Disclaimer: The following blog post is not a reflection of the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s opinion on the below topics.
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP) rattled cities across the United States with passionate demonstrations that emphasized strategic emotional appeal and civil disobedience.[1] The group, which was established by gay and lesbian activists in New York in 1987,[2] worked specifically “to obtain treatment for people with HIV infection.”[3] ACT UP continues to describe itself as a “group of individuals united in anger and committed to direct action to end the AIDS crisis.”[4] The organization’s slogan, “silence=death”, is a powerful message that showcases the group’s recognition of the importance of speaking out in protest to achieve their goals. ACT UP further highlighted the value of direct action at the height of the AIDS epidemic through its engagement with protesters’ and bystanders’ emotions. The movement inspired action by appealing to the public’s sense of sympathy and rage, as well as by uniting protesters in feelings of connection and empowerment.
According to sociologist Abigail Halcli, ACT UP’s organizational work remained “committed in principle to nonviolence.”[5] Their protests, demonstrations, and boycotts targeted the government, the FDA, and pharmaceutical companies who “had the primary responsibility for managing the AIDS epidemic.”[6] This was done not only to showcase the group’s dissatisfaction with the handling of the AIDS crisis but also in hopes of broadening the public’s access to HIV treatments.[7] Moreover, ACT UP utilized teach-ins as a means of disseminating information by educating group members about AIDS and other related issues.[8] They further brought awareness for their cause by passing out informational leaflets and displaying posters in public areas.[9]
From an emotional lens, ACT UP utilized personal connections to facilitate more effective civil disobedience. Organizationally, the group achieved this by breaking into affinity groups of like-minded individuals. ACT-UP created affinity groups for specific genders, geographic locations, and causes of interest. Disaggregating into smaller associations allowed members to get to know each other better and form deeper and more meaningful connections.[11] This created a greater ease through which group members could support each other and, therefore, strengthened the movement. These groups created close-knit communities of people who felt comfortable enough to risk arrest together, give each other emotional encouragement, and help one another not feel as scared when attending a protest.[12] The group’s success relied on the connections formed between the members. ACT UP utilized the emotion created through affinity groups to inspire collective action and make participants feel empowered, supported, and strong enough to go to the streets in protest.
ACT UP appealed to the public’s emotional capacity for anger and sympathy through direct action that employed death. Associate Professor Marika Cifor describes these demonstrations as “‘political funerals,’ actions deploying activists’ bodies, living and dead, to make affectively potent political statements.”[13] ACT UP blamed inaction, as well as homophobic and factually incorrect information, for the deaths of those who were afflicted with AIDS. Therefore, protesters began to stage “die-ins”, a tactic that consisted of participants publicly lying in coffins and faking their deaths.[14] This served to illustrate the dire consequences of the inaction perpetuated by the federal government, the FDA, pharmaceutical companies, and the general public. Death acted as an emotional tool used to appeal to the public’s sense of sympathy and invoke shock at the repercussions of the AIDS epidemic. This tactic was notably utilized during the “Stop the Church” demonstration, where “in order to protest Cardinal O’Conner’s policies against safer sex education, activists staged a die-in at St. Patrick’s Cathedral during Sunday Mass.”[15] During the two-minute-long die-in, participants lay down in the path between the pews while a church service was in session. To further the resonance of their message, protesters began to scream, “you’re murdering us”, effectively disrupting mass.[16]
Eventually, the “die-in” strategy faced a notable escalation. Professor Deborah Gould described ACT UP’s famous Ashes Action as “a shift from actions that deployed representations of death (e.g., mock tombstones and fake coffins) to a funeral procession that was centered around the actual remains of loved ones dead from AIDS-related complications.”[17] The 1992 Ashes Action was an incredibly emotional demonstration in which participants marched as they spoke the names of their loved ones who had died from AIDS, told stories about their lives, and spread their ashes on the White House lawn.[18] Participant David Robinson described the Ashes Action as “return[ing] people to the reality of AIDS. Hundreds of thousands of lives have been reduced to bone and ash, by the ignorance and apathy of the Reagan-Bush administrations. Today, we are depositing this reality on George Bush’s doorstep.”[19] This tragic demonstration worked to incite anger and garner sympathy for the lives of those who had been affected by the AIDS epidemic. It was a shocking reality check for anyone who had refused to acknowledge the severity of this crisis. The Ashes Action also acted as an avenue for emotional catharsis, as protesters could unite in their grief and express their outrage with the government.
Emotion proved to be a resonant tool through which ACT UP made a substantial amount of progress toward receiving treatment for those infected with HIV. The organization utilized emotion in their direct action to garner the public’s sympathy and communicate the importance of their cause. Their passion worked to spark change and increase awareness around the severity of AIDS. ACT UP’s strategic use of emotion in civil disobedience was critical to the success of this impressive movement.
Many thanks to UW-Madison Professor Erica Simmons for her course “Introduction to Contentious Politics”, which shaped my understanding of ACT UP’s work.
[1]Jo Freeman and Victoria Johnson, Waves of Protest: Social Movements since the 1960s (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 1999), 135.
[2]Benita Roth, The Life and Death of ACT UP/LA (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017), 3.
[3]Freeman and Johnson, Waves of Protest, 142.
[4]Jim Hubbard, United in Anger: A History of ACT UP (New York: First Run Features, 2012), 02:51.
[5]Freeman and Johnson, Waves of Protest, 143.
[6]Ibid.
[7]Ibid.
[8]Hubbard, United in Anger, 1:00:00.
[9]Roth, The Life and Death of ACT UP/LA, 4.
[10]A Local Branch of ACT UP from Shreveport, Louisiana, at the National Institutes of Health, 1990, photograph, NIH Record, 1990, https://www.nlm.nih.gov/exhibition/againsttheodds/images/exhibit/OB0134_lg.jpg .
[11]Hubbard, United in Anger, 23:00.
[12]Ibid.
[13]Marika Cifor, Viral Cultures: Activist Archiving in the Age of AIDS (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2022), 41.
[14]Freeman and Johnson, Waves of Protest, 144.
[15]Freeman and Johnson, Waves of Protest, 145.
[16]Hubbard, United in Anger, 39:40.
[17]Deborah B. Gould, “Passionate Political Processes: Bringing Emotions Back into the Study of Social Movements,” in Rethinking Social Movements: Structure, Meaning, and Impact, ed. Jeff Goodwin and James M. Jasper (New York: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2003), 158.
[18]Hubbard, United in Anger, 1:14:00-1:17:00.
[19]Cifor, Viral Cultures, 41.