Sign up to save your podcasts
Or
Share Older Queer Voices E23 JONATHAN BLAKE - AIDS SURVIVOR
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Or
Older Queer Voices E23 JONATHAN BLAKE - AIDS SURVIVOR
Content Warning
This episode of Older Queer Voices is not just about history. It is about memory, protest, grief, and survival.
Host Raga D'silva is in conversation with Jonathan Blake, one of the first people in the UK to survive an AIDS diagnosis. Diagnosed in 1982 and told he had just months to live, Jonathan’s life became an act of resistance in a time when fear travelled faster than facts and silence was often more deadly than the virus itself.
In this deeply moving conversation, Jonathan shares
• What it meant to receive a diagnosis before HIV even had a name
• Living through isolation, stigma, and the fear of death
• Finding love, community, and purpose in the midst of crisis
• His activism with Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners
• The power of memory through the UK AIDS Memorial Quilt
This is a story of survival, but more importantly, it is a story of defiance, visibility, and the refusal to be erased.
Viewer discretion is advised as this conversation includes themes of illness, grief, and suicide.
Follow us on You Tube https://www.youtube.com/@theviewsroom
Instagram @theviewsroom
View all episodes
By The Views RoomContent Warning
This episode of Older Queer Voices is not just about history. It is about memory, protest, grief, and survival.
Host Raga D'silva is in conversation with Jonathan Blake, one of the first people in the UK to survive an AIDS diagnosis. Diagnosed in 1982 and told he had just months to live, Jonathan’s life became an act of resistance in a time when fear travelled faster than facts and silence was often more deadly than the virus itself.
In this deeply moving conversation, Jonathan shares
• What it meant to receive a diagnosis before HIV even had a name
• Living through isolation, stigma, and the fear of death
• Finding love, community, and purpose in the midst of crisis
• His activism with Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners
• The power of memory through the UK AIDS Memorial Quilt
This is a story of survival, but more importantly, it is a story of defiance, visibility, and the refusal to be erased.
Viewer discretion is advised as this conversation includes themes of illness, grief, and suicide.
Follow us on You Tube https://www.youtube.com/@theviewsroom
Instagram @theviewsroom