@wsu.edu