NY Times (1992) - Magic Johnson's Return to League Isn't Welcomed by Some Due To HIV

[TomCADem]

In light of the comments on this Board regarding Ebola, which echo some of the you never can be too safe rhetoric on Fox News, it reminds me of the hysteria regarding the transmission of AIDS where people both dismissed it as a disease that only affected gay people while also using it as an excuse to shun people gays and folks who carried the HIV virus.

http://www.nytimes.com/1992/11/01/sports/basketball-johnson-s-return-to-league-isn-t-welcomed-by-some.html

Karl Malone, known around the National Basketball Association as the Mailman, delivered a strong message last week, challenging the accepted belief that Magic Johnson has been universally welcomed back to the league even though he has the virus that causes AIDS.

"Look at this, scabs and cuts all over me," Malone, the Utah Jazz All-Star forward, said last Tuesday night in the visitors' locker room at Madison Square Garden before a preseason game against the Knicks.

He pressed a finger to a small, pinkish hole on his thigh that was developing into a scab. "I get these every night, every game," he said. "They can't tell you that you're not at risk, and you can't tell me there's one guy in the N.B.A. who hasn't thought about it."

Gerald Wilkins, the former Knick who is now with the Cleveland Cavaliers, said: "Everybody's talking about it. Some people are scared. This could be dangerous to us all, but you're dealing with Magic Johnson, so people are handling it with white gloves. They're not going to say how they really feel."