A Whisper of AIDS 低语艾滋
—— Mary Fisher 玛丽·费舍尔

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• [00:00.07]Less than three months ago
• [00:03.15]at platform hearings in Salt Lake City
• [00:05.99]I asked the Republican Party
• [00:08.21]to lift the shroud of silence
• [00:10.33]which has been draped over the issue of HIV and AIDS
• [00:14.69]I have come tonight
• [00:16.78]to bring our silence to an end.
• [00:19.82]I bear a message of challenge
• [00:23.16]not self-congratulation.
• [00:25.64]I want your attention
• [00:27.47]not your applause.
• [00:30.10]I would never have asked to be HIV-positive.
• [00:33.44]But I believe that in all things
• [00:36.12]there is a purpose,
• [00:38.04]and I stand before you
• [00:39.92]and before the nation, gladly.
• [00:43.00]The reality of AIDS is brutally clear.
• [00:46.69]Two hundred thousand Americans
• [00:48.82]are dead or dying
• [00:51.04]a million more are infected.
• [00:53.89]Worldwide, 40 million, 60 million
• [00:57.82]or a hundred million infections
• [00:59.84]will be counted in the coming few years.
• [01:03.10]But despite science and research
• [01:06.04]White House meetings, and congressional hearings,
• [01:09.17]despite good intentions and bold initiatives
• [01:12.71]campaign slogans, and hopeful promises
• [01:16.10]it is, despite it all, the epidemic
• [01:20.37]which is winning tonight.
• [01:23.31]In the context of an election year,
• [01:26.21]I ask you
• [01:27.67]here, in this great hall,
• [01:30.43]or listening in the quiet of your home
• [01:33.69]to recognize that the AIDS virus
• [01:36.52]is not a political creature.
• [01:38.95]It does not care whether you are Democrat or Republican.
• [01:42.54]It does not ask whether you are black or white,
• [01:46.70]male or female,
• [01:49.13]gay or straight
• [01:51.36]young or old.
• [01:54.56]Tonight
• [01:57.61]I represent an AIDS community
• [02:00.47]whose members have been reluctantly drafted
• [02:03.15]from every segment of American society.
• [02:07.16]Though I am white and a mother,
• [02:10.40]I am one with a black infant struggling with tubes
• [02:14.65]in a Philadelphia hospital.
• [02:17.98]Though I am female
• [02:20.23]and contracted this disease in marriage,
• [02:22.34]and enjoy the warm support of my family,
• [02:25.43]I am one with the lonely gay man
• [02:28.59]sheltering a flickering candle
• [02:30.92]from the cold wind of his family's rejection.
• [02:41.03]This is not a distant threat;
• [02:43.91]it is a present danger.
• [02:46.14]The rate of infection is increasing fastest
• [02:49.22]among women and children.
• [02:51.70]Largely unknown a decade ago
• [02:54.40]AIDS is the third leading killer of young adult Americans today
• [02:59.36]but it won't be third for long.
• [03:01.58]Because, unlike other diseases,
• [03:04.34]this one travels.
• [03:06.86]Adolescents don't give each other cancer
• [03:09.29]or heart disease because they believe they are in love.
• [03:13.49]But HIV is different.
• [03:15.40]And we have helped it along
• [03:17.83]we have killed each other
• [03:19.77]with our ignorance, our prejudice, and our silence.
• [03:25.55]We may take refuge in our stereotypes,
• [03:29.89]but we cannot hide there long.
• [03:33.43]Because HIV asks only one thing of those it attacks
• [03:38.44]Are you human?
• [03:40.52]And this is the right question
• [03:43.15]Are you human?
• [03:46.08]Because people with HIV have not entered some alien state of being.
• [03:50.83]They are human.
• [03:52.70]They have not earned cruelty
• [03:54.89]and they do not deserve meanness.
• [03:57.62]They don't benefit from being isolated or treated as outcasts.
• [04:02.13]Each of them is exactly what God made,
• [04:06.09]a person.
• [04:07.37]Not evil,
• [04:08.65]deserving of our judgment;
• [04:10.62]not victims,
• [04:12.61]longing for our pity.
• [04:14.79]People,
• [04:16.20]ready for support and worthy of compassion.
• [04:30.76]My call to you, my Party,
• [04:33.31]is to take a public stand,
• [04:35.55]no less compassionate than that of the President and Mrs. Bush.
• [04:39.44]They have embraced me and my family in memorable ways.
• [04:43.74]In the place of judgment,
• [04:45.37]they have shown affection.
• [04:47.59]In difficult moments,
• [04:48.82]they have raised our spirits.
• [04:51.19]In the darkest hours,
• [04:53.58]I have seen them reaching not only to me,
• [04:55.80]but also to my parents,
• [04:58.08]armed with that stunning grief
• [04:59.85]and special grace that comes only to parents
• [05:02.94]who have themselves leaned too long
• [05:06.79]over the bedside of a dying child.
• [05:10.90]With the President's leadership,
• [05:13.55]much good has been done.
• [05:15.58]Much of the good has gone unheralded,
• [05:17.70]and as the President has insisted,
• [05:20.44]much remains to be done.
• [05:23.12]But we do the President's cause no good
• [05:26.63]if we praise the American family
• [05:29.45]but ignore a virus that destroys it.
• [05:42.62]We must be consistent if we are to be believed.
• [05:47.13]We cannot love justice
• [05:49.30]and ignore prejudice,
• [05:51.79]love our children and fear to teach them.
• [05:55.79]Whatever our role
• [05:57.57]as parent or policymaker,
• [06:00.35]we must act as eloquently as we speak
• [06:04.40]else we have no integrity.
• [06:10.11]My call to the nation is a plea for awareness.
• [06:14.15]If you believe you are safe,
• [06:16.93]you are in danger.
• [06:19.67]Because I was not hemophiliac,
• [06:22.30]I was not at risk.
• [06:24.43]Because I was not gay,
• [06:26.50]I was not at risk.
• [06:29.35]Because I did not inject drugs,
• [06:31.73]I was not at risk.
• [06:36.18]My father has devoted much of his lifetime
• [06:39.87]guarding against another holocaust.
• [06:43.05]He is part of the generation who heard Pastor Nemoellor
• [06:46.89]come out of the Nazi death camps to say,
• [06:50.13]They came after the Jews,
• [06:51.59]and I was not a Jew,
• [06:53.78]so, I did not protest.
• [06:56.11]They came after the trade unionists,
• [06:58.07]and I was not a trade unionist,
• [07:00.96]so, I did not protest.
• [07:03.26]Then they came after the Roman Catholics,
• [07:05.19]and I was not a Roman Catholic,
• [07:07.93]so, I did not protest.
• [07:11.31]Then they came after me,
• [07:13.19]and there was no one left to protest.
• [07:27.75]The lesson history teaches is this
• [07:30.49]If you believe you are safe,
• [07:32.76]you are at risk.
• [07:34.91]If you do not see this killer stalking your children,
• [07:38.35]look again.
• [07:40.33]There is no family or community,
• [07:43.36]no race or religion, no place left in America that is safe.
• [07:48.88]Until we genuinely embrace this message,
• [07:53.43]we are a nation at risk.
• [07:57.49]Tonight, HIV marches firmly towards
• [08:00.68]AIDS in more than a million American homes,
• [08:03.32]littering its pathway with the bodies of the young
• [08:06.35]young men, young women,
• [08:09.95]young parents, and young children.
• [08:13.64]One of the families is mine.
• [08:17.13]If it is true that HIV inevitably turns to AIDS,
• [08:20.57]then my children will inevitably turn to orphans.
• [08:25.72]My family has been a rock of support.
• [08:29.51]My 84-year-old father,
• [08:31.49]who has pursued the healing of the nations,
• [08:33.86]will not accept the premise
• [08:35.53]that he cannot heal his daughter.
• [08:38.56]My mother refuses to be broken
• [08:40.94]she still calls at midnight to tell wonderful jokes
• [08:44.27]that make me laugh.
• [08:46.55]Sisters and friends, and my brother Philip
• [08:49.44](whose birthday is today)
• [08:51.86]all have helped carry me over the hardest places.
• [08:55.70]I am blessed,
• [08:57.37]richly and deeply blessed, to have such a family.
• [09:03.55]But not all of you
• [09:18.98]But not all of you have been so blessed.
• [09:22.41]You are HIV-positive
• [09:26.05]but dare not say it.
• [09:28.03]You have lost loved ones,
• [09:29.91]but you dared not whisper the word AIDS.
• [09:33.30]You weep silently;
• [09:35.58]you grieve alone.
• [09:38.16]I have a message for you
• [09:40.69]It is not you who should feel shame; it is we.
• [09:45.08]We who tolerate ignorance and practice prejudice,
• [09:49.03]we who have taught you to fear.
• [09:51.76]We must lift our shroud of silence,
• [09:55.44]making it safe for you to reach out for compassion.
• [09:58.83]It is our task
• [10:00.55]to seek safety for our children,
• [10:03.09]not in quiet denial
• [10:05.01]but in effective action.
• [10:08.11]Someday our children will be grown.
• [10:10.90]My son Max, now four,
• [10:13.28]will take the measure of his mother.
• [10:15.66]My son Zachary, now two,
• [10:17.98]will sort through his memories.
• [10:20.97]I may not be here to hear their judgments,
• [10:23.84]but I know already what I hope they are.
• [10:27.59]I want my children to know
• [10:29.82]that their mother was not a victim.
• [10:32.34]She was a messenger.
• [10:34.72]I do not want them to think, as I once did,
• [10:37.56]that courage is the absence of fear.
• [10:40.69]I want them to know
• [10:42.26]that courage is the strength
• [10:44.80]to act wisely when most we are afraid.
• [10:48.60]I want them to have the courage
• [10:50.66]to step forward when called by their nation
• [10:53.82]or their Party and give leadership,
• [10:56.51]no matter what the personal cost.
• [10:59.94]I ask no more of you than I ask of myself
• [11:02.99]or of my children.
• [11:05.82]To the millions of you
• [11:07.71]who are grieving,
• [11:09.48]who are frightened,
• [11:10.96]who have suffered the ravages of AIDS firsthand
• [11:15.34]Have courage and you will find support.
• [11:19.89]To the millions who are strong
• [11:22.42]I issue this plea
• [11:24.49]Set aside prejudice and politics
• [11:27.34]to make room for compassion and sound policy.
• [11:43.47]To my children, I make this pledge
• [11:46.46]I will not give in,
• [11:47.63]Zachary, because I draw my courage from you.
• [11:51.22]Your silly giggle gives me hope
• [11:54.25]your gentle prayers give me strength
• [11:56.88]and you, my child, give me the reason to say to America
• [12:01.17]You are at risk
• [12:04.31]And I will not rest, Max
• [12:06.08]until I have done all I can to make your world safe.
• [12:10.58]I will seek a place
• [12:12.51]where intimacy is not the prelude to suffering.
• [12:16.59]I will not hurry to leave you, my children,
• [12:19.84]but when I go, I pray that
• [12:22.57]you will not suffer shame on my account.
• [12:26.57]To all within the sound of my voice
• [12:29.35]I appeal
• [12:31.07]Learn with me the lessons of history and of grace
• [12:35.32]so my children will not be afraid
• [12:38.15]to say
• [12:39.76]the word AIDS when I am gone
• [12:42.61]Then their children, and yours
• [12:46.41]may not need
• [12:48.10]to whisper it at all
• [12:50.73]God bless the children
• [12:52.55]and God bless us all.
• [12:54.27]Good night.

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