I try to remember what it was like when the AIDS epidemic first hit in the early 1980s. It’s true that it took a while to really understand what was happening, how it was transmitted, and what might be done about it. For these reasons, I’ve always been willing to cut the Reagan administration a tiny bit of slack for their slow response. But the thing that has always really bothered me about it is that the Reagans were uniquely positioned to have an early insight into the impact of the disease by virtue of all their connections to the artistic community, particularly in Hollywood. It’s true that Reagan was put in office by a conservative coalition that was, by disposition, unsympathetic to a disease that was associated with homosexuality and promiscuity. But the Reagans themselves were personally touched by the epidemic almost immediately.
Rock Hudson didn’t reach out for their help until 1985 when he was already on death’s door, but by that time the retrovirus had been identified and Hollywood had been grappling with the impact for several years. By March 1984, Joan Rivers, a friend of the Reagans, had already fronted a major fundraiser.
The spin here is that the Reagans didn’t help Rock Hudson get treatment in France because they didn’t want to show favoritism to a friend, but the truth is that they didn’t want to listen to the people they knew who were trying to get them to move on the issue.
Some favoritism would have been preferable to their indifference. And the excuse that no one understood is less available to the Reagans than it would have been to, say, the Bushes.
