Concerned Women for America - Harvard ‘Gay’ Leader Urges Homosexuals to Lie and Give Blood

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Harvard ‘Gay’ Leader Urges Homosexuals to Lie and Give Blood 10/4/2001

Harvard ‘Gay’ Leader Urges Homosexuals to Lie and Give Blood

“The risk is not so much with the diseases we can test for. It’s for the diseases we don't know about.”
— Professor Dr. F. Blaine Hollinger, explaining why health specialists oppose allowing “gay” men to donate blood

By Robert H. Knight

A Harvard University homosexual leader has urged other homosexuals to lie to the Red Cross about their homosexuality and to donate blood.

The position is reminiscent of radical homosexual activists during the early days of the AIDS epidemic, when they delayed implementation of screening by blood banks, thereby dooming tens of thousands of hemophiliacs and other transfusion recipients.

Since 1985, the Red Cross and other blood collectors have barred homosexual men from donating because of the danger of transmitting the HIV virus, which causes AIDS. Homosexual men also have higher proportions of other blood-borne illnesses, such as Hepatitis A, B and C, and various gastro-intestinal diseases.

Clifford Davidson, leader of Harvard’s BOND (Beyond Our Normal Differences), a student group self-described as “geared toward those who may not be ‘straight,’” sent an email on Tuesday, Sept. 11 — the day of the terrorist attack — encouraging members to donate blood, according to the student newspaper, the Harvard Crimson.

“On the Red Cross’s form, you will be asked: ‘Are you a man who has had sexual contact with another man since 1973?’ This applies to many of you. You should lie,” Clifford S. Davidson (’02) wrote in an e-mail to BOND, according to the Crimson.

Davidson said he wanted members to answer truthfully to the separate Red Cross question about HIV status.

“Since I am sure of my HIV status, I thought I should be able to give along with others in my position,” Davidson said. BOND member Fred Smith, concurred, telling the Crimson, “The [Red Cross] rule is based on homophobic stereotypes. In this case, I don’t think it is unreasonable to ignore it.”

Not everyone shared this view. One BOND member called it “morally reprehensible” and said that as an organization, BOND “should NEVER suggest this.” Another wrote that Davidson “should be embarrassed by [his] behavior, particularly during this time of crisis.”

Davidson found some support, however. One member wrote, “I’ve lied about my sexuality in the past to donate when appropriate and will do so in the future. But I’m also a very responsible, HIV [negative], STD free, monogamous fag.”

The homosexual Web news site PlanetOut reported September 13 that “an estimated 2 to 3 people a year become infected with HIV through blood transfusions.” It quoted Dr. F. Blaine Hollinger, a professor at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston and former chairman to the Food and Drug Administration’s advisory committee on blood donations, as saying that many specialists who favor keeping the FDA’s current policy are worried about other diseases beyond AIDS carried in the blood of homosexual men.

“The risk is not so much with the diseases we can test for. It’s for the diseases we don’t know about,” said Hollinger. “That’s a difficult thing to resolve.” Despite this, PlanetOut reports that Hollinger supports “changing the policy to allow gay men to donate if they hadn't had sex in recent years.”

Last year, the FDA advisory committee voted 7-6 to keep the current policies banning donations by men who have had homosexual sex. The American Red Cross led the effort to maintain the blood safety ban.

Peter LaBarbera contributed to this article.