"Despite an overall loss in the population in San Francisco in the last five years, we think there has been an absolute gain in gay men," William McFarland, who oversees compiling HIV/AIDS statistics for the city's government, told Reuters. Correlation or coincidence?

A quarter of gay men in San Francisco are HIV+, and the vast majority of those men will die well before they would have otherwise because of the virus they carry. But just in case anyone mistakenly believes that the city by the bay isn't health conscious, rest assured that the board of supervisors voted last week to ban smoking at bus stops and golf courses.

McFarland deems San Francisco "the gayest city in the world." (Jellicle Junkyard, though not a proper city, is certainly way gayer than San Francisco.) Yet, McFarland estimates that 63,577 gay men live in the city, which amounts to about eight percent of all inhabitants. This statistical inconvenience clashes with the claims of gay activists, who, mantra-like, insist that one in ten people is gay. Based on San Francisco's own numbers, it's doubtful that one in ten San Franciscans is gay. If it truly is the "gayest city in the world," then clearly reports of gays constituting ten percent of the population are wildly inflated.

A more important statistic than Alfred Kinsey's "one in ten" is gay San Francisco's "one in four." The first is useful fiction; the latter, tragic reality.

Whatever percentage of the population that gays constitute, in San Francisco or elsewhere, it will certainly dwindle so long as risky behavior persists. More than a quarter-century after AIDS infected our vocabulary, the terrible disease remains a villain that preys primarily upon gay men. AIDS is the biggest homophobe of them all. Even with advances in medicine, San Francisco can't long remain the "gayest city in the world" as HIV stakes its claim on a significant portion of its gay population on a yearly basis. Today, HIV claims 25 percent of the city's gay population. Tomorrow, AIDS will claim nearly 100 percent of that HIV+ 25 percent. These men are brothers, sons, fathers, best friends. They will die. But before they do, San Francisco's board of supervisors will pass numerous resolutions condemning cigarettes.

And the band played on.

Don't you know it's all Reagan's fault

Didn't they have a campaign sometime back urging Gays to use condoms, don't go to the bath houses, avoid all the freewheeling sex parties etc.. Seems that when they were pushing that, new HIV cases dropped. I don't exactly remember. It's been a few years. I have a cousin who lives out there, I'll have to ask him. Of course, let's be pc here. You can ban someone from smoking in public, but you can't tell them how to handle their sex life. C'mon Dan, you know this! I'm trying to protect you here from the pc police!

As a former, historically incorrect, gay poster used to argue unsuccessfully, the reasons for the proliferation of AIDS is that Ronald Reagan would not provide the funding for research and/or the programs to change behaviors that lead to contracting the disease.

What many at risk will not be honest about is the fact that this disease has not only not been wiped out but claims more victims than ever because those at the greatest risk continue to practice the same behavior that started the epidemic in the first place. Plain and simple, a person has a much better chance of getting sick if they continue to have unbridled bareback sex with multiple partners.

This is a disease on two levels: the disease itself and the disease of those who can't control or manage their sexual activities sufficiently to curb the spread of the virus.

This continues to appear to be a case of natural selection.

Is AIDS as deadly as it used to be? I haven't heard of any big names dying of AIDS for a while. Shouldn't Magic Johnson have died 3 times over by now?

I wouldn't call it natural selection, just pure stupidity, which is a human trait regardless of the persons sexual preference.
Drug therapies improve,the topic goes out of the headlines and people go back to fooling themselves that things like that only happen to other people.
The people who I have the most sympathy for are the spouses of cheating husbands or wives who end up contracting it, or the children born to women with it. Those are the only true victims.

Stupidity is a significant compenent of the natural selection process.

What a breath of fresh, commonsense compassion. But there is so much identity politics mindrot in the gay subculture in San Francisco that few, if any, gay organizations would ever consider taking a cue like this from Flynn Files.

Did I say San Francisco? I must admit, of late I've started to refer to it as "Stinky French Crisco". (eeewwwww)