The Human Factor

When I was younger, one of my favourite television shows used to be the police show 21 Jump Street with a very youthful Johnny Depp. Each week, the show used to tackle a social issue, whether it was drugs, adoption, abortion, rape or just general every day community problems that we all run into at some stage of our lives. Yet, even now, I still remember one episode that brought me to tears at the time, and has forever imprinted in me the realisation that all that anyone really wants in life, is some to hold you and tell you that they care.

The particular episode revolved around a high school student who was [supposedly] a haemophiliac, or in layman's terms, someone who bled easily. The student, who I forget his name, was being harrassed at school, and Johnny Depp was asked to go undercover and protect him "in case he hurt himself and needed urgent help". As the episode progressed, we - the viewer - discovered that the student was actually HIV positive and Johnny Depp was there to protect him from the bigotry and hatred of other students and their families.

What made that particular episode so emotional was that for the first time, the human side of the disease was shown on a show watched by a large audience both in the USA and abroad. There was no loose-wristed feminine guy or drag queen talking with a girlie accent, no drug addict stealing to feed a habit, nothing that when you mention the words "AIDS" would conjour up the images that most of us have today. The show placed the entire issue of AIDS straight into the lives of every living person regardless of race or sexual orientation.

Through Johnny Depp's involvement, we saw the fear and the loneliness of someone having AIDS and how the community through ignorance, treated the student. As the show progressed, we saw the student go from being portrayed as "strong, nothing scares me" into one lonely and sad person, who all he wanted was for someone to not be afraid, to simply share that milk with him, and hold him. Nothing more - just the touch of another human who cared about him and what he was going through.

I'll be the first to admit it, that by the end of the show, I was in tears over the kid. Not because he was ill or that he died, but because in the end he found someone [Johnny Depp] who cared enough about him, to simply hold him in his arms and let out all the loneliness that he had bottled up because no one else cared. And that is the saddest part of it all.

Yet 18 years after the show was broadcast, we still have many people who have an issue with people with HIV and AIDS. So the question that one needs to ask.

What are we all afraid of? Why is it that when we hear that someone is HIV Positive, we cringe and back off? Are we so scared of catching it that we back off, simply because we ourselves are either ignorant or is it because it gives us the realisation that life is not eternal and that we all die one day?

And on that, why must we treat HIV Positive people like lepers? They have an illness which will eventually kill them. But by the same token, having cancer or any other kind of illness, will also lead us down the same path. We don't treat cancer victims like that, so why treat HIV Positive people differently? If one sits back and really thinks about it, your best friend, a family member or even a co-worker could be HIV Positive, and you wouldn't know it. Would your feelings for that person change simply because you found out one day? Does it make them any less human?

Even if we are 100% healthy our entire life, we all die one day whether by natural causes or by accident. The disadvantage [or advantage, depending on which perspective you take] is that if one has got a life threatening illness, you are aware that your time is limited. And knowing that, one has two options - either sit there, feel sad and blame the world, or, go out and live life to the fullest.

From my perspective, if someone came up to me and said "James, got some bad news mate. You have 5 years left before you die", I know what option I will take. I would tell my friends [and those that are real friends will stick by me] and go out and live my life as if tomorrow is my last day. I would take that holiday I have been postponing for the last 10 years, take up that hobby that I have left for a rainy day, go out and have those skydiving lessons to get over my fear of heights. Whether I died a week from today, 5 years down the track or 20 years, I would know that my life was a full one. And the sad thing to all this is that, in the end, I would have achieved more in my life than those who are 100% healthy.

Finally, something for you to think about. Whether one is healthy or ill, its what is in one's heart and how one treats everyone else, that truly matters. We all cry, bleed, love and feel lonely regardless of our race, gender or orientation. We all crave the human touch at some stage in our lives, someone to hold, someone to simply be there for us during our moments of need.

James